Recently, sports sponsorships for casinos became a thing.
There was a time not too long ago when casinos were limited in their ability participate in major league sports, or sports of any kind.
Then the dam broke.
The repeal of the Professional and Amateur Sports Protection Act (PASPA) in 2018 marked a turning point, allowing states to legalize sports betting and paving the way for casinos to increase sponsorship of sports entities.
In a few short years, sports betting became legal in 38 states. The repeal of PAPSA allowed sports leagues and college sports to accept casinos as major sponsors, a thing that was a rare occurrence before 2018.
Today you can see casino sponsorship of the NFL, NHL, NBA and Major League Baseball, not to mention all other sports.
As casinos move into the world of sports there are endless opportunities to develop brand awareness and tap into an untouched world of loyal fans with plenty of discretionary spending.
For “How It’s Done” I spoke to casinos that are involved in sports sponsorships in a big way to learn how different casino operators approach this relativity new gold strike.
FireKeepers Fires Up Sponsorships
Jim Wise, Vice President of Marketing and Sports/iGaming for FireKeepers Casino Hotel, Battle Creek, MI, oversees two major sports sponsorships: the FireKeepers Casino 400, a NASCAR Cup Series race held at Michigan International Speedway, and the FireKeepers Casino Hotel Championship and event of the Epson Tour-Road to the LPGA.
Objectives and Reality
I asked Wise what are the objectives for sponsorships at FireKeepers.
“What is the goal? What’s your objectives before you secure the sponsorship? …Instead of running out and securing the sponsorship and then figuring out how to make it work best, understand what you want before going in.
“For example, with NASCAR our race is one day; but there’s a substantial amount of publicity in the week leading up to the race. It draws tens of thousands of people not only from Michigan near Battle Creek, but from across the state, and it draws in people from our neighboring states: Illinois. Ohio, Indiana, Wisconsin.
“Because FireKeepers sits off of I-94 which is the main thoroughfare that runs from Indiana through to Wisconsin we get a chance from a marketing standpoint to attract business from all these neighboring states and not just our local community. Our business is very much divided among 15 different markets.
“The NASCAR race does the same thing. The NASCAR race brings in people who traveled for hours and hours away. Many of them come in campers and maybe arrive in Michigan on Tuesday or Wednesday of race week. The NASCAR race mirrors our player activity,” Wise said.
Measurement Standards
Sponsorships are notoriously difficult to measure. Commonly used measurement standards are: a rise in brand awareness, player engagement, ROI, increased customer loyalty, increased revenue and enhanced activity for high end players. Sponsorships are judged against appeal to a casino’s target audience, alignment to the brand, activation, and increased profitability.
I asked Wise what was important to FireKeepers when they evaluate sponsorships. “I’ll say brand awareness is number one and the ability to create one-of-a-kind experiences for our VIPs is number two. For example, we have one VIP as Grand Marshall while another waives the green flag to start the race. They go out on that little walkway that is over the track.
“We also have the ability to go to the racetrack to actually touch and talk to the guests. I would say engagement is also important. That’s probably number three.
“The Michigan International Speedway produces a 60-to-70-page post-race analysis that talks about everything from the media side, whether it’s TV radio, to the digital side, to the actual fans on the property itself,” Wise stated.
Supercharged Customer Engagement
A name in title sponsorship of a NASCAR race gives FireKeepers numerous opportunities to get their VIPS and guests involved. FireKeepers guests can ride high performance cars around the track the morning of the race. Players can access the track pre-race and for the trophy presentation.
“VIP players sit in a pit road suite which allows them to look straight down on all the pit activity. When the race cars come in, and those athletes who are working in the pit crew are rapidly going through pit stops of gas and tires, they’re able to see that. Our VIPs can actually go back into the garage areas and see people working on cars and see the drivers interacting with their teams. We take advantage of everything that Michigan Speedway offers; and we think it’s a great partnership because of that,” Wise declared.
Digital Racing
Sponsorships can use all marketing channels such as digital to reinforce the events. “When people enter the Michigan Speedway, one of the pieces of the sponsorship is to have access to a giant billboard that is visible as 60,000 NASCAR fans enter race day and tens of thousands the days leading up to the race.
“We also are a pretty strong social media house especially with Facebook. We have over 450,000 Facebook followers and we have a very loyal group. We’ll go out to the track and do some driver interviews ourselves and put it on Facebook,” Wise recounted.
In-House Sponsorship Programs
Sponsorships are effective when cross promotions bring the excitement of the event to the casino property.
“One of the things that I recommend is to make sure you try to bring that sponsorship back to your property in any way you can. The other thing I would say is we tried to maximize this NASCAR sponsorship far longer than maybe just the 30 days or two weeks right around the race.
“We start in January for an August event date by giving our Red Hot rewards card holders unique opportunities to buy tickets before they go on sale to the public. The Michigan Speedway folks come out and set up a booth to talk to guests about racing.
“We tried to make this at least about an eight-month engagement. On the Friday night before the race for the past eight or nine years we’ve always had a NASCAR driver do an appearance at the casino. And the response to that is been crazy busy. It’s just been very popular,” Wise said.
Community Focus
“The FireKeepers Casino Hotel Championship on the Epson tour is the tour that women play on to get themselves in a position to attain the LPGA Tour. You might want to compare it to Triple A baseball. Young aspiring players come out of college or come out from foreign countries. If they want to get on the LPGA Tour, this is their road to do so. The other thing is if you attain the LPGA Tour and you don’t secure certain results, you will then bump back to the Epson tour in an effort to again gain the qualification,” Wise said.
“There’s no charge to park, there’s no charge for admission. There’s no charge if you come out and spend the day, so we tried to make this one less commercialized and a little more of a community event for us.
“Now the business part of it is where these golfers will play Pro-Am rounds with foursomes of Firekeepers VIPs. That creates a great experience all the way around and our VIPs love it,” Wise exclaimed.
Advise for casinos considering sports sponsorships
“My advice would be to know what your goals are before you even start. Try to keep your ego out of it. A sponsorship with a prominent partner like NASCAR or major sports league can be a boost to the ego; but not if you’re not being productive with your goals. It’s great to say you have a sponsorship with this team or that team; but if you leave money on the table that’s not productive.
“You also need to know how much of your audience or potential audience is going to see any kind of signage or digital media that may be involved. Is there a VIP element or a special experience that can be built into sponsorship? Does the casino want the ability for people to physically meet people and maybe sign up for loyalty cards? I think those are the kinds of things that are critical. Is it going to meet your goals and objectives before you get too excited or keyed up over the fact that you’re now a sponsor of such and such team,” Wise stated.
Angel of the Winds Going Deeper
As of May this year, Damian Riley, Director of Marketing for Angel of the Winds Casino Resort, Arlington, WA, is helping to guide a brand-new sports sponsorship as the official casino sponsor of the University of Washington Football Huskies. Riley sees that the sponsorship will go much deeper than the Football Huskies.
“I had the opportunity to meet up with one of the Huskies representatives for University of Washington athletics. Just through casual conversation, we realized that they had never had a casino partner before. I was completely shocked that nobody had ever approached them.
“We said, what can we do together? Since they had never worked with a casino, and we had never worked with a collegiate organization, it was kind of new territory for both of us.
More Than a Typical Sports Sponsorship Deal
“One of the important things for me was I didn’t want to jump into this as though it was just an advertising opportunity. That’s what anyone would have done. We started working backward and said, ‘How can we be good partners? How can we be involved? How can we make this a reciprocal relationship?’
“That approach organically started to open up other opportunities. It started out just about football and then became all of the University of Washington network divisions. It’s for all University of Washington athletics, and we’re heavily involved with the Alumni Association.
“We have advertising opportunities in the football stadium. There’s volleyball, basketball, softball, soccer, and gymnastics; it’s pretty much every sports faction at the University of Washington.
“We also wanted to have a tribal component to our relationship, with the opportunity to build a conduit between the Stillaguamish Tribe and the University of Washington, which we hope includes ecological programs and Tribal liaisons.
“In addition, we were trying to partner up with UW on murals, art installation pieces, and things around the university that are more than just advertising but rather highlight UW student pride. We want to cement a positive, lasting relationship with the organization over the next seven to ten years,” Riley said.
Alumni
“At the casino, we will host watch parties for big games. We want to have a special card available for our player’s club for UW alums where they can get additional discounts while they’re here on the property. Maybe we will call it the Dawg Card?”
Well Established Potential
“Most collegiate alumni associations have very strong economic backgrounds. We are getting the ability to tap into a well-established potential player base.
“I understand that close to 25,000 new alumni go through the system every few years. It just continuously grows. The University of Washington is ranked among the top 20 universities globally and No.3 in US public universities and will continue to strengthen.”
“After graduation, many University of Washington alumni stay in Washington, or they eventually move back. That’s one of the things that we’re thinking about for the long term. It’s not about those instant conversions or instant gratification on an ROI metric. It’s really about the long-term brand identification and relationship to establish an affiliation with that alumni base to understand Angel of the Winds is a dedicated partner to the organization and that we’re a destination for entertainment, fun, escape, all of those great things right in their backyard,” Riley stated.
From Pariah to Bonanza
Sports sponsorships have moved from a pariah to a bonanza in a few short years. In part one we examined how casinos execute major sponsorships like NASCAR sponsorship and how sports sponsorships can be an effective tool for community relations.
Our How It’s Done Series looks in-depth at successful strategies by Tribal casino operators. Coming soon in Part 2 we will dive deeper into how best practices in Sports Sponsorships can be an effective tool for marketing casinos.
