"A word on our sponsors"

Comment from Shaun Whatling on Mark Ritson's piece last week "A word on our sponsors":

Mark Ritson's got a point of course. I just wish he could have aimed it better.

He's right to call out the many big ticket sponsorships which totally fail to deliver against ROI (without the convenient myth of AEV, that is).

And he's right, yes, big companies which don't sweat the details will find the rhetoric of the sponsorship sales boys reassuringly compelling: sign on the dotted for global brand awareness and a worldwide audience of fanatically appreciative fans (all responding positively to the question: are you pleased brand X is spending its marketing budget sponsoring this event?).

We welcome Mark's scepticism. As a business, Redmandarin has saved clients literally tens of millons of pounds - behind the scenes - advising them how to discern measurable business value amidst the spurious claims of glossy sales decks offering, often, big, dumb sponsorship.

But he's woefully off piste to denigrate sponsorship per se. His simplistic characterisation of sponsorship as an 'i-pay-you-a-hefty-wedge-and-get-to-stick-my-logo-on-your-shirt' is anachronistic and he should really do a bit more prepping before his next class.

No matter how cleverly our associate professor of marketing has 'run the numbers', I'm pretty sure he won't have done it better than Coke or McDonalds. Or Samsung. Or us.

And instead of looking at the list of 2012 sponsors, as Mark suggests, take a look at Interbrand's top consumer-facing brands - and consider the role of sponsorship in shaping brand perception and supporting business growth.

The point is not about a simple correlation between bad business and sponsorship: the point is that far too many businesses fail to approach sponsorship intelligently.