Choosing among alternative parties to be sponsored for supporting brand strategies, based upon emotional responses

• Published in: Journal of consumer behaviour Vol. 5; no. 6; pp. 504 - 517
• Main Authors: Hansen, Flemming, Halling, Jens, Christensen, Lars Bech
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Chichester, UK John Wiley & Sons, Ltd 01.11.2006; Wiley Subscription Services, Inc
• Subjects: Advertising; Brands; Communication; Consumer behavior; Consumer preferences; Corporate sponsorship; Customers; Demotions; Emotions; Employees; Enterprises; Information processing; Market positioning; Marketing; Sponsorship; Sports; Strategic behaviour; Studies; Television
• ISSN: 1472-0817; 1479-1838
• DOI: 10.1002/cb.199

In recent years, much research has been concerned with the effects of sponsorships and the possible advantages a company can gain from engaging in sponsoring activities. Recently focus has been on the role, that sponsoring plays in branding strategy. Here it becomes important to understand exactly what a potential party to be sponsored contributes to the perception of a brand or a company. In this paper, the aim has been reversed to focus on the sponsored party. We propose a number of measurements to determine emotional responses and overall evaluations associated with a sponsored party who is a part of a sponsorship agreement with a company. Four different groups of parties to be sponsored are investigated: social aid organisations, culture, sport and TV‐programmes. Several interesting results emerged from this study; the parties to be sponsored were evaluated very differently on the dimensions used in the study and it is shown that a company can gain very different results depending on the type of object to choose to sponsor. Furthermore, it was shown that the overall evaluation of a party to be sponsored to a large extent is determined by emotions. Copyright © 2006 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.