Role Of Sports Logo Design

Have you ever wondered why every business establishment spends millions of dollars in sponsoring one or the other sport or game? You probably not!  Every major or minor company, whether it be a manufacturer of a consumer product or a service provider, inevitably supports a sports team mascot or club, a mere local, state level, national level or international level team or club, depending on its financial stand!

According to www.livemint.com, sports sponsorship is on the most buoyant areas of marketing in recent years.  The autos (motor car manufacturers) and financial services (banks, insurance companies, etc.) are the two of the biggest sectors of financial support for sport, spending millions of dollars on the sports events they sponsor.

Baden sports is encouraging the public to participate in a donation drive – for every $20 donated by the public, Baden, a leading sports ball makers, will provide five balls to the US Army Service who will give the balls to the serviceman and women to hand out in Iraqi neighborhoods and villages.  According to Baden’s CEO, Mr Michael J. Schindler, “Iraqi kids love soccer and US soldiers love giving out the balls.  It is one of those little things that might end up making a big difference!”

Why? And what ‘big difference’ does this act of ‘sponsoring sports’ make?

As an advertisement says (sorry, I don’t remember the site owner’s name) ‘We build strong kids, strong families, strong communities’.  And ‘strong communities’ make a strong nation! Sport and game events came into existence as physical exercises to build strong youth that eventually participated in battles.

Almost all the sports and games were based on the survival and fighting needs.  It was realized long ago that giving rigorous military training to those soldiers recruited just before a war began, it would be better to have a tough, strong young generation with great endurance.  And so the sports and games became a part of life at teen-ages and continued up to the age when the new generation took up their positions in the society.  Naturally such an endeavor needed an efficient planning, skilled organizers, and above all, a continuous supply of money, some stable patronage.  Who could have organized it better other than the rulers who actually needed a strong and loyal youth to defend their country and the regal more than anybody else!

Though the shape of war and battles and the methods of actual fighting have changed over the years due to the developments in the field of weaponry (using guns and bombs in place of swords and bow and arrows), the physical exercises in the name of sports and games have stayed alive with the people.  The survival techniques which saved the lives of soldiers have become popular entertainment activities.  The once blood-chilling war dances and war cries that inspired home soldiers and frightened enemy soldiers have become novel entertaining shows for the amusement of the ever-growing tourists!  People liked to watch their young exhibiting their skills in warfare in those days; and people like to watch their home teams show their utmost skills and winning spirit in the competitions these days!!

However, the fundamental purpose of these activities have hardly changed: ‘winning and losing’ is still there; as the rulers of the yesteryear based their political strategies on the strength of their armies, so are the business monarchs of the present era basing their business strategies on the talent of the teams they sponsor!!!

In other words, to promote a product, the producer needs to make it known to as many people as possible – the more the people are attracted to the product, the more the product sells, and the more the product sells, the more profit the producer gets.  After all, the logic behind selling a product is to get profit.

How do sports make it possible?

It is a fact that The Kentucky Fried Chicken’s sponsorship of Twenty20 cricket has helped it to rise from 73rd position to 18th position in the list of marketing and Speedo’s association with the Beijing Olympics helped it to move from 17th to 6th position.

According to Articlesbase.com, a free online Articles Directory, ‘this industry (sports industry) has a large turnover, a complex infrastructure and an influence on many people’s lives via media and participation.  To completely understand the nature of the sports industry, one must know that it is composed of different components.’  So it is obvious that sports business industry has certain influence on the lives of general public.

NFL is so popular that the logos of the teams are seen everywhere: on billiard tables, balls and clocks, bar tables and stools, dart boards, on pub light ‘shades’, beer jugs, coffee cups, …

Let’s look into the popularity of the NFL, National Football League, the largest professional American football league in the world: 42% of Americans consider some level football their sport; the total percentage of Americans who liked or loved NFL football exceeds 60% of the American public; the NFL has the highest per-game attendance of any domestic professional sports league in the world, drawing over 67,000 spectators per game. You can see football logos and soccer logos everywhere.

A moderate stadium has a capacity of 80 to 100 thousand spectators, and an international match of a popular game draws millions of people when broadcast on TV; and the newspapers, magazines and radio help to draw some considerable number of viewership. Therefore, it is quite obvious that a company selling breakfast cereals or an industry making a million-dollar posh motor vehicle is given a wide and grand publicity, viewers from every walk of life watch it over and over, once the company’s brand name and the logo are in any one corner of the stadium or the TV screen.

As a marketing expert, Tyrone Polastri, in his article ‘Main event marketing: corporations sponsor sports …’, put it “The dollar value a corporation can realize from event sponsorship is particularly difficult to evaluate in the intangible area of public relations, goodwill, image and brand awareness. However, one simple rule that is generally used by the trade is the 10 to 1 rule–for every $1,000 spent, a sponsor is looking to generate $10,000 worth of publicity. Sponsors feel this 10:1 media conversion is a cost-effective value, particularly when taking into account what a $100,000 30-second television ad buys them in comparison to a $100,000 event sponsorship.”

So, sponsoring a sport even certainly makes sense.

After watching sports for a considerable period, people get to like a particular team or a particular player, and when the team or the player is shown using a soft drink of a particular brand, the public in general and the sports enthusiasts in particular, attach themselves to that brand of soft drink, and being an official drink at a major international sports event is not only a status symbol but also an important step-up in the company’s marketing.

Now to the main point of showing a sponsor’s brand name and the logo.  Though the stadium where the sports events take place may be very large, the largest with the capacity of 150,000 spectators, the sponsor is given a small spot to advertise the brand, because the main event in a sports stadium is not the trade fair, like it is at an international expo where the products are on display.  The spectators gather there to watch their favorite teams or player(s) fight with one another for the top place.  So the sponsors have to make do with the limited space they are allotted.  A banner measuring 2 feet by10 feet or a poster of the same size kept beside the scoreboard has to represent the entire company including the product(s).

How to make a good impression on the minds of the crowds who are most of the time overwhelmed by the ecstasy or great disappointment depending on their team’s performance?

The best way is to have a short but effective brand name and a clean and clear logo.

Some popular sportspersons with the sponsors’ brand names and logos on their clothes

In some games, the players are free to wear the brand names and the logos of their sponsors on their uniforms, but in some either the players do not like to wear them or the regulations of some sports clubs do not allow their players to wear them.

Marlboro’s, a cigarette manufacturer, the brand name on the F1 racing car

Visa credit card brand name and logo, and Nike logo on the side walls of the track. This photograph demonstrates how a short brand name and a simple and clear logo can be used at track and field events. This finish line picture is very valued because several sports enthusiasts marvel at this clear shot, and so it is shown on TV, internet, and is published in print media. Wherever and whenever you see this picture, you see the visa and Nike brands as well!

It is quite evident that sports business industry is a major entertainer to the public and a great platform for the business establishments.  What a prospecting company needs is a long-term marketing strategy and a strong team of a chosen sport.

The effectiveness of the whole operation depends on the brand name and logo of the company, and so, a wise company makes a wise choice in choosing a competent logo designer who can create a logo that deserves attention! At SpellBrand, an international logo and web designers, for small and medium businesses, logos are not just designed; they are created, created with wisdom, vision and purpose!

For Some samples of excellent logos from Logo Design Words please visit sport logos page.

In our next article which is to be posted soon, we will be discussing the various teams and their logos of ball games – football, soccer, basket ball, base ball, et.  Until then bye!