The different approaches to sports sponsorship
CSM joined Mastercard, foodpanda and AIA at the SportsPro APAC Conference in Singapore on the 1st August. Regional Director for Asia, Kathryn Rhodes, moderated a panel discussing the various sports sponsorship strategies taken by brands in the region. Kaveri Khullar, VP for Consumer Marketing & Partnerships talked to Mastercard’s diverse portfolio of impressive global partnerships across tennis, football, golf, cricket, rugby and esports. Anna Znamenskaya, CMO for APAC for foodpanda, in comparison, detailed their localised approach, with individual partnerships and strategies across their 11 key markets in the region. Lastly, Melita Teo, Chief Customer and Data Officer for AIA Singapore, celebrated the recent Spurs pre-season tour to Singapore and the power of football to connect and bring together people from all walks of life and all ages.
All agreed that a strategy should be rooted in consumer data and insights, ensuring that their various sponsorship strategies appealed to target audience passion points. By doing so, their sport partnerships become central to driving brand consideration and preference against their competitors. For Mastercard, identifying 11 key passions globally has helped them create a diverse portfolio that can be utilised to appeal to passion points on a global and regional scale both in men’s and women’s sport. foodpanda spoke to their hyper-localised approach to position themselves as a local brand in each market, utilising the love of basketball in the Philippines as their starting point with a local partnership like the NBA for example.
Finally, to ensure clear ROI for all partnerships, the panel agreed the approach is often test, learn, and evolve. For AIA and Mastercard, this is through how they activate long standing partnerships. AIA are celebrating 10 years of their partnership with Tottenham Hotspur and have shifted the activation from pure brand awareness to the partnership being central to their brand promise of encouraging people to live Healthier, Longer, Better Lives. Integrating the power of football with supporting communities across Asia through their AIA Better Lives Fund initiatives. With CSM’s support over the last 10 years, AIA activates year-round across digital, hospitality, year-round community coaching and incentive-led campaigns that drive brand & business metrics.
Thank you to SportsPro for bringing us together, and we look forward to next year!