Building an authentic brand through charity sport event sponsorship

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Thesis (PhD Doctorate)
Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)
Dept Tourism, Sport & Hot Mgmt
Griffith Business School
Organisations are required to develop a unique brand as well as meaningful and emotional relationships with their consumers to achieve a sustainable competitive advantage in a crowded marketplace. An increasing number of organisations sponsor charity sport events to assist in achieving these objectives. Charity sport event (CSE) managers and representatives of the sponsor would benefit from the development of an authentic sponsorship program as consumers may form negative attitudes towards corporate partners who partner with an event for overly commercial reasons. Therefore, the purpose of this thesis is twofold. First, this research examined how CSE managers and sponsors can create sponsorship programs that promote the sponsor’s brand in an authentic manner. Secondly, this research investigated how CSE sponsorship programs facilitate the development of meaningful and emotional relationships between CSE participants and sponsors. Three research questions were advanced. The research questions were addressed through an explanatory sequential mixed method research design consisting of three studies. The MS Moonlight Walk is an annual CSE that supports people living with MS and represents the research context of this thesis. The research adopted organisational identification theory and service-dominant logic (S-D logic) as theoretical frameworks. According to organisational identification theory, consumers identify and form emotional relationships with brands, which they perceive as meaningful and distinct. Consequently, Study 1 and Study 2 were guided by organisational identification theory. Study 1 examined how sponsoring a CSE can assist the sponsor to develop meaningful and emotional relationships with event participants. Data were collected from MS Moonlight Walk 2018 participants through pre- and post-event questionnaires. The ii results indicated that event participants were unable to answer the questions included in the questionnaire prior to and after the event