Page 24 - 2019 April-May IWMA Magazine

Sponsorship Marketing
By: Ernie Saxton
There have been books written on sponsorship. Some are good and some are bad...very bad! Give me a call and I will be glad to recommend a couple of good ones.
What I find amazing is that there has never been a book that tells a sponsor what they should expect for their investment. In fact there are a lot of sponsors out there that have never seen a return on their investment. It is a buyer’s market for sponsors and they are demanding more for their money. Are you ready to deliver?
A gentleman called the other day to talk about spon- sorship. He really didn’t know much about auto racing. He owned a small business and wanted to sponsor a race team. Some other businesspeople he knew were doing it and he figured it would be good for his business. It would be his first venture into “marketing through motorsports”. He had no idea what to expect. Someone had given him my name and telephone number. He is not the first to call and he will not be the last.
His story was a familiar one. He did not have a lot of money to spend on sponsorship but he could see the value. He spent a lot of time watching racing on television and took note of all the exposure sponsors receive. First thing I did was lower his expectations and pointed out that sponsoring a local racing team would not be as glamorous as being a spon- sor in big league motorsports. However, I did tell him that if it was done right, sponsorship on a local level could be very rewarding.
After spending considerable time with the potential sponsor on the telephone, I came away with the thought that there are probably a lot of business people like him with the same questions.
I can tell you that there has been a huge number of small-business people turned off to the sport because they did not get what was promised and there was nothing in writing. In fact all they got were promises. They wrote out the check and did not hear from the team again. There were some race teams that did absolutely nothing for the small businessperson and had the nerve to come around at the end of the season wanting to talk about renewing for next season.
I would need a calculator with strong batteries to add up the number of horror stories I have from people in busi- ness who are still waiting to reap the benefits of marketing through motorsports as it was outlined in the proposal shown them by the race team but never delivered.
Most small-business people are too busy trying to grow their business, or these days just trying to keep the busi- ness solvent. Often they do not pay attention to what is going
on with their sponsorship support program. Many take peo- ple at their word.
Certainly there is a way to keep that from happen- ing. A sponsor should not pay the full amount when it is requested. Put together a contract and pay, perhaps half, at the signing and the rest in monthly payments. The payments are made when the team provides the business with proof of performance. If nothing has been done, there are no measur- able results, there should be no check.
Let’s go back to the part about the contract. If there is no contract, there should be no deal. Even the smallest deal should include a written contract or a letter of agreement. Everyone involved should understand what is expected from each side. The sponsor should know what to pay and when, the race team should know what is expected from them.
Depending on how much money is involved, a spon- sor should expect:
A logo or business name clearly visible on both sides of the race car (or the hood or rear). Some teams have dif- ferent sponsors on each side of the car. When that happens the sponsor misses out on visibility when photographs or videos are taken from media on the other side. If a sponsor does decide to take the cheaper deal, then at least make sure a competing business is not on the other side.
Often forgotten is the hauler. More people will prob- ably see the hauler than see the racecar. Part of the deal should be a logo or business name on the hauler. Avoid the back door if at all possible. The sponsor, in order to get full exposure, should have the name/logo on both sides of the hauler. And please don’t tell me that old story about putting logos and names on the hauler will let people know there is a racecar in the hauler and it cold be stolen. Buy good insur- ance and make sure the sponsor helps pay for it.
The race team should be offering the sponsor oth- er opportunities to benefit from marketing at the facilities where the team races. Have you told them about billboard opportunities, track magazine advertising, public address an- nouncement, sponsorship of an event (get all your sponsors together and share the cost), a hospitality suite and more. If not it might be because the race team is afraid that the spon- sor will spend money activating the sponsorship instead of spending that money on them. One of the problems that I see with most deals is that the sponsorship is never activated so the sponsor does not reap the benefits that are available.
As the race team owner, do your best to partner with businesses that you can get fully behind as well. Promot- ing them on social media is as important as that logo going around the track, so make sure this is part of your contract.
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