364 CHAPTER 11 SPONSORSHIPCommunications results can also be measured. In this respect, sponsorship campaign
eff ectiveness measurements are very similar to the advertising campaign tests discussed (see
Chapter 9 ) on advertising research: brand awareness, correct sponsor attribution and the eff ect
on the image of the sponsored event and the sponsoring brand can be measured. Besides
increasing brand awareness, associating the brand with the sponsored event is the most
important objective of a sponsorship campaign. As a result, measuring the percentage of
the target group able to attribute correctly the name of the sponsoring brand(s) to an event
is one of the most important measures of sponsorship eff ectiveness. In this type of test, a list
of sponsored events is presented to a sample of consumers, who have to attribute (aided or
unaided) the sponsors of the event. Th is results in an indication of the percentage of the target
group that can correctly attribute sponsors to events, as well as measures of ‘sponsor confusion’.
Correct (aided and unaided) sponsorship attribution can be very low, while sponsorship
confusion is in some cases stunningly high.The airline company Virgin Express sponsors several music festivals. To counter the problem of festival visitors not
knowing/remembering who actually sponsored the festival, Virgin decided to move from just being present during
the festivals to involving festival visitors before and during the festival. To this end, Virgin launched the Festival
buddy campaign. Festival lovers could register by means of SMS or on the festival buddy website. Afterwards, Virgin
sent them a ‘buddyword’ by SMS. The challenge for the registered persons was to find another person with the
same buddyword. Everyone who succeeded in this and presented themselves with their buddy at a Virgin stand on
one of the festivals won a free Virgin flight. The campaign created an enormous viral effect and was a real hype for
several months in many communities. A Google search on the word ‘festivalbuddy’ delivered about 80 000 results.
Someone created a special ‘festivalbuddy-matching’ site and during the festivals several people wore a T-shirt on
which their buddy word was printed in the hope of finding their buddy. No doubt, Virgin succeeded in its objective
of being linked to the sponsored festivals.^74BUSINESS INSIGHT
Virgin’s Festival buddyAdditionally, the purpose of sponsorship is to associate the sponsoring brand or company
with the sponsored event. Sponsorship research can therefore also focus on the link between
the image of the brand and the event with members of the target group.
Th e eff ectiveness of sponsorship can also be conceptualised by means of the ‘Persuasive
Impact Equation’.^75 Th is equation integrates a number of important sponsorship impact
factors at the communications level:
Persuasive impact = Strength of the link × Duration of the link
× (Gratitude felt due to the link + Perceptual change due to the link)
Th e more the target group members are aware of the link between the sponsor and the
sponsee, and the longer the duration of this perceived link, the more the impact a sponsorship
has had. Th e larger the gratitude felt as a result of the sponsorship, and the more positive the
perceptual change of the image of the sponsor, the more the impact the sponsorship has
achieved.
Although increasing sales or market share is not the primary objective of sponsorship,
its long-term eff ectiveness can also be assessed by estimating the sponsorship’s commercial
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