TV sponsorship has evolved considerably over the last ten years or so, and is recognised as a powerful option for marketers.

Over recent years the rules have relaxed allowing sponsors more freedom over what and how they sponsor. We can now sponsor not only programmes, but strands of programming, dayparts and even whole channels. And although the market is growing at a phenomenal rate, sponsorship can still be a relatively cheap way to start advertising on television or to boost and leverage TV presence.

It is a highly effective method for clients to communicate their message by association and alliance to a specific programme or collection of programmes. Brands benefit from the perceived values that the programme delivers and can inherit these through a successful partnership.

More than anything though, good sponsorship can provide effective cut-through and targeted communication to specific viewing audiences. And of course, these days, fans of a particular programme might watch the show on first broadcast, or on a +1 channel, or later on via their DTR (Digital Television recorder), or when they want to, on-demand. Wherever the show goes, the sponsor can go too.

Here are some questions you may wish to ask yourself if you are considering this way of using TV, in the form a guide.

Overview

Many TV programmes are themselves powerful brands. Their prestige and popularity can impact on those brands associated with them. With the sponsor's credits running directly ahead of the programme, optimal viewer attention is guaranteed.

If the creative idea for the credits is engaging and relevant to them, viewers of all ages welcome sponsors as supporters of their favourite TV programmes. Many have said that if a programme is sponsored, it must be good!

Sponsorship can deliver a consistency of audience, time of day and environment that is expensive to replicate through the traditional media buy.

What do you want to achieve and what to sponsor?

What you choose to sponsor depends on your priorities, target audience, and of course your budget.

Your objectives dictate the programming to choose and how to best leverage the association. These are the crucial questions to ask yourself:

• Do you want to make a new product famous fast?
• Do you want to reposition or de-seasonalise your product?
• Do you want to take the high ground in a competitive market?
• Do you have a variety of products or variants to display over time that do not have a TV advertising budget?
• Or do you want to change perceptions of your brand?

Sponsorship can be used to launch a brand. For example Farmhouse Fare lacked awareness and needed to appeal to ABC1 women and promote family pudding for sharing. They sponsored The Royal on ITV1 on Sunday evening, which was a perfect time to reach families watching TV together. Awareness rose from 11% to 50%, Tesco doubled its business with the company and sales were up 41% year on year.

The Thinkbox research TV sponsorship: a brand's best friend established that sponsorship can help make brands famous by association. The study shows that for fans of the content, brand fame is increased by up to 10%. Brand fame is a key drive of effectiveness. The study also showed that sponsorship not only makes brands famous but increases purchase intent, favourability and 'for me-ness'.

Sponsorship can tie in with seasonal activity. Sainsbury's sponsored Christmas on UKTV; a sponsorship that included 700 hours of programming over 6 weeks and reached c. 70% of housewives.

Sponsorship can be used to drive response. These days, brand activation is a more important part of the mix and the accessibility of response channels - especially online - means that consumers can respond or find out more much more easily than in previous eras. The result of all this is that we are getting increasing evidence that programme sponsorships can generate significant levels of consumer activity in themselves.

For example, Vodafone sponsored Channel 4's 'Secret Millionaire' programme (a reality show featuring wealthy philanthropists looking for deserving causes in deprived communities) to promote their 'World of Difference' community volunteering initiative. Applications doubled on the previous year and the programme sponsorship was shown to be by far the most cost-effective means of generating search as well as perceptual change

Nokia sponsored Channel 4's 'Misfits' series (an edgy sci-fi drama series) to promote their new Ovi apps store to a 15-24 year old audience. The sponsorship creative encouraged viewers to download the Ovi app that would provide access to bespoke and exclusive content. Success was measured across a range of key indicators; direct downloads, total downloads (including viral), sign-ups to the Nokia music store, viral activity and social media 'buzz' all reached or exceeded their target levels

Thinkbox has explored the power of online as a response channel for TV in several research studies. This is creating shorter, more intuitive and effective consumer journeys, and the viewer is fully prepared to respond to the right 'message' or brand communication. Even programme sponsorships, which rarely even contain a call to action, are benefitting from this complementary relationship.

All in all, there are quite a lot of things sponsorship can do for your brand, and you can find many examples in our sponsorship case studies here.

Aside from your marketing aims, also consider timing and risk. TV programmes have a lifecycle. Some burn brightly for short periods of time, others display a more classic curve of growth, maturity and decline over a longer period (like many American comedy series). And some, of course, simply run and run.

The trade-off is between being new and exciting vs established with a more guaranteed return. It is true that fortune can favour the brave, as the first sponsors of Big Brother and Popstars discovered, but some options will be more of a known quantity than others.

All of these factors, together with the expertise to be found at your Agencies and Media Owners, will determine the best option for you.

The Question of Fit

Some sponsors are looking to stand out quickly, and deliver a boost to their advertising during a key sales period. Some need to launch a product and arrive on the market with a bang. Either way, sponsorship can mean a reappraisal of the brand. The most important thing in the brief is to decide where your brand is now and where you want to take it.

For example: Bailey's famously used their sponsorship of Sex and the City to totally reposition their brand and move it from a seasonal drink to one throughout the year. It's a classic sponsorship triangle - with the pull of the programme moving the perceptions of the brand, and doing so very successfully both in terms of reappraisal and sales.

Many of the most successful sponsorships have started off feeling a little uncomfortable, but ended with the audience perceiving a perfect fit as the "pull" of the programme moves people's views of the brand to precisely where you want it to be.

Other brands use a closer fit to reinforce a message. For example, Givenchy wanted to associate their fragrances with a programme property that reflected the high quality and glamorous nature of their brands. The Oscars on Sky were a natural fit.

Creative Work On Screen

The most crucial area to get right is on-screen credits. These are how the audience will judge the brand. They should engage the audience while bringing out a common value between product and programme, which gains credibility in the territory you want to occupy. It's vital to make sure that the on screen work has enough time and investment to produce something you can be proud of. It should never be left until the last minute or unplanned within the budget.

The Thinkbox research TV sponsorship: a brand's best friend (carried out by Duckfoot), found that the best results come about when the sponsorship bumpers successfully introduced the brand into the emotional relationship that the viewer had with their programme. Where there was a more of an obvious link between a sponsorship bumper's creative content and the programme content, the brand performed better across all the key measures. You can read more about our research findings, particularly how sponsorship works on the implicit mind here.

We've also put together a section on how you can get the most from your TV sponsorship creative here. It's a mix of insight and tips.

Off air

There are many off-air rights options available for promoting your product to different sections of the audience. No two sponsorship plans are the same in design, even when a programme has been sponsored previously. It all depends on who you need to talk to and your market territory.

A product in the FMCG market may use licensed promotions at the point of sale. One in the Computer Games market may favour a mobile telephone solution; in the Travel sector an online solution, in the Music industry a live event - and some may require a mix.

You can extend sponsorship to social media. A visible sponsor that matches the TV programme adds 'official' status to a Facebook group. The bigger opportunity, of course, is to bring something new to the party: for example, with exclusive information, access to tickets or content, or with competitions and prizes.

You can extend your sponsorship onto Web TV. Most programmes either have a presence in a bespoke area of the TV company site or can be accessed online via catch up. Being online, sponsorship bumpers and other on-site advertising that is placed around the programme content can carry click-throughs to advertiser sites.

Online TV provides a powerful environment for TV content sponsors. Thinkbox's Me-TV: The Future of On Demand research study found that amongst newer advertising formats that could be provided online, including digital overlays, in-skin advertising and the Hulu 'choose your ad' model, programme sponsorship bumpers were by far the most popular formats. This is in large part because the bulk of the online TV audience is there to catch up with their favourite broadcast shows and they want to view those shows in as similar a context as when they are viewing on their main TV screen.

You can extend your sponsorship via the red button. For example, viewers pressing red around 'I'm a Celebrity Get me out of here' were lead to content of all sorts sponsored by Iceland. There, they could also access individual profiles for Iceland brand ambassadors, the awareness of which was driven from the IACGMOOH sponsorship idents, TV commercials and in store promotions. Over the period of the show, 2.4 million adults used the interactive service with 40% (1.5m) of interactors visiting the Iceland area more then once AND 17% visiting nearly every episode.

Measurement

Research Specialists and Media Owners provide bespoke solutions to each client. Many also have longer term tracking studies available. The basic challenge for any sponsorship is to isolate the sponsorship effect as far as possible from other activity that may be running in parallel. So we often test differences in attitude, awareness and likelihood to purchase among those who have seen the sponsorship (i.e viewers to the programming) vs those who haven't. This requires pre and post research and a mixture of qualitative and quantative testing. Because you need to prove your money has been well spent, research planning can't be an afterthought. Your objectives need to be clear and realistic from the outset.

Although there's plenty of evidence and a barrage of case studies (many here on the Thinkbox website) demonstrating the power and effectiveness of sponsorship, the Thinkbox research TV sponsorship: a brand's best friend demonstrated that the effects of sponsorship are felt most strongly on the emotional and implicit mind, which means that tradition explicit, recall-based methods of evaluation are destined to underestimate the true value of TV sponsorship.

You can read more about evaluation techniques here.

Seven points to take away

1. Sponsorship works by the brand becoming part of the relationship the viewer has with their programme
2. Bumpers work most efficiently when they facilitate the brand entering this relationship
3. Sponsorship works on the emotional mind
4. It works better long term
5. Brands can also adopt the personality of programmes
6. This leads to brands becoming more famous, more for me, more of a favourite and more likely to be bought
7. Sponsorship should be measured & appreciated in these terms