Spectators’ experiences at the sport and entertainment facility: The key for increasing attendance over the season

Attending live sporting events is a popular leisure and entertainment activity in contemporary European societies, none more important than football (the sport Americans refer to as soccer). For example, according to Deloitte’s (2014) annual report about the football industry, the top 20 European clubs generated combined revenues of over €5.4 billion in 2012-13, including almost €1.2 billion in gate receipts. However, due to myriad aspects such as the difficult economic environment in many countries, the increased competition of other leisure/entertainment activities, the importance of selling broadcasting rights, and the development of new technologies, clubs now face the challenge of retaining and even increasing this high demand. In this sense, clubs need to look for the games as regular opportunities to strengthen the link with current and prospective spectators by providing memorable consumption and/or entertainment experiences that include more than just the competition between two teams on the field, court, ice, track, or better yet, the stage

Sponsorship of the 2016 Rio Olympic Games: An empirical examination of the reactions to local sponsors and rival brands

This study examines awareness, congruence, attitudes and purchase intentions of three local sponsors of the 2016 Rio Olympic Games and their strongest rival brands, and tests the relationships among congruence, attitudes and purchase intentions of both actual sponsors and their rivals. Data were collected through an online questionnaire (n = 621). Results indicated that awareness was significantly higher for only one of the sponsors. Neither congruence nor attitude toward the brand was higher for local sponsors when compared to their rival brands. Purchase intentions were significantly lower for local sponsors. Attitude toward the brand was significantly related to purchase intentions for all local sponsors and their rival brands. These findings suggest the need for local sponsors to engage in leveraging activities and to partner with the host to explain their role in the event's success. This study also draws attention to the importance for brands to carefully select the events to invest

When sponsorship causes anger: understanding negative fan reactions to postings on sports clubs’ online social media channels

Research question: Fans’ perception that sponsors are a financial need illustrating the increased commercialisation in sports is not always aligned with their view of a club’s culture. This perceived imbalance represents a challenge in the online marketing strategies of sports clubs. When club managers decide on the content of online social media posts/messages related to sponsors, they should be aware of potential fan reactions. Therefore, this study analyses how sponsor-related and other online social media communication of football clubs affect fan reactions. Research methods: We analyse Facebook postings (N = 4,603) published by German first division football clubs. After classifying postings regarding their content, we regress ‘Reactions’, ‘Shares’, and ‘Angry’ reactions on the content variable and further covariates. Linear regression models, Poisson regression models, and general dominance statistics are used for exploring variance within the data. Results and Findings: Fans react considerably angrier to sponsor-related posts than to other content except for defeat-related postings. Regarding overall reactions and shares, sponsor-related posts perform worst among different contents. In addition, the content of posts is elementary to negative reactions, but of less importance to overall reaction rates. Implications: Sports managers and sponsors should be aware of the potential negative shift in reactions when using clubs’ social media channels to share sponsor-related content. We recommend releasing sponsor-related posts as videos on game days to decrease the fraction of negative responses and simultaneously maximise the overall reactions.</p

Airline environmental sustainability actions and CSR impact on customer behavior

Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) are growing concerns among passengers and airlines. However, the communication of such actions by airline companies is underexplored. Accordingly, this study aims to analyze airlines' CSR and Environmental Sustainability Actions (ESA) communications' impact on customer loyalty, through a Relationship Marketing (RM) perspective. Following a text-mining approach, 6181 Facebook comments were collected. A word frequency matrix was created from the collected data and used as input for PLS-SEM to test raised hypotheses. Results suggest that communication based on ESA and CSR positively affects behavioral loyalty and commitment. RM moderated ESA's communication impact on customer loyalty but not on the relationship between CSR communication and loyalty. These findings suggest that communicating environmental efforts positively affects customer loyalty, providing airline managers with valuable insights that should be considered within communication strategies to enhance return and customer retention