SPORTENTIAL – Potential in Sports

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Each sport property also has a unique set of exploitable sponsorship components to offer prospective sponsors. This brings to focus one of the basic theoretical changes in marketing with the last 25 years.

The move from a product orientation (Sell what you make) or a Market Orientation (Make what will sell). Clearly this must function in the area of sponsorship as well.
My 1998 research with the top 50 sponsors in the US indicated that too often, sport properties were trying to sell their inventory rather than looking to meet sponsor needs.
Thus, the Filter Component of the Model is the inventory which the Sport Property has to offer through which the sponsor objectives may be met. Certainly alternative marketing opportunities, other than sport sponsorship, will be considered by the sponsor as well.

The flow of objectives through the filter will yield the Activated Components
Activated Components
These would naturally vary depending on the sponsors and the property.
Give the unique nature of each sponsor, customized proposals and tailored sponsor benefits must be constructed.

Evaluation Protocol
Previous research by Irwin and Sutton presented and empirically test criteria utilized by corporations to select appropriate sponsorship opportunities. However, they did not address evaluation. According to the principles set forth in exchange theory, in order to justify continued spending on sport sponsorships, corporations must ascertain if their benefits support their expenditures
An evaluation model for sponsors based on this scheme has yet to evolve. This evaluation model must be based on the ideas presented thus far wherein the most appropriate measure of effectiveness emanate, not from what the sponsorship accomplished, but from whether the specific marketing objectives of the corporation were met.

So What are these measures of ROI?
What is the relative measure of effectiveness of sport sponsorship?

Key performance indicators must be established and an evaluation protocol developed for each performance indicator.

Because of the complexity, most corporations have not engaged in measuring sponsorship effectiveness. Some have accepted data and reports from sponsored properties that attempted to measure what the sponsorship accomplished, with little regard to the sponsor’s objectives.

Therefore, specific and authentic measure related to each objective must be undertaken. As noted in the Model, these could include:

• recognition and recall measure,
• Qualitative interviews,
• employee morale measure within the sponsor company.
• Consumer-based focus groups
• sales data collected pre and post event.

These are supported in the literature, yet all too often not in practice.

There have been sporadic measures as illustrated by the following
1. During the 2002 Olympics, Samsung conducted recognition and recall measures in 10 different markets around the world.
2. Qualitative interviews again, after the Olympics, VISA asked consumers about their sue of the VISA card. 65% of all consumers interviewed (18 and over with annual income of over $20,000) were aware of VISA sponsorship of the Olympics. 20% of those indicade that they used their VISA card more in the last month than they had the month prior to the Games.
3. NASCAR has been famous for consumer-based focus groups. Data has been widely reported that indicate that consumers are positively influenced in their purchasing by a sponsors’ participation in NASCAR sponsorship. Similarly, Pitts found that the participants of the Gay Games were incredibly loyal to the sponsors.
4. Sales data are also important measures related to corporate objectives. Coke’s research during the 2002 Olympic Games found that first quarter sales increased in the US, Japan, Mexico, and Germany more than 5%.
While these present just a few examples, the general opinion is that no systematic protocol or model has been presented which provides a comprehensive over view of how theory can shape current proactive.

Hopefully this model can be utilized to bridge the gap between theory and practice in sport sponsorship. Those who propose theory without a connection to practice are as misguided as practitioners who disregard theoretical underpinnings.

David K. Stotlar
University of Northern Colorado
david.stotlar@unco.edu

QUALITY

Since the last thirty years there is a strong expansion on the sport- and leisure market, with new distribution and communication channels, all reasons for more attention for quality in sport. The sport market was penetrated with a variety of new sports like fitness, aerobics, steps, tae bo, skateboarding, snowboarding etc. All these innovations were initiated and organized by commercial organizations, which used other formulas than the traditional sport associations. They were led by managers, with commercial backgrounds. Different management techniques, like quality management and marketing were introduced in the sport sector. People tend to use the word “quality” a lot, but with different meanings, like with the words “professionalization” and “efficiency”.
Quality is being used generally, which automatically results in a lack of content until it is being related to a performance. And when the relation is there, it will be obvious that the classification of quality is very subjective and related to a certain time. For example: Twenty years ago the pollution of cars were not related to the quality of the car, as the environmental pollution was not on the (political) agenda. Nowadays the pollution of a car is a quality criterion.

Robinson (2004) mentions that different quality gurus have their own definition, approach and standards for quality. But they have argued that the principles of quality management are the way forward to ensure organizational success.

The Olympic Committee of the Netherlands (NOC*NSF; 1999) defines professionalization in sport organizations as a process where three aspects are considered important:

1) paid labor: The honorarium (for a 40 hour workweek) should be at least equivalent to the official minimum wage

2) general acceptance of regulations, education and qualifications. The development of these aspects will result in a standardization of the different functions in sports

3) increase of quality of work/ performance.The increase of the quality of work is of influence on different dimensions within an organization like the product or the process within an organization.

So what is quality in sports?

Lucassen and Van Bottenburg (2004, Chapter 5) define four different quality dimensions:
1. Product orientated (internal)→ this was developed in the industrial sector. The final
products were being analyzed if they complied with product specifications, developed by technicians.
2. Process orientated (internal)→ A next step of the product orientated dimension was to control the whole production process. Deficiencies of the product were caused during the production process. Therefore one should have more attention to the process than just the product. The International Standard Organization (ISO) paid a lot of attention to this. The ISO quality system says more about quality of the company and its employees, than the product itself.
3. User orientated (external)→this dimension focuses on the users, as being decisive whether a product has quality or not. The Service Quality Model (SERVQUAL) prioritizes the user’s expectations of a product. Quality becomes a more subjective aspect.
4. Society orientated (external)→Since the last years of the twentieth century there is more attention for societal responsibility of organizations.

Next to the commercial activities which result in more profit, organizations have activities for people and the environment. This is more and more expected from the society.

Indicator of professionalization: All four dimensions of quality are indicators of professionalization. In the case of sport organizations, the product is their specific sport, which they are statutory obliged to develop (produce) on the continental level. Upgrading of the board and the development of a strategic plan will benefit the control on the “production process”. The users are the members of the sports organizations, like athletes and officials. They will decide if the product is up to par, or not. Sport organizations become more and more society orientated. Cases of corruption and doping have tremendous negative influence on the sport and it’s responsible sport organizations.
So we can speak of “integral quality” if there is attention for all four quality dimensions.

This article is part of the thesis written by Remco Tevreden, as part of the international program MEMOS (Executive Masters in Sports Organisation Management).