A Qualitative Study of the Conceptualization of Sports Sponsorship
Authors:   Asia-Europe Perspective Association, Choi Hye-Lin , Park Jeong-Eun 
Published: April 2019

Companies make use of various marketing strategies to survive in the intensely competitive environment. Of those strategies, sponsorship has been highlighted as an effective means of marketing over the last 30 years. In 2017, the investment scale of the global sponsorship market increased by 4.3% compared with the previous year to reach 62.7 billion dollars, and in 2018, it is expected to continue to grow by 4.9% to reach 65.8 billion dollars(Statista, 2018). Companies such as Coca-Cola, Pepsi, and Adidas are said to invest over 100 million dollars in sponsorships each year, and among those, sponsorships in sports are said to represent the largest share totaling 70%(MediaPost, 2018). As such, sponsorship investment by corporations is experiencing a growing trend, and research on sponsorship is actively being conducted both domestically and overseas. However, as we examine previous research on sponsorship so far, the research is mostly on the effect that sponsorship activity has on purchase intent and brand image improvement(Kim and Yoon, 2003; Lee et al., 2013; Pope and Voges, 2000; Biscaia et al., 2013) and on consumer characteristics that have an effect on the sponsorship effect(Kim and Cho, 2007; Kim et al., 2011; Dees et al., 2010). Although research by Kim(1998) and Kwon et al. (2011) on sponsorship stated that sponsorship activity can be divided into communication activity as well as event contribution and image improvement activities, the fact is that research on sponsorship activity as a fundamental concept is lacking both domestically and overseas. Therefore, in the present paper, we first examined the concept of sponsorship proposed by previous research, and then we conducted qualitative research on the concepts and latest issues (characteristics, target, motivation, and purpose) of sports sponsorship, which comprises the largest portion of the sponsorship field, while targeting 10 experts (professors and hands-on workers) in the domestic sports sponsorship field. We can see that previous research defined the concept of sponsorship as the act of providing money or goods to an activity to achieve commercial purposes; the act of investing in events or causes to achieve goals such as an increase in company sales, improvement of reputation and product image, and increase in product awareness; and the relationship between the one providing money or services and the individuals, events, and groups that receive that right for the purpose of commercial profit. That is, we can say that rather than being a relationship wherein one side is the provider and the other is the benefactor, it is a relationship where both the sponsor and those who are sponsored benefit, which is different from support or charitable work by its emphasis on commercial aspects. However, the concept of sponsorship that we learned through expert interviews showed that compared with the concept definition by past scholars, the current definition has expanded even more through emphasis on the dimension of “social contribution activities.” In addition, compared with ordinary advertisements wherein culture, race, and language need to be considered, effective communication to potential customers can be made through the medium of sports sponsorships, and from the perspective of federations and organizations, it was shown that sponsorships could secure resources and improve competition values. In addition, through sports sponsorships, which are the result of effort and sweat, a company “can transfer the positive image” of the purity, health, and honesty of the sport to itself. Moreover, as most sponsors of sporting competitions are limited to one company per industry, we found that official sponsors can gain a dominant position in promotion activities compared with other competitors in the same range.