Relationships in sport sponsorship : a marketing perspective

D.Phil. (Sports Management)Despite the large amounts of money spent on sponsorships and per implication sport sponsorship, little research is available concerning sponsorship practices in South Africa. There is thus a need for a research study or project to establish how corporate sponsors and sport organisations manage relationship marketing within sponsorships. Literature shows that there is a need to understand the various relationships in sport sponsorships, in order to be able to establish and maintain long-term successful sponsorship agreements. Most international as well as local research on the subject, focused on the establishing of the sponsorship objectives (Abratt & Grobler, 1989; Mattheus, 1996; Polonsky, Sandler, Casey, Murphy, Portelli & Van Velzen, 1996 and Spence, Abratt & Mattheus, 1997). Although this gap is prevalent in the broader field of sponsorships, the focus of this study is on the maintaining and enhancing of the sponsorship relationship between a corporate sponsoring organisation (the sponsor) and sport federations (the sponsoree). The primary objective of this study is to develop a framework from a marketing perspective that could guide the establishment and enhancment of relationships in sport sponsorships in South Africa between a sponsor and a sponsoree. The following sub objectives were formulated to help achieve the primary objective of the study: - Identify, describe, analyze and contextualize the relationships within sport sponsorships. - Investigate, describe and argue the theoretical framework of marketing and the positioning of relationships therein. - Compare the theoretical framework of relationships in sport sponsorship with the current practices within the South African context. For the purpose of this study, the respondents have been divided into two categories. The first category is corporate organisations in South Africa involved with sport sponsorships (that is corporate organisations sponsoring sport). The second category is the sport organisations in South Africa (sport codes) that receive sponsorship money. The first phase of the study involved an intensive study of the available literature on the subject, involving local as well as international resources. This provided the academic as well as the theoretical basis for this study. The second phase of the study focused on the empirical research of the study. During the empirical research phase, a questionnaire was developed in order to determine the primary and secondary objectives of the study. The growth in sponsorships illustrates its popularity as a marketing communication element to be applied by organisations. All indicators are that sport sponsorships will continue to play a major role in the marketing communication of organisations. It is therefore important that marketers understand the role of sport sponsorships within marketing. Corporate organisations view the sponsorship relationships as an activity that will benefit both the corporate organisations, as well as the sport federations. This implies that such a relationship already exists. Sport federations on the other hand rank the development of such a relationship as a priority, implying that they are of the opinion that such a relationship does not exist at this point. The two target groups ranked the reasons (or intentions) to become involved in sponsorships somewhat differently. For the respondents of the corporate organisations, the development of the corporate image is the most important goal. The respondents from the sport federations are of the opinion that the most important goal for corporate organisations to get involved with sponsorships lies in the fact that sponsorships have the ability to generate some free publicity for the organisation. The respondents of the two target groups viewed the different factors that might have an influence on the sponsorship decision-making differently. Respondents from corporate organisations viewed the ability to get their organisation involved in the community as the element that had the greatest influence on their decision-making process while the respondents from the sport federations on the other hand saw the coverage that a sporting event would get, as the element that would have the biggest impact on the decision making process. Trust was viewed by both the corporate organisation as well as the sport federations as an important element in the forming and establishment of relationship marketing within sport sponsorships. In the establishment of relationships within sport sponsorships, the conclusion can be drawn that the concept of loyalty has a very strong influence, since the respondents from both target groups viewed it as such. The same conclusion can be drawn concerning the development of bonds in sport sponsorship relationships. After comparing the views of the two target groups concerning the role of empathy in sport sponsorship relationship, it was found that each group had a different view of its importance. The respondents from the corporate organsiations saw it as very important while the respondent