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Leverage, longevity, linkage, language. Leverage, longevity, linkage, language. This sports marketing tongue-twister will guarantee a successful sports sponsorship marketing strategy if repeated daily.
So says Graham Hollins, director of Spine Consulting, a training consultancy with a specialization in sponsorship, who explains that many commonly misunderstand sponsorship.
“It’s a fallacy that many people make that sponsorship is about getting a straightforward exchange of money for signage or some form of visibility,” says Hollins. “Unlike advertising – where messages are communicated in a more two-dimensional way – sponsorship has the opportunity to provide an experience and to be very interactive.”
So how can brands use sports to create an experience for their audiences and interact on a level that’ll leave a lasting impression? Christian Fedorczuk, strategy director at OMD, says there are “a thousand different ways to connect audiences,” depending on the sport, but that there are three essential pillars that hold up a successful interaction. “First, we require a clear strategy and long-term commitment to a sport,” says Fedorczuk. “The second thing is, we try to provide a benefit for the fan, and not just stick a logo somewhere. The third thing is that the brand, the sport, and the audience should work together.”
“Red Bull is the best example of that,” he continues. “Their product energizes you, they create events like the Flugtag, and they go after thrill-seeking youths. So it works really, really well.”
Donal Kilalea, chief executive and executive vice president of Promoseven Sports Marketing, says the sports arena is the one that all brands can get involved with, because of its reach. “Every person is a sports person,” says Kilalea. “Whether it’s playing tiddlywinks or long distance running, it’s the one thing that unites us all.” Regionally, Kilalea says the sports field has grown fast over the past six years, giving a big boost to the sports marketing industry.

SPORTS STARS. Fedorczuk says that, while the sports marketing discipline is very young regionally, a number of brands have taken on the challenge and succeeded in establishing lasting partnerships.
“There’s one brand that stands out for me, and that’s Emirates,” he says. “They’ve got a clear, long-term, global strategy and a clear, long-term commitment. With football they sponsor Arsenal, Hamburg, and other clubs, and they sponsor rugby, and other sports relevant to their destinations.”
He says another regional and global brand is Pepsi. “They combine the emotional benefit of sports marketing with their commercial goal,” explain Fedorczuk. “They have talent searches, local activities in the market, branded content, testimonials in advertising, Facebook groups, media sponsorships of leagues and the World Cup. It’s one of the few brands that have the financial ability to do all that.”
Bashar Abdulkarim, managing director of Relay, recalls a time when brands in the region were inactive in terms of sports marketing. But times have changed, he says, particularly in the past five years. “I remember in the late nineties, brands like Snickers or Mars never used to do activities,” he says. “But they started investing in grassroots activities around 2005 with football events around the region, and then expanded into different markets, and invested in their brand identity. Snickers organized three on three football games for example, and their brand identity was very edgy and underground.”
Kilalea also cites Emirates as a brand that has identified the right sports to fit the company ethos, but says that all brands are able to align themselves with sports.
“In terms of local sports, Etisalat has been the headline sponsor for the football league,” he says. “I can understand the association, as football is the most popular sport in the UAE, so they reach their target.”
And many other regional brands have started realizing the potential of sports marketing and sponsorship, Kilalea says, and have worked hard at making their brand ethos fit with sports. “Sports marketing and sponsorship is an effective medium, and it cuts through the clutter,” he explains. “Above-the-line media is now extremely fragmented, but with sports you’re cutting through that.”

OWN GOAL. Abdulkarim says that, while the popularity of football in the region provides the obvious opportunity for brands looking to capitalize on sports marketing, that very popularity also proves a problem. “When we discuss sports in the region, usually 80 percent of the activity falls into football, because the main interest of target groups here is football,” he says. “The lack of interest in other sports in the region makes sport marketing limited; it makes football cluttered. Chevrolet used to be known as one of the key supporters of the game along with Pepsi, but then three years ago they realized they should pull out because it was a cluttered field and was not giving them return on objectives. When you have interest in athletics or basketball for example, you can maneuver with different ideas and different kinds of activation.”
Fedorczuk believes that, in spite the cluttered field, a lot of brands are trying to get into football, though the effort is often lackluster. “They’re doing it halfheartedly,” he says. “They put up boards in stadiums, but there’s hardly any brand that has a really coherent strategy.
“The opportunities for ready-made solutions to invest in are limited as football is the only sport that’s really accepted regionally,” he continues. “ You can invest in [another] sport and totally own it, but with football it takes a long-term commitment. … The most successful partnerships are brands that have been involved with sports for decades. Brands need to do that here.”
With the sports marketing industry being so young in the region, Abdulkarim says that brands are still hesitant to put their budgets towards sports activation and sponsorship. “They feel more secure with media like television, or PR activity,” he says. “The main reason they feel that way is because of the measurement aspect; the data provided is return on objectives (ROO) rather than return on investment (ROI). The market doesn’t offer the data specific to ROI for [sports] activation yet.”
Leverage, longevity, linkage, language. Hollins stresses the importance of the four L’s, especially in an emerging market such as the Middle East. He is confident about the continuing prospects of the discipline in the region.
“I think there’s enormous potential, as there’s a clear interest in both sport and sponsorship, at grassroots and consumer level, and at a commercial level,” he says. “It’s a nascent market, but overall it’s in good health.”

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