2023 course underway | Next intake January 2024

Photocredit: URBAN REC
The ESA Diploma is designed for practitioners of all levels who wish to learn more about the commercial world of sponsorship and sports marketing. Its flexible, web-based platform enables its students to study when convenient, fitting around all aspects of their lives. Since its launch in 2012, the Diploma is now widely regarded as mandatory for those wishing to successfully develop a career in the exciting and challenging world of sponsorship and related marketing.
Ever since its inception, the course has attracted candidates from across the industry spectrum – sponsors, rights holders, agencies, suppliers and post-graduates – and increasingly internationally, with many different countries having had successful candidates since 2012. The 2023 intake will be the 12th iteration of the course, with well over 600 practitioners having now successfully qualified.
For a broader view and what the ESA Diploma entails, here is a video of Peter Raymond, the Course Director, holding an introductory session for the course. He explains its benefits, how it is structured, and outlines what it takes to be successful.
Watch the video here
The ESA Diploma is constantly refined and updated and all of its components are annually influenced by feedback received from its students immediately after each course. It provides a true 360-degree view of the industry, including numerous best practice guidelines and hundreds of case studies featuring highly effective partnerships in action. The ESA Diploma is essentially about the industry training itself, raising standards and providing a qualification which prepares candidates for a long and successful career in sponsorship and sports marketing, in particular, and marketing, in general.
The Class of ’23 will be able to take advantage of updated learning materials and demonstrate their knowledge via a series of stimulating learning exercises (updated to be more approachable and refined) and a long-term project involving a real-life sponsorship challenge. There will be a series of digital class seminars presented by a wide-range of industry luminaries as well as newly-initiated social gatherings to enable valuable networking.
To celebrate the start of our second decade, the ESA Diploma Scholarship was created in 2022 to help grow the diversity of the sponsorship industry by offering one applicant a place on the annual ESA Diploma course. We believe that together we can create an industry-wide movement that promotes an inclusive approach to dialogue and thought leadership, welcoming diverse perspectives and allowing each of us to be ourselves, while shaping the future of international sponsorship – see here for more information and to apply for 2023.
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