Consider a firm pursuing a sponsorship with an image-enhancement goal——it must first be able to examine the sport in terms of traits that Will offer meaning to the brand. It may be difiicult for managers to assess the appropriateness of a sponsorship by examining the sport on a multitude of characteristics. Thus, We condone the use of the established Brand Personality Scale (BPS) as a basis of evaluation. Utilizing that scale offers firms operating in a wide variety of product categories the opportunity to assess how various sports or events fit with their brands on factors that impact brand image. By employing the BPS to match compatible brands and sports on dimensions shown to maintain high relevance toé brands, We believe our studies present a methodology that advances previous research and that offers proven relevance in a condensed format.
Summary
As noted earlier, in order clearly to establish and fortify the image of a brand, brand managers _ensure that brand associations are consistent. A sponsorship is a brand association. This would suggest that in a circumstance Where a firm is considering a sponsorship, it should also be acutely aware of the perceived image of the sport or event. Based on the image-by-association hypothesis, While a good personality match might enhance the image of a brand, so a poor match may actually dilute a brand’s image by confusing What the brand stands for. Schema theory Would also support this possibility and suggests that While a sponsorship that appears image consistent would strengthen the brands image schema, a sponsorship association that lacks image fit may disrupt the existing schema.
This result would also have implications for firms entering into a sponsorship for reasons other than image enhancement. There are numerous objectives for engaging in a sponsorship role, but it is important for managers to recognize that there are benefits and risks of sponsorship on a number of fronts. A good personality match may serve both awareness and image functions as a contribution to brand equity. In this case, a sponsorship that maintains a good personality match as Well as a good demographic match literally stands to achieve two benefits for the price of one. The value for the sponsorship dollar is increased as the sponsorship is used as an identity- enhancing vehicle as Well as a name-awareness tool. Risks are introduced if a firm selects an inappropriate sponsorship. Risks may not only be financial (in the form of Wasted dollars on a sport/event that is a poor fit) but, and perhaps more importantly, perceptual (in the threat of diluting brand image). If a firm selects a sponsorship based solely on demographic fit and disregards personality, the image-association messages are still pervasive. Thus, regardless of the sponsorship objective, since the potential for image by association is present, a firm should not ignore the perceived image of the event/sport. We do not argue that all sponsorship opportunities need to be evaluated based solely on goodness of personality fit; however, We would suggest that when assessing these opportunities, personality fit should always be taken into consideration to some degree.
Limitations
The obvious limitation in Study 1 was that it employed a student sample of limited size. A second major limitation of Study 1 was the limited number of brands and sports utilized in the examination. The absence of more brands and sports constrained our ability to conduct a more detailed analysis. Addition- ally, in Study 1 perceptions of sponsorship fit were asked following a series of questions pertaining to personality; hence the potential for bias towards personality-driven