As SponsorPitch introduces a new and improved platform this week, it seemed appropriate to look into the whole concept of information sharing in the sponsorship marketplace. After thinking about it, is there another industry that is less open with information? OK, I’ll give you the National Football League, and the Central Intelligence Agency, and maybe KFC’s guarding of the Colonel’s Secret Recipe, but after that?
Let’s face it. There are no standard techniques for leveraging sponsorship assets or quantifying results from sponsorship investments. In fact, the hottest topic in sponsorship is universally “how do I measure it?” Perhaps not surprisingly, a veteran marketer on the brand side even suggested that the reason there is so much secrecy is precisely because there are so few...

Last week’s column topic was about how Wal-Mart and other large retailers are commanding vendor brand marketing budgets in the same proportions those brands sell of their total sales through retailers. Since this action reduces the amount of dollars a brand has influence over spending, it logically follows that brand marketers will have fewer dollars to earmark toward sponsorship marketing initiatives. They will need their partners to make those decisions on their behalf.

After seeing the post, a veteran of Wal-Mart chimed in with an interesting perspective, suggesting Wal-Mart is just being smart. But she also added in her comments that Wal-Mart doesn’t “blow money on sponsorships.” This was an interesting choice of words. Does Wal-Mart really believe sponsorship investments a...

When Wal-Mart acts, we had better pay attention (for those of you too young to know E.F. Hutton: click here). Given the fact the majority of brands involved in sponsorship sell at Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer’s latest move warrants some attention.
As Ad Age reported this week, Wal-Mart is now requiring brands to pony up marketing, media, and promotional budgets to the big dog in the retail kennel, in the same proportion that it sells those brands versus their overall sales. As The Ad Age piece sites, since Wal-Mart is responsible for upward of 30% of all P&G’s sales, P&G will have to fork over north of $1 Billion to Wal-Mart to be held in good standing and be prominently featured in Wal-Mart stores and advertising. Wal-Mart will then take those dollars and pay for its o...

By now most people are familiar with crowd sourcing and/or have heard of or read "The Wisdom of Crowds" by James Surowiecki. As an advocate for crowd-based decision-making, the book sang to me. It seemed to validate a lot of my suspicions, and frankly, my company Fantell is predicated on the notion that crowds are more accurate than individuals.
I had never really thought about crowd wisdom in the context of sponsorship marketing. Then, this past week I received an email from my Congressman that got me thinking. Basically, Rep. Mike Honda solicited mock-ups for a re-design of his website, and instead of choosing the design he wanted, he asked his constituents to vote on the design they wanted.

Not only did the crowd develop the concepts, the crowd made the choice. Knowing ho...

In 1998 when working as an AAE at FCB Sports in San Francisco, I got a call from a guy interested in pitching sponsorship of a college basketball event called the “Pete Newell Challenge” to our client, PowerBar. It was one of the best calls I ever had in that job, as it introduced me to Andy Dallin.

A sports and sponsorship marketing veteran on both the corporate and property side, Andy is one of the most talented people I have encountered in the sponsorship business. After many years working for teams and agencies, in 2002 he joined with partner Dave Almy and formed ADC Partners to work together and implement sponsorships their way. Impressive in his own right, Dave authored one of the most concise presentations of the differences between sponsorship, cause marketing, and charity...

"There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things. For the reformer has enemies in all those who profit by the old order, and only lukewarm defenders in all those who would profit by the new order, this “lukewarm-ness” arising partly from fear of their adversaries and partly from the incredulity of mankind, who do not truly believe in anything new until they have had actual experience of it."

-Niccolo Machiavelli (1469 – 1527)

In the summer of 2008 I began discussing building an online fan engagement application for a Fortune 500 company. The objective was to help activate a sponsorship of a major NCAA member institution with modern technology. T...

OK, my 10-6 ideas of the Top 10 issues in sponsorship marketing didn’t illicit many comments on the blog. Fear not. I can report that I did talk to and get direct comments from several people about my list that pretty much validated it. My biggest takeaway: there is great passion for this business. No doubt about it.

The good news is I did get some new ideas I wasn’t thinking of necessarily contemplating for issues five to one of my list. So without further adieu, here are five more topics in the Top 10 issues in sponsorship marketing.

5. Valuation

Doing a proper valuation is time well spent. It’s difficult to be in a position to build a partner’s business when you don’t know all the available assets you have to sell. Standard valuation methods, like those from IEG, pro...

We need to get some dialogue going on what we think is important in our business, as a community of professionals. We’ve got properties, agencies of properties, corporate brand sponsors, agencies of sponsors. We’ve got consultants that serve both sides, reporters, service providers, industry associations, and academics. We’ve got major professional sports properties and very local small ones. We’ve got fortune 100 companies and small businesses. We’ve even got consumer sponsorship and B2B sponsorship. Everyone in these constituent groups has his/her own ideas and perspectives. And each one deserves to be heard.

The goal is to have this space be where you go to hear different viewpoints, challenge conventional thinking and make your case for what you think is and isn’t impor...

When one person’s sponsorship is another person’s charity, there is bound to be miscommunication. When one person’s advertising is another person’s sponsorship, there is bound to be miscommunication. When one person’s cause marketing is another person’s charity, and another person’s sponsorship, there is bound to be miscommunication.

In order for a market to operate effectively, its participants must use the same language and understand it by common definitions. It also helps to have price transparency, or the ability to see what other people are paying for things. The more information a market has, the better it functions for all.
Think of rowing as a metaphor for a market. When a team rows in sync it goes ahead smoothly. When a team is out of rhythm it experiences hitches ...