Chapter 2: Benefits of Sponsorship Activation Examples

Sponsorship activation can help you improve brand awareness and increase engagement with your products or services. Many popular brands use sponsorship activation at different events to keep attendees engaged and get them thinking about their brand, even if it's in the back of their minds. Interactive stations are an excellent way to market products or services, which any brand can do.

This chapter covers the benefits of sponsorship activation, examples of famous brands, and ideas to help create a fun, engaging station at your next event. 

The Benefits of Sponsorship Activation

Sponsorship activation brings many benefits to your brand. One of the primary benefits of sponsorship activation is that you can promote your brand at the event without having to host the event yourself. While you may contribute to a portion of the finances and entertain attendees, the event organizer handles the bulk of the costs, such as promotion and venue expenses. You'll gain access to large crowds of new potential customers at a fraction of the price it would take to host your own event.

Other benefits include:

• Becoming a part of something bigger: Promoting your brand at an event allows you to become a part of something bigger. Your brand is just one part of a significant event with other brands. You become part of a larger culture and find opportunities to increase your brand visibility within a bigger market.
• Association with the event and other brands: Sponsorship activations allow you to become associated with the event and other brands. Ideally, you'll want to attend events that align with your brand values, ensuring the audience you reach is a good fit for your business. Associating your brand with other brands and the event can also go a long way in creating visibility and increasing networking opportunities.
• Increased exposure: A key benefit of sponsorship activation is increased exposure. You'll gain access to a large crowd of individuals and have the opportunity to showcase your product or service. The increased exposure can help your brand generate new customers and promote your business to markets you want to reach. Some events, such as festivals or conventions, are also featured on the news, helping draw in a bigger crowd of potential customers.

Sponsorship activation is a fairly natural way of advertising your product or service. Consumers are integrated with your brand rather than interrupted by things like advertisements or other types of promotions. As a result, you can foster deeper connections with your customer base, allowing you to build relationships that can lead to loyal customers. You'll also have the opportunity to go in-depth about your product and service while entertaining event attendees, ensuring that your business reaches the right audience and generate leads.

Sponsorship Activation Examples

Events bring together people from similar demographics and interests, something you can capitalize on to increase your visibility and brand awareness. To truly benefit from sponsorship activation, you must come prepared for the event and understand how other brands have been successful. Various big-name brands use sponsorship activation to get event attendees involved and engaged with their products. Here are some sponsorship activation examples that popular brands used to increase brand awareness:

• Pepsi: Pepsi is one of the largest brands that appear at many events and uses sponsor activation to improve its brand image and increase awareness. At one event, Pepsi offered branded can coolers to attendees with their name and photo, a personalized gift that builds a connection and creates brand loyalty. The brand also created a sofa ice sculpture with the Pepsi logo to help gain the attention of attendees.
• The CW: The CW network engaged in sponsorship activation at one event by offering games for attendees to entertain themselves, such as large games of Jenga and cornhole at their beach-themed area. They also used relevant branded items that attendees could use, such as beach balls, chairs, hammocks, and an ice cream cart.
• Wet N Wild: This brand released the "Steal the Look" app and created a mugshot background where event attendees could take photos, complete with two models dressed as police officers to make the photo. The station even attracted some men despite the brand being female-dominated.
• Bud Light: This brand had multiple interactive elements at its station. Attendees could use a touchscreen display to play games and the Microsoft Kinect technology to kick virtual field goals. Bud Light also posted various hashtags to encourage people to post on social media. Attendees could create images of themselves wearing football helmets and post them to social media, helping promote engagement and increasing brand awareness.
• Intel: This brand created an impressive light show using drones at the 2018 Winter Olympics. The images captured attendees' attention and even those watching the Olympics from the comfort of their homes. The light show quickly went viral on the internet, reaching over 12 billion media impressions in less than 12 hours. Intel was able to engage audiences and increase its brand awareness through this performance.
• Nike: This brand promoted its new Nike Epic React running shoes by creating an interactive station in downtown LA Runners where individuals could wear the shoes while participating in an interactive video game. The game would track their motions on a treadmill so they could run in a 400-meter race that was broadcast on billboards in real-time in downtown Los Angeles, creating a fully immersive experience while promoting Nike's new product.
• Bacardi: At one event, Bacardi set up stations for attendees to play games, such as ring and frisbee tosses. Winners received branded prizes or small sample bottles of Bacardi, helping engage and excite attendees while promoting their brand.
• Adidas: Adidas was present at the music festival Lollapalooza. Within the festival grounds, Adidas set up a miniature skate park so guests could watch professional skateboarders do what they do best, all while wearing Adidas gear. Guests were encouraged to take photos and enter giveaways, helping them further interact with the brand.
• Honda: Social media is an excellent way to get event attendees involved with your brand. At one event, Honda created a dedicated selfie area with angled mirrors so attendees could take photos of themselves. The selfie area encouraged individuals to interact with the brand and post to social media, increasing Honda's brand awareness through attendees.

These brands created experiences that helped get individuals involved through games, social media opportunities, or entertaining exhibits. These are just a few examples of popular brands increasing their awareness and engagement through sponsorship activation and successfully generating buzz. You can use the examples above to determine how to implement sponsorship activation for your brand.

Sponsorship Activation Ideas

Now that you've learned about some ways other brands have successfully used sponsorship activation at different events, you can start generating ideas that fit with your brand identity and values. Consider some of the following ideas that you could implement for sponsor activation at an event:

• Photo promotions: Photos promotions are an excellent way to engage and communicate with event attendees. You can set up a photo booth at an event and provide props for attendees to use as they take photos. Photo promotions have the added benefit of extra exposure when people post their pictures online.
• Free items: People love receiving free items at events, whether tote bags, office supplies, T-shirts, or other swag. You can brand these items with your logo, contact information, or message to help promote your business. You can also offer tickets to an upcoming event to help promote your brand and get people engaged!
• Social media engagement: Social media is an excellent way to increase engagement with event attendees. Share information on your social media channels leading up to the event to showcase your involvement. Once you're at the event, you can use different methods to encourage social media engagement among attendees, such as selfie booths or photo promotions and a special hashtag to let attendees engage with you online.
• Contests: Contests are an excellent way to increase engagement with your event attendees. You can promote the contest before the event and encourage entries once the event starts. You can even have people enter your contest before the event and announce the winner at the end of the event. Some contests you can host include a photo contest, a trivia contest, a social media caption contest, or anything else that fits within your brand identity.
• Games: Setting games up at an event are an excellent way to get attendees engaged with your brand. To increase brand awareness, you can even offer prizes to winners, including branded promotional items. You can host traditional games like tug of war, ladder toss, cornhole, or other games that encourage engagement.

Once the event is over, you can use it as an opportunity to analyze your sponsorship activation methods and determine if you need to make any changes for the next event. You can also have attendees fill out surveys toward the end of the event so you can learn the best way to re-market and re-engage with your desired demographic.

Engage in Sponsorship Activation Using Promotional Products

Apart from the examples and ideas we listed above, you can also use promotional products to help encourage engagement at various events. Promotional products include your brand's logo, contact information or message and help increase your brand awareness by reminding attendees about your product or service. Attendees who use your promotional items also help improve your visibility as they carry or use them throughout the day.

SourcePromo carries various promotional items that you can use for sponsorship activation. You can choose from apparel, activewear, bags, and drinkware to attract attendees to your station at any event. People love receiving free items or winning them after playing games, making them an excellent option to help you increase brand awareness and visibility.

We have various services, including graphic design, to help you create a memorable logo for your promotional materials. Contact us today to learn more about how we can help at your next event, or get started by browsing our collection of promotional products!