Link Between Business and Sports Advertising - Research Paper Example

Link Between Business And Sports Advertising Name Institutional Affiliation Date First 1000 Words on Same Topic: Link Between Business and Sports Advertising Introduction A sports advertising as a marketing strategy focused on promoting sporting events and activities and associated competing teams together with other related services and products that go hand in hand with sporting. This is a service, whereby, the elements which are being promoted takes different forms and range from brand name to physical products with the goal of providing the targeted clients with schemes to either promote sports or other products or services using sports as a conduit to achieve this objective. Wants and needs of consumers can also be met through a variety of exchange processes due to the unique design of sports advertising. The normal marketing principles and strategies apply when it comes to sports advertising. There are three broad sectors under the umbrella of sports advertising, and I shall attempt to discuss them briefly. i. Marketing through sports One of the such sectors includes promotion of various products of different companies through the individual sports athletes, the competing sporting teams and the various sporting events and organized competitions (Foster, Greyser & Walsh, 2006). In this category, companies under different brand names like Barclays Bank, Nike, Guinness, and Smirnoff among others use the individual players and sports participants to promote their products. Such companies deal in different products, and some of them may be financial institutions, alcoholic and soft drinks manufacturers like coca-cola while others may be outfits manufacturers. They can also sponsor sports teams or sporting events to help them advertise their products. In such situation, products or services may be related to sports or may not have any correlation whatsoever. ii. Marketing of Sports Sporting associations such as Olympics, FIFA World Cup, English Premier League, and LA Liga among others can also be advertised under sports advertising. This can be done under sponsorship of associations or other related organizations. Such advertising is, therefore, directly related to sports. iii. Grassroots Sports Marketing Normally, this is done through creation of public awareness so as to increase public participation in different sporting activities. In order to undertake the above forms of sports advertisements, the associations and companies employ different conduits ranging from athletes or teams, radio or television advertisements during live sports broadcasts or advertising on the sporting venues. Other channels to undertake this task can be through billboards, street lighters and sidewalks among others especially during major sporting events like FIFA world cup and Olympics (Foster, Greyser & Walsh, 2006). Advertising through individual athletes and sportsmen has over the years been so viable since the athletes have shown royalty to the brands they champion while their fans are also loyal to them. This is so evident through the many contracts being signed between the sports companies and the individual sportsmen, and where they are required to put on the products of the companies they represent once they are paid and their fans consequently inculcate loyalty to such products for a long period of time. Research Question What is the link between business and sports advertising? Research Objectives The aim of this research is to; i. Find out what business opportunities are there in sporting activities ii. Evaluate the viability of venturing in sports advertisement iii. Find out how to tap the sporting events for business Literature Review In this research paper, I shall base my arguments research done by Foster, Greyser & Walsh (2006) in attempt to elucidate the link that exists between business and sports advertising. For instance, different organizations and authors, sports events promotion and advertising may be defined as creating and designing an activity which is live in nature with the aim of promoting organizations, teams, products and cause through displays, occasions and sporting events exhibitions such as Olympic Games, FIFA World Cup, Champions League. These live events are organized to promote the events themselves, different sporting teams or even the sport itself. Contracts can be signed with various other companies in an attempt to transmit the events or promoted through radio or TV commercials. The concept of advertising through sporting activities has been in use the 1980s and has gained popularity and significant importance since then as a result of growth and expansion of various sports types (Kahle & Riley, 2004). Sports advertisement can be used in two different ways depending on the intended outcome. It can be done through the sport and in this case the advertising responsibility is carried by the concerned sporting associations or the different sports clubs whereby the advertising responsibility lies squarely on the concerned sporting associations. In the latter case, advertising is achieved through sponsorships, images or names commonly referred to as endorsements, licensed merchandise, broadcaster advertisements, ground signage or equipment advertisements games promotion and advertisement through players, leagues or clubs. A lot of products can be marketed through sports advertising as briefly discussed below. Marketing of sportsmen through social media Owing to technology that is growing at an exponential rate, advertising a team’s or individual’s products via media sources can lead to positive revenue and consequently create increased attention both to audience and fans Television advertisement during broadcast sporting events Companies such as Gillette promote their personal hygiene merchandise through their champion figures like Thierry Henry during television broadcast sporting events. Here the company undertaking the advertisement is not related to the sports at all but they seek to demonstrate that since successful personalities use the product, the audience and loyal fans should use them too (Kahle & Riley, 2004). Sponsorship of Teams and Events A company can undertake to sponsor a sporting event like football match or a rugby team and as they carry out this, they also advertise their products, for example Barclays Bank can sponsor a soccer match to advertise their financial products. Summary and Conclusion In conclusion, this research will provide sufficient reasons why one needs to venture into the sports advertisement as a business opportunity basing on the expected lucrative returns. This is because sport is a peculiar source of entertainment since one never knows the ending no matter how many times one goes back. Therefore, when one ventures in sports advertising, he/she enjoys this advantage since the audience sees the advertisements over and again every time they attend events. This guarantees the different companies a wide range of opportunities. References Foster, G., Greyser, S. A., & Walsh, B. (2006). The business of sports: Text and cases on strategy and management. Mason, OH: Thomson/South-Western. Kahle, L. R., & Riley, C. (2004). Sports marketing and the psychology of marketing communication. Mahwah, N.J: L. Erlbaum Associates. Second 1000 Words on Same Topic: Link Between Business and Sports Advertising Introduction Sports advertising has become one of the big business. From the many premier leagues played in the world, millions of people throng in large venues with an intention of watching the competitions for championships. Yes, people watch sports for different reasons but regardless of their reasons, they are all viewed as customers. Therefore, many business people have ventured into this business opportunity with the aim of targeting the millions of viewers whom they see as potential customers. In terms of viewership and participation, there has been a dramatic increase in popularity of sports. A good example to validate this statement can be obtained by checking at the TV ratings for the Superbowl. Over the past ten years, there have been increases in worldwide viewing audience annually by approximately 21 million viewers. This has resulted to younger people and older people to be encouraged by a number of public programs. The encouragement of active involvement of people in sports has been one common aim of a number of many sports business activities. The creation of a value-based business that yields social benefits to the society is one way of sports businesses. Sports have earned recognition worldwide. This field has created millionaires who have in turn helped in boosting the economy of their respective states by investing in them. Sports are, therefore, important to us for a number of ways; they entertain us, keep us physically fit and healthy, build our character through socializing, and help us develop team spirits. Due to the many benefits of sports, commercializing has been necessitated. Through commercializing sports, good earnings have been experienced. Sports have, therefore, created potential career opportunities. Research questions What is the motivation of sports advertising in the business industry? Research objectives a. To establish the benefits of sports advertising as a business b. To identify the reasons for growth of sports advertising in the business industry Literature Review In order to conduct this research, various sources of information has been used. For instance, according to Pegoraro, Ayer & O'Reilly (2010), several companies are redirecting energies to sports marketing. Innovative tools like one to one or Customer relationship management have been greatly used in reaching out to a large target. Due to the changing consumers’ tastes almost on a daily basis, the marketing strategies need to conform quickly in the usage of their marketing instrument to these trends of the consumers. Sports marketing give an opportunity to companies to work on the passion consumers have for sports and thus becoming an efficient marketing tool. Therefore, companies should choose the sport that has the highest number of people, getting to know the competitors, looking at media coverage and come up with a communication plan regarding it. Further, Pegoraro, Ayer & O'Reilly (2010) argues that entirely every marketer applauds for sports. The same researchers go ahead to assert that sports market creates revenue. For instance, sports market for North American sports by 2017 is likely to have revenue of about $67.7 billion from the value of $53.6 billion in the year 2012. This value includes merchandising, gate revenue and media rights. He seconds Robert Carter, who said that one has a better opportunity to get his message in front of people viewing sports unlike somebody doing drama. It was seen that a lot of marketers were increasingly purchasing media packages that include both second-screen experience and traditional TV ads. A lot of media houses were selling second-screen experience and broadcast packages where Twitter is the leading in the second-screen experience. The article points out that fans are actively engaged in social media and hence becoming the major target (Fortunato, 2010). One of the most popular sport advertising websites is the mostpopulasports.net website where surveys have been done indicating that soccer has the largest number of fans as far as the field of sports is concerned (Fortunato, 2010). Fortunato, further, points out that the FIFA World cup that is usually held after every four years has quite a number of TV audiences like in 2006, we had over 30 billion people watching the world cup in Germany. In Africa, the most famous website that has of recent greatly developed is the superSport website. It is a leading in the African’s top sports websites. Its unique growth and popularity can be proved by the figures for effective measures where it has been indicated that it had over a million different browsers in the calendar of the month of February 2010 (Fortunato, 2010) The website live streams and video highlights the latest sports news and information on the world’s best sporting action. At the same website, it also provides gallery pages for fans to upload their pictures, fantasy games and videos as well. It was complemented by information for all football supporters like in stadium and city info, information features on extensive transport and recommended restaurants. This enabled fans to follow up their favorite contestant and to track their progress. According to Fortunato (2010), sports fans can give their comments in the integrated columns in an event where both off and on the field had many talking points. Supersport slogan ensures that fans are never out of touch with results, news and latest scores. The engine behind the success of supersport is the Dstv.supersport.com. Summary and conclusion From the research, it has come out clearly that a lot of devotion has been diverted to sports advertising as a business. Sensitive areas highlighted need to be given attention for the sports advertising business to thrive. I concur with the information revealed by  different researchers and even expecting the fans to exceed the values because the technology in itself is reaching a number of regions worldwide. The many fans have tremendously propelled this business industry, and thus this has greatly motivated the ventures. References Fortunato, J. A. (January 01, 2010). Digital Media and Sports Advertising. Pegoraro, A., Ayer, S., & O'Reilly, N. (January 01, 2010). Consumer Consumption and Advertising Through Sport. American Behavioral Scientist, 53, 10, 1454-1475. Read More