The issue of what represents the best buy in sports marketing elicited diverse points of view at a New York City sports sponsorship conference this week, but panelists did agree that occupying the space behind home plate at a baseball stadium or behind the backboard on a basketball court is prime marketing territory.
“We love it when there’s a fight in front of that sign,” said Don Dixon, Autotrader.com senior director of local marketing, sponsorships and promotion, referring to Major League Baseball’s recurrent bench-clearing brawls over batters hit by pitches or tiffs between catchers and base runners. Those scenes of faux fisticuffs naturally have behind-the-plate signage as backdrops—and invariably see plenty of replays on sports news shows.
The discussion about the best spend in sport took place during Sports Business Journal’s Sports Sponsorship Symposium.
Those signage deals are frequently one element in an integrated marketing package an advertiser strikes with a baseball team.
“A lot of those signage deals are not just stadium signage. They’re part of larger deals with local clubs,” said Tom McGovern, executive vice president of OMG Sports Entertainment.
Smaller sports properties, such as the Ladies Professional Golf Association Tour, can be easier to deal with than larger properties. The LPGA typically includes its star players in marketing deals, he said. But McGovern noted that a smaller franchise may not serve the purposes of a big brand.
“It’s about who can provide you access with a platform that answer your needs,” he said.
MLB and NASCAR have worked well for Holiday Inn, according to Wayne Hamilton, Holiday Inn director of brand marketing, who said the company also looks for “the right mix of media” between traditional media and the Web to hit its target audience. Consumer response to Holiday Inn’s “Everyday Heroes” online contest is strong, and 25% of all its bookings are now transacted online.
“The best buys that we see are those that consider the buyer’s targets,” Eric Johnson, ESPN executive vice president of multimedia sales. “For us, a lot of it is in the intrigue around the game.”
ESPN’s game countdown shows that precede MLB and National Football League games help build audience interest and also drive SportsCenter viewing hours before game time, he said. And although people will watch the screen nearest to them when a big game is on, television consumption is growing along with other media.
Apart from the signage behind home plate, Autotrader.com sees its baseball sponsorship as a prime entry point to “try to create inside-the-ropes experiences for [auto] dealers,” Dixon said. Back to signage, Dixon said Autotrader.com’s single heaviest traffic day occurred when its signage was the backdrop for a backboard during a National Basketball Association playoff game.
State Farm has a diversified strategy with large properties including MLB, the NBA, and smaller properties including the National Hockey League – the also-ran among major sports leagues – and the LPGA.
“When we have the kind of presence we have, it makes us the top player in the marketplace,” said Mark Gibson, State Farm assistant vice president of marketing communications, who noted that the company recently exceeded the 42 million mark in auto insurance policies.
Gibson pointed to State Farm’s title sponsorship of the annual MLB Home Run Derby as an ideal property because there’s no competition from other sports in its mid-July primetime time frame on ESPN. And State Farm executes ancillary activations around it, with street teams prowling New York City before this year’s slugfest at Yankee Stadium.
Home Run Derby footage is prime fodder for sports fans the morning after, and Johnson’s ESPN said the network still sees most video usage in what he called “snackable content” of several minutes’ duration, with the busiest snack times around 9 a.m., when people arrive at offices, and shortly after 5, when people are getting home.
In the case of the recently concluded Beijing Summer Olympics, McGovern noted that the record-setting video streams that NBC served up online were still only there to serve a larger purpose: bringing a big audience to the bigger TV screens.
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