Sports Sponsorship Needs a Technological Upgrade

And it’s about to get just that, with Instant Sponsor

Let’s face it, sports sponsorship has evolved mightily in the last 50 years. Sponsorship at one point was simply paying money to have your logo in a stadium or have a professional athlete endorse your product.

Return on investment (ROI) and exposure were not measured to the fullest extent. Additionally, target audiences were loosely taken into account.

Technology and advanced analytics have allowed brands to be more selective with whom they choose to do business with when it comes to sports sponsorships. This advancement has prompted rights holders (teams/athletes) to become more tech-savvy with their offerings for sponsorships.

That is why we have seen developments like virtual-signage, social media sponsorships, content marketing, and so on.

“Everything has evolved so quickly over the last 10 years,” said Scott Tilton, CEO of Hookit. “That SPONTech — the convergence of sponsorship and technology — if you think about the marketplace…the total sponsorship dollars invested, plus all of the activation-spend, you’re looking at about $150 billion spent on sponsorship and activation. And that dollar is not measured like any other form of marketing.”

Tilton used Ad-Tech — which is short for advertising technology, broadly refers to different types of analytics and digital tools used in the context of advertising. — in comparison to the changes in sponsorship technology.

“Now 84% of all display advertising is programmatic. Where you don’t call up a digital property and place an add. It’s all done programmatically. And there are elements of sponsorship moving in that direction. And the most challenging piece is ‘how do you measure all of that?’

And while the advancement of technology has enhanced certain aspects of the sponsorship ecosystem, there is one aspect that is desperate need of enhancement.

And that is matching sponsors with sponsorship opportunities based on advanced data and analytics.

It’s difficult to predict the future.

How will a certain team or athlete play?

How well will my sponsorship be exposed?

Will this sponsorship be worth the company’s marketing dollars?

Giving brands more certainty when it comes to these questions s difficult. Unless there was a way to filter a brand to the perfect opportunity based on metrics that will bring them a return on investment…

Introducing Instant Sponsor

Instant Sponsor will serve as sponsorship’s solution in 2019. The Instant Sponsor platform is backed by a proprietary algorithm — Campaign Consultant feature — that matches sponsors with the opportunities that present them with the greatest ROI.

Essentially, the Instant Sponsor platform solves two major issues in the sports sponsorship industry.

Between 5–50% of a rights holders’ sponsorship inventory can potentially go unsold. The platform will allow the rights holders to engage a wider-range of sponsors who have the budgets to purchase their inventory.

From a brand perspective, the platform breaks down the barrier of entry into the sponsorship ecosystem. Brands who are not Fortune 500 companies will finally have a better opportunity to secure sponsorships on sport’s biggest stages.

If you are interested in Instant Sponsor’s platform then you should check out the Instant Sponsor website and join the Official Telegram Community to receive news and updates about the company and sports sponsorship industry.