Sport Sponsorship Essay

2650 Words11 Pages
In the Sport Industry it is essential that Sport Sponsors must continually keep up with the inevitable change and maintain a competitive advantage. This paper examines common problems that sport sponsors face, in particular Nike, and how they have dealt with these issues and possible ways in the which these can been both handled efficiently and prevented. Sport Sponsorship can be defined at ‘the provision of resources (i.e. money, people, equipment) by an organisation directly to an event or activity in exchange for a direct association to the event or activity. The providing organisation can use this association to achieve their corporate, marketing, or media objective’ (Sandler and Shani, 2002). Sport sponsorship is one of the fastest growing areas in sport marketing. With this growth, comes more competition and more innovative development. In the modern world sport’s constant popularity as entertainment means that sponsorship remains a popular way for companies both small and large to market themselves, and effectively tie their brand with the reflected values of that sport. As professional sport is driven by money, sponsors are critical in providing the adequate money that is needed for the sport to continue to run. Sponsorship is a way in which a brand can market to millions of viewers through just one single channel of communication, therefore a sport that has little media coverage has little chance of sponsorship. Problem Potential problems that all sponsors are confronted with include, ambush marketing, over-commercialization, loss of endorses to fellow competitors and endorsement scandals may negatively impact on the brand. Nike, Inc. established in 1964 has experienced all these issues. Nike sells both clothing and equipment for numerous sports such as Athletics, Soccer, Tennis, Golf, Cricket and Basketball. Nike has always concentrated

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