What’s your name and position within the organisation?
Mark Covington, CEO of SNAP Sponsorship
How did SNAP Sponsorship come to work with Rights Holders and Brands? What ‘bigger picture’ did this relationship seek to meet?
My own rugby club started a journey to redevelop the clubhouse to future proof its ability to offer great facilities to boys and girls, men and women alike. This resulted in a £1.2 m spend and a considerable loan to service.
As a club, we had historically relied on the generosity of members to introduce their own companies as ‘sponsors’ and their own individual philanthropy. This approach is commonplace across large parts of amateur sport, and this – over time – has resulted in an over reliance on unpredictable, unrepeatable and unreliable revenue for individuals and clubs.
SNAP embarked on a mission to bring technology to the heart of best practice in sponsorship. Today we have www.snapsponsorship.com which enables Rights Holders and Brands to manage their portfolio, make informed future investment decisions and share and learn from best practice.
The bigger picture is set to make rights available everywhere, to everyone, opening the market to brands globally with no need for an ‘expert’ to over-complicate the theory or execution.
How is the effectiveness of the relationship(s) measured? What metrics do you use?
Depending on the objectives of the Brand’s campaign or Rights Holder’s needs, we use a range of scoring matrices to determine ‘success’. Over the past six years, it’s become clear that attribution to ROI and demonstration of value to the boardroom is on the rise. We look at repeat investment trends, retention and referral to measure internal success.
What are the current trends within your business area, and how are they affecting how you work and how you deliver on strategy?
Brands now have a route to market that previously didn’t exist from a cost effective, access perspective. Now they do, it’s changing the landscape and making local impact possible.
We are currently seeing Rights Holders invest in acquiring rights to broaden their own portfolio. Our ability to deliver on strategy couldn’t be better, as we have positioned ourselves uniquely in a space which solves the problems that have been causing Brands and Right Holders pain as the marketplace evolves. Brands now have a route to market that previously didn’t exist from a cost effective, access perspective. Now they do, it’s changing the landscape and making local impact possible.
How has sponsorship changed in your industry over the past few years? And how do you think it’s going to change in the next five years?
We are seeing an increasing shift towards hyper localisation as brands aspire to become more impactful in the day-to-day lives of consumers and potential consumers.
In the next five years, I believe we will continue to see a shift towards hyper localisation as brands seek to engage both directly and as part of wider activations for flagship investments such as World Cups, the Olympics and regional tournaments such as the Six Nations.
I also believe that standalone assets and activations contained within single Rights Holder entities, and transactions made in isolation, will continue to decline at an astonishing rate.
How are you harnessing and executing on digital strategy, and what problems / opportunities has this created?
This only further strengthens our desire to allow the community to drive and shape the future development of the system as they become increasingly engaged.
We are putting digital at the heart of all our activity. Our platform breaks all boundaries and empowers Brands and Rights Holders alike to regain control of what they have, how they use it and how it performs.
The problem with the level of traction we have seen, is that clubs and brands all want new functionality and enhancements to the system from day one. This only further strengthens our desire to allow the community to drive and shape the future development of the system as they become increasingly engaged.
The strength of this desire for change has resulted in both global brands and SMEs, international stadia, Local Authority and grass roots Right Holders getting in the same room to define what’s possible and how we can bring sponsorship into the 21st century.
What challenges have you encountered, and how have they been overcome?
Our biggest challenge has been to build something that doesn’t exclude any user groups. We had to pick a sport for the beta system, which we did (Rugby). However our phase 2 launch sees multi sport, public sector and individuals brought into the system and mapping all the data requirements is a huge and complex task.
All these challenges have been overcome by working with key stakeholders from all industries, to gain their valuable input, shaping the solution with the people it is intended for!
Contact Mark:
t: +44 (0)1483 617222
e: info@snapsponsorship.com
www.snapsponsorship.com