$43.5 billion worth of consumer influence - or not?

Sponsorship of major events is a growing business: but are sponsors wasting their money?
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Thursday, 7 August 2008

Companies around the world are spending billions of dollars on sponsorship deals but many may be wasting their investment.

This will be a key message from an international expert in sponsorship effectiveness and consumer behaviour, Professor Pascale Quester, at the University of Adelaide's free Research Tuesdays Public Seminar Series on Tuesday 12 August.

"Globally in 2008, US$43.5 billion will be directly invested in sponsorship," says Professor Quester, who is Executive Dean of the University's Faculty of the Professions. "In the Asia Pacific region, under the influence of the Beijing Olympics, sponsorship this year will increase by 25% on last year. With associated spend on advertising, the total amount may be as much as 3-5 times that.

"Sponsorship is massive - one of the fast growing areas within marketing - but, more often than not, its use is haphazard and its evaluation sketchy.

"In reality, a lot of companies are getting into sponsorship for the wrong reasons, perhaps only because their competitors are. They are throwing money into it but, if they don't understand how it works, they make little or no impact on consumers."

Professor Quester says that to make sponsorship effective it is essential to create a meaningful and legitimate association between the company and the activity being sponsored - something that consumers can make sense of. She will also tell the Research Tuesday audience how companies can get more out of their sponsorship through better management of the relationship between sponsors and the organisations they are sponsoring.

Professor Quester is also Professor of Marketing in the University of Adelaide Business School. She has pioneered research into sponsorship effectiveness and is widely published on consumer behaviour. She holds two Australian Research Council grants and is the Asia Pacific editor for the Journal of Marketing Communications and a member of the editorial committee of several international journals.

A recent visiting professor at Sorbonne, she was awarded in 2007 a prestigious honour by France's National Academic Committee in recognition of her contribution to marketing knowledge.

Held on the second Tuesday of every month, Research Tuesday gives leading experts from the University of Adelaide an opportunity to engage with business, community leaders and the general public on issues that impact on them.

WHAT: Research Tuesday: 'Sponsorship: creating meanings and delivering value'
WHERE: Lecture Theatre G04, Napier Building, North Terrace Campus, University of Adelaide
WHEN: 5.30pm, Tuesday 12 August
COST: Free. Please book by email: research.tuesdays@adelaide.edu.au or phone: (08) 8303 3692

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