Sponsorship has developed so much more than a t-shirt badging exercise, where advertisers now activate the sponsorship through making brands engage with their consumers in a helpful and entertaining way - it is all about creating an experience around the brand and the game.
So what is so attractive about Rugby Sponsorship for brands? It firstly taps into an audience which are usually hard to target, rugby reaches a wide affluent audience - 63% of which are ABC1, compared to the 55% in Football. It is an emotional sport, you get fans when they are at their most engaged and arguably their most receptive - allowing brands to tie in with those passionate feelings. Rugby also has a large fan base, both in-stadium and at homes around the world. Rugby fans are typically fans of the game before they are the teams – allowing for more cut-through to focus on the support of the game rather than just the teams themselves.
Rugby sponsorship can take many forms as brands can sponsor; a team (e.g O2 for England), an athlete (e.g Jonny Wilkinson for Jaguar), a tournament (e.g Heineken Cup) and a League (E.g Aviva Premiership) - based on the budget you have, the relevancy of your brands and what you want your brand to be associated with. In terms of what brands can get out of it - you get high brand awareness from putting your brand and product into the public domain, you get brand affinity - where brand names are synonomous with rugby concepts and brand association - where your brand values are represented by the values of the game, i.e rugby is seen as passionate, brave and adventurous. Additionally, it allows brands to form a deeper relationship with their existing clients, staff and potential consumers through engaging them with content specific to them.
Sponsorship is also perfect breeding ground for some good (and bad) PR. Brand ambassadors act as a good source of PR - it gets them and others to back your brand by engaging consumers on their level. If your brand ambassador is a popular and trusted figure within society, then those values will transfer to the brand, encouraging people to buy the product/service based on those values. However, getting people/teams etc to represent your brand can be a risky business as you rely on other people to ensure the image of your brand remains positive - the famous 'bloodgate scandal' had a rugby team member put fake blood in his mouth to encourage what would have been an illegal substitution. This caused havoc in the rugby world as pictures of his bloodied shirt, sporting the airlines brand 'Etihad', stormed press headlines. This automatically links Etihad to 'bad play' with a lot of negative PR - however, Etihad supported the club throughout and even renewed their sponsorship with them, which begs to think that maybe negative PR is not that bad after all?
Social platforms are another great way to activate a sponsorship by getting people to talk about your brand and the game. Aviva Premiership and Heineken cup have branded Twitter and Facebook pages, reaffirming brand association with the games. Social platforms are brilliant for sharing rugby content, which are usually viewed well after the games have finished. YouTube is a perfect platform for this as highlights and game plays can be accessed through brand channels or user generated videos. An example of a successful rugby video is the New Zealand and Tonga Haka which got 9.1 million views and still counting! This is a perfect environment for brands as they continue to be associated with rugby whilst obtaining lots of media value.
O2 for the England Rugby Team is a perfect example of how sponsorships can be activated effectively by ensuring consumers have an 'experience' with the brand. O2 have; 'Priority moments' where customers can get get access to other areas, win food/drinks at the stadium, and chances to win home match tickets; 'O2 Scrum on the beach' which is an opportunity for people to go and play rugby on the beach and meet England players based on their ethos of 'making rugby accessible to everyone'; 'O2 inside line' is video content of 20 episodes to see exclusive player interviews, player cam, match analysis and predictions; 'O2 touch' is the setting-up of community clubs of touch rugby and helping local people get involved - the website allows you to find the nearest club, how the game works, when they are on, who else is doing it etc… which shows they are really trying to get people into the game. They also have 'The O2 blue room' in Twickenham stadium which is based on the mantra that the experience goes beyond just watching an 80 minute game but playing on the fact that it is a whole day-out with friends - it gives O2 customers the chance to get a free beer, pie and to meet players within the comfort of the O2 tent. This focus on consumer engagement inside and outside the stadium allows to target all rugby fans and heighten their experience with the game and the brand - the activation will help O2 associate themselves with consumers who are passionate for the game whilst trying to get others involved and enjoying it too. O2 have also just renewed their sponsorship deal which will see them into the world cup 2015, a great opportunity to really get their teeth into activating an awesome sponsorship!
Rugby Sponsorship is essentially all about creating an experience around the game using your brand as a method of communicating this. When considering sponsorship, brand values must transfer and must fit together naturally with the game, atmosphere and people - otherwise, consumers just won't understand the connection and could create a negative bounce back. Finally, sponsorship must be activated effectively and used to it's maximum potential using all resources at your disposal - otherwise, just activating a badging exercise will not only be a waste of money but a complete waste of effort as people just won't care.
