| AT ISSUE Preparing beneficial post-sponsorship fulfillment reports |
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| TAKEAWAY Recaps must be detailed, user-friendly and reflect sponsor priorities. |
IEG Sponsorship Report
October 6, 2008
Raising The Bar On Sponsorship Fulfillment Reports
As sponsors and properties have grown more sophisticated in their approach to the medium, many of the essential elements of sponsorship, from the sales process to negotiating strategies to valuation to benefits, have undergone major changes to meet demands.
That includes post-sponsorship recaps, which not that long ago were not even considered essential. Today they are an expected deliverable, and the type of information they need to contain must go beyond an overview of an event and directly relate to helping corporate partners determine their return.
“You should not be in this business if you don’t do them. They are as important as the contract or the event itself,” said Kathy Emery, president of The Sponsor Placement Co., a sales agency that represents Taste of Minnesota, Detroit’s Comerica Cityfest and other civic festivals.
Especially in tough economic times, properties that don’t produce reports, or provide only superficial summaries, are at risk of losing their sponsors.
“There is a lot of pressure on corporate budgets. If you are not offering post-event sponsorship reports, you are opening yourself up to being replaced by a property that is,” said Kyle Caddell, director of sponsor sales and services with the NFL Carolina Panthers.
To be sure, properly crafted fulfillment reports are highly valued by sponsors in both good times and bad. According to the 2008 IEG/Performance Research Sponsorship Decision-makers Survey, post-event reports are ranked as the most important service provided by a property, valued more highly than research on sponsor recall and loyalty, among other services.
Connect The Dots
Where once a simple summary of what took place at an event and a review of media coverage may have sufficed as a sponsorship report, sponsors say they now need more information that demonstrates how the sponsorship helped meet their objectives.
“Properties can add value to their partnerships by providing recap reports that are less about what the organization accomplished and more about what it did to help a company meet their sponsorship objectives,” said Constance Mosher, sponsorships and events manager for Wells Fargo & Co.’s Minnesota marketing territory.
“A property must do a good job understanding a sponsor’s objectives at the beginning of the relationship, and then tie that back to the recap report.”
One way to ensure delivery of valuable data is to include information that only the property has,such as response rates to a sponsor-related email promotion sent out to the organization’s database.
“A property might not share the database with us, and we understand that, but it’s very helpful if it can share click-through rates, or how our campaign performs versus other campaigns,” said Tim McGhee, director of corporate sponsorships with AT&T, Inc.
“That allows us to determine the effectiveness of the program.”
AT&T and other sponsors see a great need for properties to put documentation in context.
For example, in addition to reporting and showing that a sponsor received four signs, a report should include information on the number of people exposed to the signs and how that number compared to other available exposure opportunities.
Asked where else AT&T sees room for improvement in fulfillment reports, McGhee pointed to the level of detail.
“Tell us more rather than less. We may not go through an entire 100-page report the first time through, but we will go back and review the document when we are planning for our next cycle.”
Another important piece of advice many sponsors have for properties: play the role of a consultant and provide objective analysis of the sponsor’s involvement.
This positions the property as a strategic partner and not just a recipient of funding.
Such an analysis should include a candid review of the sponsor’s and property’s performance and recommendations on how the sponsor can improve its return by tweaking activation efforts, or adding or subtracting benefits.
When reviewing reports, McGhee said he looks for insights from the sponsored organizations based on historical perspective, their work with other sponsors, and additional knowledge they have regarding their audience and other stakeholders.
“We always come up with our own key learnings, but it’s very helpful when a property gives us its take,” he said.
To be viewed as a trusted advisor, properties must be honest about their own shortcomings, including explaining what happened and offering ideas on how to overcome those challenges going forward.
Sometimes, a factual explanation is all that is necessary. “Attendance may be low due to weather or something else,” McGhee said. “People realize some things will be outside the property’s control–you don’t have to make excuses.”
Properties also can use reports to demonstrate where and how they went beyond the terms of a contract, as long as it is done in an objective manner.
“Fulfillment reports clearly show what we delivered versus what we promised, and how we overdelivered,” said Stacey Halpin, sponsorship manager with West Palm Beach, Fla.’s SunFest music festival.
Potential Impact Of Quality Reports
Beyond documenting results for a property’s sponsorship contact, fulfillment reports serve additional and important purposes.
Most importantly, rightsholders use their recaps as a natural launching point for renewal discussions.
In addition, the documentation is an important tool to share with others at the sponsoring company, from senior-level executives to those responsible for on-the-ground execution to personnel who are unfamiliar or not directly involved with the sponsorship.
“There are so many changes in leadership at companies right now,” Halpin noted. “I can use postevent fulfillment reports to show them what my event is all about and what they have gotten out
of it.”
Emery shares post-event reports with her primary contacts, as well as with local company reps that also are involved in the sponsorship. “It helps to get everyone’s buy-in,” she said.
It is important that a report contain an executive summary so company execs and staff can easily see the key takeaways without combing through pages of data.
Typically, executive summaries are one to two pages that highlight key deliverables and include a short interpretation of the data, as well as recommendations on improving the partnership.
Outside of the companies they are intended for, fulfillment reports–scrubbed of any proprietary or sensitive information–also can show potential sponsors what they can expect in terms of benefits and servicing.
“It’s an excellent sales tool. It gives someone a clear indicator of what they will receive as one of our sponsors,” Halpin said.
Gather Information Continuously
To ensure all necessary information is compiled, properties should establish a system to collect data.
That often entails enlisting the help of the organization’s PR, IT and other departments that come in contact with sponsorship.
For example, a property’s PR staff may be responsible for tracking media exposure, while the IT department will be able to report the number of visitors to a sponsor-related area of the property’s Web site.
SunFest uses an internal checklist that outlines all of the benefits promised to each sponsor to make sure it highlights and recaps all of the promised deliverables.
The festival enlists the aid of volunteer photographers to capture visuals of each sponsor’s on-site presence.
“When I’m putting together a post-event report for Washington Mutual, I know that I’ll have pictures of their stage and their meet-and-greet,” Halpin said.
While compiling data can be a challenge for any property, it is compounded for those that encompass multiple locations or involve affiliated organizations such as local chapters of a national cause.
In those cases, the person responsible for servicing sponsors should develop an Intranet or other turnkey system so that its local representatives can easily gather and report information.
Reports tied to events should be delivered within 30 to 45 days after the event while the sponsorship is still top of mind with the sponsor.
Whether or not the report is delivered personally, the property should schedule a meeting or phone call to discuss the findings and next steps, which could include renewal if the sponsor’s contract is ending, or changes to the program if it is mid term.
Format Options Multiply
While fulfillment reports started out as printed documents, technology has created new opportunities for producing them in the formats that will be most convenient and useful for individual sponsors.
“The days of three-ring binders are long gone; you can put information on a CD or a DVD, and it’s all there in one fell swoop,” said independent marketing consultant Doug Pirnie, a former IMG executive.
The majority of sponsors contacted by IEG SR were partial to electronic formats, due in large part to the ease in which the documents can be shared with colleagues.
“I prefer post-event reports electronically,” Mosher said. “Books are not easy to forward to management in other locations, and they tend to go on the shelf and stay there.”
One alternative is a Web site that sponsors can visit to receive their fulfillment information.
Michael Aisner, president of MDA Co., created a site–www. CyberBikeRecap.com–to capture Herbalife Ltd.’s results from its CyberBike activation program at the Amgen Tour of California cycling race.
Immediately after the event, CyberBike rep Aisner posts information, photos and video on the site documenting Herbalife’s use of the interactive attraction that lets attendees compete in a virtual race on stationary bikes.
Content includes the goals of the program, attendance figures, media exposure and the involvement of Herbalife’s independent distributors.
Aisner created the site using a Mac laptop, iPhone and video camera. Apart from the hardware, his costs are $10 a year for the site and $100 a year for a shared computer server.
“Anyone could do what I did. It requires no technical skills of any depth, just attention to content, some of which you can write in advance,” he said.
Properties also have the option of using specialized fulfillment report software to produce their recaps, such as eBrandedSolutions, Inc.’s SponsorshipPRO+.
Although hard copies may no longer be the primary format for reports, a growing number of properties are using self-publishing services such as Apple Inc.’s iPhoto Print Products (IEG SR, May 19, 2008) to create supplemental leave-behinds.
For example, venue owner and event producer Newport Harbor Corp. last year began using iPhoto to create custom books for two major sponsors. The property uses the coffee table-quality books to supplement its post-event reports and stay top of mind among sponsors.
SOURCES
AT&T Inc., Tel: 210/821-4105
Wells Fargo & Co., Tel: 866/878-5865
Carolina Panthers, Tel: 704/358-7000
SunFest, Tel: 561/659-5980
Doug Pirnie Consulting, Tel: 917/847-1992
MDA Co., Tel: 303/444-5501
The Sponsor Placement Co., Tel: 800/334-1821
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