Visual ethnography of on-site sponsorship activations: A case study of Spokane shock

Abstract

Sport sponsorship has become an effective marketing communication tool in business and a set of clearly defined marketing goals and objectives for engagement have been established, including to increase awareness of the company and its services, to enhance company image, to build business and trade relations and goodwill, to enhance employee morale, and to boost sales products and services, etc. (Irwin, Sutton, & McCarthy, 2002; Stotlar, 2005). In order to meet the sponsorship marketing goals and objectives, sponsors are required to develop well-designed and appropriate on-site activation plans depending on the nature of the sporting events and venue types and locations (DeGaris, West, & Dodds, 2009). Unfortunately, few researchers tried to measure the effectiveness of on-site promotions in a qualitative way even though several limitations about quantitative approach as an effective measurement tool have already been reported in the previous literature (Choi, Stotlar, & Park, 2005). The purpose of this current study is to identify whether the sponsored promotional activities at a sporting venue, such as logo placement, product demonstrations, hospitality centers, etc., actually matched with the interests of spectators from a qualitative perspective. The primary data for this research were generated by photo-journaling. Eleven graduate students were recruited at a private northwestern university. Research participants were asked to bring digital cameras to perform their duties in the research. Each person was required to take at least 10 pictures of images that attracted his/her attention at the venue. A total number of 110 pictures were collected and they were categorized based on the same or similar marketing and promotional theme by using inter-rater reliability (Neuendorf, 2002). The researchers looked at each one trying to find common themes across the board, while recalling some of the participants’ interesting comments associated with each photo taken. Some dominant themes were identified and the photos were grouped together accordingly, and some less-dominant themes or even outliers were also spotted. The dominant themes included the following categories; (a) visual signage such as standard non-digital A board signature, (b) PA announcement such as digital signage and products brought onto field for on-site promotional purpose, (c) personal contact such as mascots, sponsors’ employees and promotion workers, and (d) giveaways such as items handed to fans or picked up from display tables. All other categories than listed above were named as less-dominant themes due to the small number of cases that were not enough to extract the theme.