The Impact of Event Familiarity and Involvement on Sponsor Brand Image and Purchase Intention : A Case of Indian Premier League

Indian Premier League (IPL) is a privately owned professional cricket league, which invited private enterprises into cricket and successfully created it as a commercial property that matches the new social trends and lifestyles of the attendees. This study used structural equation modeling technique to find out the cause and effect relation between the event (IPL) and the sponsor (VIVO). The study found the positive impact of attendee‟s event association in the form of event familiarity and event involvement on sponsor‟s brand image. The study also found the high involvement of the attendees with an event positively influences their purchase intentions. © 2017 Elixir All rights reserved. Marketing Management Available online at www.elixirpublishers. com (Elixir International Journal) Jaskirat Singh and Apar Singh / Elixir Marketing Mgmt. 108 (2017) 47412-47418 47413 form the positive attitude towards the brand and transfer the positive association of the attendees from the event to the brand. Attendee‟s positive thinking towards the event can become a major factor for the companies that can influence their behavioral decision making (Speed and Thompson, 2000; Gwinner and Bennett, 2008; Lee and Ferreira, 2013). That is the reason, in 2016, in the 9 th season of IPL, the Chinese mobile manufacturer company VIVO got the event sponsorship title off the IPL by paying INR 1000million per year. The title sponsorship money was 27 percent more than the last sponsor Pepsi. For the research purposes, this study has taken IPL as an event and the title sponsor of the event brand VIVO as a sponsor of the event. The study empirically investigate the linkages between the event familiarity and event involvement on sponsor familiarity, sponsor image and purchase intentions. In other words, study tries to find out the connection between the event and the sponsor of the event. In the upcoming section, the conceptual framework and hypotheses of the study will be discussed by using different studies related to the event and the sponsors. In the next section, the research methodology of the study will be presented and then data analysis and results will be discussed. In the end, the study will discuss the theoretical and managerial implications of the study and also reported the limitations and future research of the study. Social identity theory The word identification has used in sports sponsorship in different terms such as social or sports identification and team or group recognition. According to social identity theory, the people will incorporated closely with some groups of the society (i.e. Sports participants, organizational members or political groups) in such a manner, that the group becomes a person‟s source of self (Tajfel and Turner, 1985). Madrigal (2000, 2001) used social identity theory to ascertain out the connection between sports fans and the preferred sport team or event. He found that those fans that identify the particular team or event are highly bonded to that squad. The identification with the team or sponsored entity can affect positively their purchase intentions. Funk and James (2001) have given a theoretical framework called psychological continuum model (PCM). The model shown that how the sports spectators and sports fans were connected with the sports leagues and sports teams. PCM model had described individual‟s psychological connection with the sport or team in four phases. In the beginning, individuals were getting the awareness about the team or the sport through social agents. After getting the awareness, the individuals were choosing their favorite team or sport based on the different attributes of the team or sport. These beliefs create the psychological connection between the individual and the sport or team. If the connection between the individual and the sport or team satisfies the social and personal needs of the individual, then the individual creates the positive attitude towards that sport or team and became the loyal or committed fan of that particular sport or team. Cornwell and Coote (2005) used social identity theory to explain consumers‟ emotional connections to sponsor teams and sponsorship issues. The survey found that, consumer‟s who identify the organization as a non-profit organization; attached emotionally to that organization. That attachment influences their sponsorshiplinked purchase intentions. In another study by Gwinner and Bennett (2008) examined that those consumer‟s who identify the fit between the sport and the event, they were more attracted towards the sponsor brand. Their attachment towards the sponsor brand can influence their purchase intentions. Ngan et al. (2011) found that, those consumer‟s who were highly attached to the team, are less affected by their performance. But, weak team identifiers were more sensitive towards the performance of the team which can affect their purchase intentions. A study by Ian and Kate (2007) examined fans individuals‟ affiliation with the team and social identification with the team as a mediator to find out its impact on purchase behaviour of the fans. The study found that fans behavioural intentions were positively motivated when they were emotionally attached with the team and also socially identified the team. Review of literature and hypothesis development Event familiarity Event familiarity means the awareness or knowledge of the attendees about the particular event. The fans that were familiar with the event and also showing the interest in the event and its team and players, they also spend their time and money for watching the games, and buying the different memorabilia of the team or event (Wann and Branscombe, 1993, Fisher and Wakefield, 1998). A study by Gwinner and Swanson (2003) found that, the fans those are highly attached with the sport/event can easily recognize the sponsor of the event, form positive attitude towards the sponsor and increase the patronage and satisfaction with the sponsor. An associative memory network viewed by Keller (1993) suggests that brand associations can be influenced when a brand gets associated with fame through an endorsement or linked with a sporting event through sponsorship activities. In essence, the celebrity or event image is transferred to the brand. McDaniel (1999) has explored the relation of events and the brand in terms of consumer involvement. He found that subjects rated attitude toward the ad significantly more confident when a highly involving product (e.g. An automobile) was mated with a highly involving sporting event (e.g. The Olympics) than when the product was paired with a low involvement sporting event (e.g. PBA bowling). Wakefield and Bennett (2010) found that the consumers could easily identify the prominent and related sponsors of the event, because of the performance of the event and the consumers involvement in the event, which could generate the affective intensity of the individual towards the sponsor and that could help them to correctly identify the sponsor of the event Hypothesis 1: Attendee‟s event familiarity will increase the familiarity of the sponsor of the event. Event involvement Event involvement means the attraction and involvement of the attendees towards the event. The study of sports literature shows that, attendees/ fans, those have highly attached with the event, form the positive picture of the event and the sponsors of the event in their mind. Highly involved fans or consumers easily identify the sponsor, judge the congruence between the event and the sponsor and also associate the image of the event with the sponsors of the event (Madrigal, 2000; Meenaghan, 2001; Beaton, Funk, Ridinger, Jordan, 2011; Bachleda, Fakhar, & Elouazzani, 2015). A study by Sirgy et al. (2008) found that selfcongruity with a sponsorship event has a positive impact on brand loyalty, when customers are aware of the sponsoring firm and also involved with the event. A similar study by Grohs, Wagner and Vsetecka (2004) Found that event sponsor fit, event involvement and exposure are the dominant factors predicting sponsor recall. Jaskirat Singh and Apar Singh / Elixir Marketing Mgmt. 108 (2017) 47412-47418 47414 Event-sponsor fit and sponsor leverage are the factors which affect image transfer from event to sponsor. A study by Close et al., (2006) investigate that the attendee‟s those have the knowledge of the event, and they are very enthusiastic about the particular sport or the event and also actively participate in the sport, form the positive framework about the sponsor‟s brand in their mind, which delivers a positive influence on their purchase intentions also. Beaton, Funk, Ridinger, Jordan (2011) used psychological continuum model (PCM) to ascertain the impact of consumers sports involvement on their hedonic, central, or symbolic values. The study found that the consumers involvement in sport became an important component of their life when their attraction towards sport changed to attachment and attachment converted to allegiance. The consumer‟s involvement in sport provided them hedonic and symbolic values. The psychological and behavioural intentions of the individual consumer have also impacted because of the sport involvement. Hypothesis 2: Attendee‟s involvement with the event will increase the familiarity of the sponsor of the event. Sponsor familiarity Sponsor/Brand familiarity means that how much the attendees/fans have knowledge about the brand and the sponsored product. The sports literature support the construct that if the consumer‟s are aware about the particular brand and also found that brand as event or team sponsor, that can positively affect their perception towards that brand (Cornwell and Coote, 2005; Madrigal, 2000, 2001). A model developed by Close et al., (2006) found that, the knowledge of the event attendees about the sponsor‟s product, their enthusiasm and activeness towards the sport have positive impact on the their perception