Comment: Looking beyond the logo - December 2007  

Ian Riley, head of corporate marketing at Siemens plc, explains why a sponsorship is not always just about a logo.

When Siemens began to consider which sport would make the ideal partner for our business, we looked for a sport which shared the same values as us and with which we could engage with at a number of different levels. After considering a number of options, rowing, Britain’s most successful Olympic sport was the ideal choice.
Rowing shared our objective of creating a ‘high performance’ culture, is a sport famed for achievement, goal setting and developing a winning mentality.

Identifying a platform

With 26 different business units, Siemens is a diverse company and so it was critical to identify a platform, which would bring all these different businesses together. We wanted a true partnership, one which wasn’t just about a logo on a shirt or a boat but one where we could add real value, for example, bringing our technical know-how and applying it to the sport of rowing. However, having seen other sponsorships sail by without doing much for
employees, we became more and more determined that the Siemens High Performance
Partnership with GB Rowing would bring some of the focus back in-house and in turn benefit our core; those who work for Siemens. We therefore challenged Sponsorship Consulting, our sponsorship consultancy to develop a platform upon which this would take place; the Siemens Indoor Rowing Regatta was born. We invited all our UK employees to jump on a rowing machine at one of 12 heats across the country to try and win a place in the London
final. This might not be a groundbreaking piece of activation in itself, but it paved the way to creating a buzz about rowing inside the company, empowering members of different departments to challenge themselves and each other. Sponsorship is undertaken for commercial benefit, however, can a sponsorship ever achieve maximum gain without the foundation of employee involvement? Should we as sponsors look to directly benefit those most central to the business?

Laying solid foundations

I am glad that Siemens has gone some way to doing this by using a combination of employee-centric ideas and practises, coupled with a sport steeped in success. Hopefully we have created the groundwork for a highly successful programme throughout our sponsorship running until the end of 2012. Maybe we could have opted for a sport with a higher profile, but as an employee engagement tool and one which gets employees talking, this has been great. We have a long commitment to the GB Rowing Team (pictured courtesy of Getty Images Sport/Shaun Botterill) and I am very pleased at how well our sponsorship is progressing. The entire company is excited as to the opportunities that will arise as the partnership develops.

This article first appeared in S&T's suster publication BritSport, the weekly ezine produced by SportBusiness International.

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