Havas_SE European Music Festivals Sponsorship Research

02 | DIGGING THE DIRT ON FESTIVAL SPONSORSHIP

IN THE SUMMER of 2011 we LIVED, BREATHED, TASTED and sometimes even SMELLED FESTIVALS

IN THE SUMMER of 2011 we LIVED, BREATHED, TASTED and sometimes even SMELLED FESTIVALS


HERE’S HOW WE DID IT:

3 months in 2011

6 of the largest European music festivals

6 countries

2,244 surveys

JUNE

JULY

AUGUST

FRANCE

UK

SPAIN

ITALY

GER

MA

NY POLAND

fansfrom30

countrieshailing

from500cities

Alongside a comparative study of non-festival goers

Over 70 personal interviews conducted onsite

66 sponsor activations analyzed including:


HERE’S WHAT WE WANTED TO LEARN:

CAN THEY LIVE TOGETHER IN PERFECT HARMONY?

PEACE, LOVE &

ROCK’n’ROLLBRANDS

Whatever the answer, here’s THE INESCAPABLE FACT:

SPONSOR

without SPONSORS, most FESTIVALS couldn’t happen

…and festival-goers seem to RECOGNIZE, ACCEPT, and APPRECIATE sponsors for this.


Let’s meet the FESTIVAL-GOERS:

54% are female

are under 25 years old

ARE EMPLOYED

They spendHALF as much time watching TV

VS the average consumer (116 minutes versus 229 minutes per day)*

* Source: HS&E music study and Eurodata NOTA

64% of them

compared to only 25% for non-festival goers

SHOPONLINE

They are TWICE as likely to participate in cultural activities

than their non-festival attending peers

They’re COMMITTED.

go to at least THREE other music events a year

They are VOCAL

71.9% recommend products and services they like.

37.6% think people come to themfor their opinions on products

and services before they buy

And last summer (2011)

there were roughly 2.6 million of them across Europe.


THEY REJECT BRAND ADVERTISING

Less than 11.3% find advertising interesting

Over two thirds think advertising is a ‘waste of time’

Some don’t even notice it (25% of fans online and 18.5% on TV claim not to see advertising)

Only 20.4% think advertising helps when making purchasing decisions

Less than 33% ‘like advertising’

But the GOOD NEWS is, they don’t reject BRANDS:

Out of the 2,244 fans surveyed, only TWO didn’t notice any sponsor onsite

On average they noticed 5.8 out of every 10 brands onsite

65.2% think that brand partners actually improve the festival experience

85% LIKED the activations they visited

32.5% would visit the brand’s website as a result of the sponsorship

36% agreed they would be more likely to purchase a sponsor’s product AFTER the event

Festival fans are MORE receptive and aware of brand sponsors than the general public:

They’re ACTIVE, ENGAGED and most importantly VOCAL about the things they LIKE.


FIT is everything. A brand’s DNA determines it

A snapshot of brand types’ ‘fit’ score – graded by festival goers, onsite*:

Title sponsor | Beer | Radio station | Drink | Mobile phone | TV brand | Transportation | Clothing | Bank

2

4

6

8

108.4

BRAND

8.0 7.7 7.06.4 6.0 5.7 5.3

4.2

*minimum 3 sponsors per category

In terms of recall, BEER brands score highest – often remembered more than even the title sponsor. But ANY brand stands to gain AS LONG AS they master the art of BRAND ENGAGEMENT.

SO WHAT ARE THE BIG TAKE OUTS?

• BRANDS MAKE FESTIVALS (they couldn’t happen without them)

• BRANDS CAN MAKE THE FESTIVAL EXPERIENCE BETTER

• THE 2.6 MILLION FANS AT EUROPE’S FESTIVALS CAN (and should) BE YOUR BRANDS’ BFF*. They know what they like, they know what they dislike and most importantly, they VOCALIZE their likes and dislikes to influence their peers.

• FestivalgoersareCULTURED, considered, INTERESTED and most importantly, EARLY ADOPTERS

• Theaudienceisonline,so BE THERE TOO.

*Best friend forever


SIZE matters. The biggest brand activations attracted more fans – a minimum of +40%

Check list for success:

BE BIG!

74.4% visited one stand, 25.1% visited 3 or more. 5% visited 5 or more.

STAND OUT!

80% of fans felt strongly that brands should have a green strategy

BE GREEN

BE GREENBE G

REEN

BUT BE CAREFUL...

felt that sponsoring brands were ‘imposing’...

... thought they were ‘tasteless’!

19.2%32.9%

Instigate LONG TERM RELATIONSHIPS through:

REAL INVOLVEMENT

UNEXPECTED

but relevant

experiences

unobtrusive DATA capture

I agree

meaningful ongoing

dialogue online

…and most of all, give them something they’ll love to talk about

W E U!


SPORTS & ENTERTAINMENT: an interesting discovery

Their passion for SPORT directly relates to their INTERACTION WITH SPONSORS

SPONSOR

Fans interested in sport visited over twice as many brand stands on average (3.7 versus 1.6) and remembered 55% more brands onsite

A FINAL MESSAGE FOR ORGANIZERS & BRANDS

Your audience is online, WHY AREN’T YOU?

Festival-goers spend 220% MORE time online than the average global consumer.

BUT despite the 60.1% of festival goers with active social media accounts, only 9.1% of fans heard about the festival via social media. So HALF the festival audience isn’t engaging with theevent via social media.

9.1%

Festivals with an active Facebook account stimulate twice as much auxiliary online buzz as festivals without.

We discovered that fans heard about a festival via word of mouth (65.7%) – nearly half of them (45.3%) hearing about it EXCLUSIVELY via word of mouth. So they weren’t exposed to ANY other communication.


Be THERE, be UNEXPECTED, add VALUE to their experience and the fans will LOVE YOU!

About Havas Sports & Entertainment | We’re the brand engagement network of the Havas Group. We help brands connect with fans by putting people’s passions at the center of the conversation. We do it through sponsorship, content creation, partnerships, social media, and live brand experiences.

Who we are | Over 550 dynamic and creative individuals spread across 35 offices in 20 countries. Our network includes Havas Sports & Entertainment, the Cake Group, and ignition.

Our music expertise | From driving buzz for Burn energy drink to leveraging the partnership between MTV and Hyundai, to blending extreme sports and live music for Snickers, to handling PR for Virgin Media’s V Festival, and staging major music events for Motorola, Vodafone, Axe, and Ben & Jerry’s, we are leaders in music PR and music event production.

Be THERE, be UNEXPECTED, add VALUE to their experience and the fans will LOVE YOU!

Why we did this study | To be totally credible when advising our clients, we wanted to go further than ticket sales, media coverage and gut feel by living the experience alongside music fans to determine what makes festival sponsors entertaining, memorable and welcomed.

Intrigued and hungry for more? | We had to condense three months of research into this little booklet, so we left a few juicy bits out. Contact Christopher Rapaport, Network Business Development and Global Research Manager via email [email protected] or phone, +33 (0)1 58 47 84 28 or visit www.havas-se.com to get the full lowdown, including those tasty nuggets we didn’t include such as what matters more to festival goers, which brands really bring festivals to life and why, and which ones don’t.

Havas_SE European Music Festivals Sponsorship Research

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