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Sponsorship

Hi again..

So last Thursday I had a stroke of luck and was offered the chance to go and have a look round Earls Court in West London as part of our course, and this happened to be the venue for the Ideal Home Show.. so was a great opportunity to see a snap shot of the build in. Here are the pictures from the day

Right now down to sponsorship.. both events have some level of sponsorship, although in my eyes both use sponsorship in different ways and I expect to their best advantage.

The Ideal Home Show has a whole host of different sponsors and sponsorship levels as you can see from their website (Ideal Home Show - Sponsors). The first thing to notice about the make up of the show is it is obviously an exhibition and therefore has a variety of different exhibition areas such as Technology, Garden, Cooking and various awards and competitions. This means the organisers can section off different parts and offer sponsorship to different companies which best suit there industry sector, this can been seen on the link above. For example the technology and future department is sponsored by Virgin Media, the 'How to' theatre is sponsored by B&Q and the Garden department is sponsored by Hydropool (specialising in hot tubs and swim spas). All these department sponsors are likely to have stands at the show to not only tie in with the advertisement but with the aim to make sales, I would also hazard to guess that some of the sponsors have agreed an exclusivity part to the contract and therefore will be the only business in their market segment to be at the show!

Not only this they have also assigned a main sponsor, Everest, which is attached to the Ideal Home Show logo and wherever this is printed Everest will be too. The show also has a host of subsidiary sponsors, which will have a much smaller involvement in the show. 

This shows a list of the Shows main sponsors. 

Taken from the Ideal Home Show's website home page

Another form of sponsorship is the celebrity endorsements the show uses, just like the company sponsorships the organisers have arranged a variety of celebrities to act as a figure head for each department, again on their website they have a section designated to the team and what areas they are to head.. (Ideal Home Show - Meet The Team). These endorsements are as much about promoting the event as to adding value to the show, as if they did not have the celebrities the show could be deemed to be a supermarket with plenty of people selling different products.

Demonstration of the celebrities involved in the show

Sponsorship is something that needs great consideration from the beginning, the process has the following four steps (Masterman, 2004a):

1. Determine the requirements of the sponsorship
2. Develop measures for evaluation
3. Provide a sponsorship solution with a set of event rights that mess the objectives of both the sponsor and the event
4. agree payments and/or provision of products/services to be made by the sponsor in return for the determined events rights

I believe this event has succeeded with this in mind as there is a good balance between sponsors selected and the evolvement within the show, obviously I'm not aware of the total agreement between organisers and sponsors or any monetary values paid. However this for type of event it is important to have businesses within the industry sector that the show sits at the event to add value to the event.

Overall I feel the Ideal Home Show uses its resources to the maximum and really gets the most out of sponsorship revenue. It also selects and uses celebrities to gain maximum publicity. Celebrities offer a good way to promote an event, this is because each celebrity has a public relation and tone, by this i mean the public will know what to expect when they see Alan Titchmarsh is going to be at the show. This can offer two types of benefits, one being reassurance for people not sure whether to attend and the second is raising awareness for people who are not aware of the event.

Ok now with the X-factor Live Tour this event is limited in the sponsorship revenue it can gain, essentially the marketing department have been a bit lazy in gaining any new sponsorship for the brand. This is because they have just adopted the main TV show sponsor for the live shows. This could be something that Talk Talk have insisted as they would not want another sponsor being associated with the X-factor.

Overall I think sponsorship for the X-factor Live Tour is something that just comes out of the TV shows and is not something the marketing department will spend much time on, having said that I think it works with the relation to the TV shows and demonstrates the two are linked to potential attendees. 

I have just found some more examples of sponsorship in relation to the X-factor Live Tour and it comes in the shape of ticket give aways of the packaging of well known food products.

These are two quite different product sponsorships mainly due to the surface area they have to play with when designing the packaging, the two products are very different as well! The Tic Tac's are a pocket product and likely to be displayed in many newsagents, off-licences and supermarkets near or at the till, this means that the X-factor will gain plenty of publicity. Tic Tac's are going to appeal to a wide range of consumers and I'm not sure its particularly aimed at its target market but appears to be more of a 'shotgun' approach where they have potential of hitting the whole population with this promotion.

The Chicago Town pizza ad is much more elaborate mainly due to the increase in surface area they had to use, the promotional print has consumed the box a lot more compared to the Tic Tac box. This is too such a point that information informing the customer about the product has taken a back seat! However this does allow the pizza box to inform the customer about the competition at the point of sale rather than having to go to a website. Again as with the Tic Tac's this promotion is going to appeal to a wide range of people from families, to students and people who are living alone or are house sharing,  which again is likely to hit their target market somewhere along the line.

So these promotional give aways are both aimed to give away tickets for the Live Tour shows and the television shows, therefore this is another example of the organisers feeding off the TV shows promotional activity. This is one thing that has definitely stood out compared to the Ideal Home Show, where they have had to build up a stand alone marketing strategy, where the X-factor combined both the TV and Live Tour shows marketing to reduce costs and possibly to ensure the two events/shows are seen as one organisation by the public.

• Masterman, G. (2004a) A strategic approach for the use of sponsorship in the events industry: A search of a return on investment. In Festival and Events Management: An International Arts and Cultural Perspective, Yeoman, I., Robertson, M., Ali-Knight, J., McMahon-Beattie, U. and Drummond, S. (ads). Butterworth-Heinemann

Television advertising

Watch this...

OK now for some good old traditional TV advertising... above is the ad shown on ITV in the last few weeks of the X-factor television show.

The first thing about this is that it will immediately hit its target audience obviously because they are all likely to be watching the show! This is also a natural progression for the TV show as towards then end of the series is when an increasing amount of people will be tuning in.

With regards to the theme and production of the advert, it is definitely matched against the TV shows. It also appears to be an extension of the show and a vehicle for the audiences to continue and fully round off the whole X-factor experience by that I mean all the original competitors are back for one final time to perform in the same performance before they break off and continue their own careers.

This ad is likely to be a very cheap production as it uses clips from the ITV1 show and just imposes text over the top. I believe this ad is impeccable to the whole campaign of the Live Tour despite its relative easy construction. This is because if it was not shown potential attendees could possibly assume the Tour is not going ahead as in previous years, also in this case from all my previous research there does not appear to much in the way of pushing ticket sales.. therefore I would assume most of the sales are likely to be generated off the back of the TV shows, more than likely as Christmas presents!

I will be back to compare any television advertisement for the Ideal Home Show tomorrow!

A little while later...

So I could not actually find any television advertisement for the 2012 show.. but i did find one from previous years show, my thoughts are that maybe this years ad will go live on TV next week in the lead up to the show starting. As I have previously said in previous posts, this sort of event, which runs for a number of weeks/days is more likely to attract the spontaneous punter as the whole excursion to London will not be based around this show, unlike the X-factor Live Tour.

Another point to make about the ad is that it has many celebrity endorsements and appearances, this is something that is extremely strong in the whole advertising campaign and is something I will discuss in my next post...

Tooooooobe ads

Hi again.. Last Thursday, I found myself going on a last minute trip to London with Chris, Callum & Badger from the Events course... the intention was more about chilling out and paying a visit to the famous Camden Town rather than educational blogging uni work!

Having said that as we were negotiating the crowds on the tube... and Badger was discovering that you need to stand to the right because Londoners won't ask you to move! I spotted an ad for the Ideal Home Show... but photographing it appeared to be more difficult.

Badger on the other hand... even while not being the most sober person in the world managed to capture this ---->>

At the end of a night after enjoying Camden and having a skin full of booze, we spotted another advertisement on the tube. Callum insisted on getting in on the act for this one... and yes we were those annoying drunk people on the tubes and trains that night...

Callum loving the train 

I would like to say I looked out for X-fatctor Live Tour advertisement as well, but this wasn't the case..

But I think tube advertisement is definitely more suited to the Ideal Home Show based upon the concept of the show, by that I mean it is the type of event you can drop in and out of the show over the two weeks, therefore potential attendees will see the ad and will consider a visit over the next week or so. But The X-factor Live Tour is more of a one off show type of event, where attendees will plan there night around the show. Spontaneous visits will be higher with the Ideal Home Show.

Tube advertisement is immensely valuable in London, as the tube carries around 1,107 million passengers per year! Also according to CBS Outdoor, the company who sell the ads to companies, 87% of commuters enjoy the advertisements as a welcome break from the monotony of the journey. Some more statistics include each passenger waits on the platform for an average of 3 minutes and spends around 13 minutes inside the carriage! Its a no brainer really... if you need to promote an event in London and can afford the tube ads... its a must have!

Social medial junkie

Apologies for the delay in updating you with the media coverage of the two events... had a birthday to deal with!

But here we go anyway.. the next area I  want to look at is how the two events use social media to connect, advertise and communicate with their target audience. So the obvious place to go first... is Facebook (FB), I was quite surprised to find out that the X-factor Live Tour didn't have a designated Facebook page to its event, however it did have a page for the TV show and general hype around it.

The first thing I noticed about the page is that it covers absolutely everything X-factor from the live shows, which I am interested in, down too how One Direction (third place in 2010s competition) done in this years Brit Awards. This must have been something the PR people at X-factor decided upon to include all information and updates in one single FB page and not to break it up into different years competitions and/or the Live Tour shows for the respected years!

Taken from the FB page 28 Feb

Taken from the FB page 28 Feb

With this single social media portal the organisers seem to have taken its no surprise that the FB page is overwhelmed with posts about different aspects of the brand. Having said that I took the time to flick back though the page and pick out the posts relating to the Tour. There was a large gap between posts up to three weeks, baring in mind that the live shows were due to start in Manchester on Saturday 25th Feb, I thought this was considerably late to still be pressing for ticket sales?? However only 5 of the 36 shows had actually sold out, and it was due to run until early April.

Apart from posts drumming up ticket sales the only other posts were links to articles on the main X-factor website with exclusive behind the scene material of the build up and rehearsals of the show, one other post that they did have was a picture of Little Mix rehearsing a couple of days before the live shows.

Another thing to notice about the page is the lack of media content it has, the videos posted on there are mostly from 2010s show and pictures and very limited as well. Overall despite having 4.5million 'Likes' I feel that the FB page is not a particularly a high priority for the marketing team at X-factor.

Taken from IHS website
28 Feb

Ok, now my impressions of the Ideal Home Show is that social media is not going to be its main stream of marketing but I checked it out anyway. First thing which jumps out at me is the fact they have a quick link bar on their own website home page which links to FB, Twitter, Ideal Home Show Plus and a calendar download.

Taken from the FB page 28 Feb

The number of 'Likes' are fairly dismal compared to the previous event standing at 2,190! The benefit of this page is that all the content is relevant to the event and I would expect anyone who has liked the page is generally interested in either attending or has at least considered attending.

The page appears to mainly be used to post additions to attraction lineup due to be on show are the event and extra information about current attractions. Not once has the 'Ideal Home Show team' posted with the intention of pushing ticket sales, however they have created an event which would have been sent to all its fans. But this suggests that they way they use the page is to add value to its fans.. and maybe they realise this  is not going to be where tickets are sold?!

Earlier in january there were a few posts that caught my eye as they were advertising competitions that fans could get involved with and had the chance to win various prizes such as kitchens too other home products. These were all posted as links to the events home page on their website.

So to compare I don't think that the pages are fundamental to their respective marketing strategies, as they don't appear to be involving potential attendees as much as I would expect. By this i mean there are other features on Facebook such as the questionnaire feature, which were not used by either event, along with the lack in additional media content.

The Ideal Home Show appears to use FB to connect with attendees by commenting on their posts which range from questions about the event to just comments that they have purchased tickets. X-factor also have this interaction but due to the large number of fans, when they post something the comments turn into a mini forum where many people add their views and often this conversation stream spirals into other areas.

There should be another post coming by the end of this week so stay tuned!...

Olympic venues

One thing both the venues for my events have in common are that they are both going to play a part in the up and coming London 2012 Olympic Games, Earls Court is going to host the volleyball competitions and Wembley Arena is going to host the badminton and rhythmic gymnastics.

You may wonder why I chose to bring this up... well the Olympics is the reason I went to visit Wembley Arena, after being selected to be part of the volunteer army which is needed to make the games happen I had a orientation and training session on the Sunday just gone. Therefore thought I would get some good venue research done for this blog!

The journey into London wasn't as straight forward as I had hoped... I'll just show the pictures as I think they will tell a better story.

View from my flat as I woke up

There's something not quite right here...

Ok so eventually I got to Wembley Arena and proceeded to look for advertising for the up and coming events and shows. I quickly came across plenty of large posters promoting all kinds of events scheduled at the arena including of course the X-Factor Live Tour.

Taken inside Wembley Arena 5 Feb 2012

Taken inside Wembley Arena 5 Feb 2012

I continued to walk round the venue and soon spotted various information desks and stands with a selection of marketing leaflets again about various events, amongst these was Wembley Arenas Events Guide.

Front and back cover of Wembley Arena's Events Guide

Inside Wembley Arena's Events Guide

Also on the stand was a specific handout for X-Factor Live Tour as seen below, I was expecting this to be a smaller version of the posters which were dotted around the building, but they weren't, however judging by the full dates list it was just a standard handout designed to be used in all venues on the tour.

Promotional leaflet for the X-Factor Live Tour

After visiting Wembley I thought I would take a trip to Earls Court to see if they had a similar amount of advertising materials... in short, they didn't. What they did have was a whole lot of promotional signage advertising the current exhibition, Destinations Holiday & Travel Show. I expect they will have a similar amount of marketing for the Ideal Home Show in a months time, but I will definitely go down there and have a look!

Taken outside Earls Court 5 Feb 2012

Inside the venue's foyer I didn't find any posters of the Ideal Home show, or any other up and coming event at Earls Court, although I did find a "What's on" poster tucked away in a fire escape corridor which did have a small piece of text relating to the Ideal Home show!

Taken inside Earls Court 5 Feb 2012

Taken inside Earls Court 5 Feb 2012

Situated on the only reception/information desk was a "What's on" leaflet, this had some basic text about the show and the shows web address. (Exactly the same information as the poster above!)

Inside Earls Court's What's On leaflet

So what did I actually find out...?

Well Wembley Arena had an obvious higher level of promotional materials on site and appeared to be actively advertising future events to all they're visitors. Whereas Earls Court appeared to focus much more in transforming the venue to suit the current exhibition or show and any material they did have was either hidden or was trying not to take attention away from the Destination Holiday & Travel Show.

The X-Factor Live Show leaflet which I picked up from Wembley and in fact all the leaflets on the stand appeared to not be one particular style or design... this suggests that these are all produced by the promoter/organiser rather than the venue.

Im not really sure what the next post will be about but I've got plenty to go on... so stay tuned!

Target Audience

To find the target audience for the Ideal Home Show was remarkably easy... as they listed a visitor profile on their website within the Interested in Exhibiting section. So section done right?... well probably not as this is university so I should apply some thoughts, views and compare the two events!

http://www.idealhomeshow.co.uk/interested-in-exhibiting/

So moving on to the X-factor Live Tour, I was hoping for similar results and nicely presented list of who they actively target their marketing at... after looking through the X-factor's main website (because there isn't a dedicated Live Tour site), as expected this wasn't the case. I then thought that if I could get a profile of the average viewer to the X-factor's television shows, as this would be the same audience as the Live Tour. So I went on the hunt to find ITV's advertising website and as expected found a profile of the average viewer to the show. 

http://www.itvmedia.co.uk/the-x-factor

Right down to comparing the two! Without even reading the information it was obvious that the Ideal Home Show's information was much more comprehensive, which could suggest that the target audience is more niche than the X-factor. This is backed up by a Guardian report into the viewing figures for X-factor compared to Strictly Come Dancing on BBC1, this report states that despite a drop from 17.2 million views of the final in 2010 a staggering 13.1 million people still tuned in to the 2011 final which is a fifth of the UK's population. 

With such a large capture from the X-factor there are almost definitely overlaps with people who will attend the Ideal Home Show and the X-factor Live Tour, one similarity I have noticed is that they both have a high interest in attracting females. Even though the ITV site doesn't state the per cent of males to females... I would expect it is not too dissimilar to Ideal Home Show. (I may have to look into this more)

X-fractor is obviously going to appeal to a younger audience as it hits their interests and hobbies on the head... and the fact that not many people own a house/flat in their late teens and early twenties! 

This pretty much is all I can say based on the information I have... I think I might have another look into the X-factor to see if I can find any reports or newspaper articles on the target profile!

• http://www.idealhomeshow.co.uk/interested-in-exhibiting/
• http://www.itvmedia.co.uk/the-x-factor
• http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2011/dec/12/x-factor-strictly-come-dancing-viewing-figures