Sponsorships are an important way marketers choose to strengthen brands, increase awareness and build businesses. The challenge, however, is deciding to sponsor a specific sport, event, star or athlete. To reflect on marketers’ approach, I reached out to 1Password’s chief marketing officer, Melton Littlepage, about the company’s decision to sponsor the Presidents Cup and PGA TOUR professional Mackenzie Hughes.

Brand background

Understanding who to sponsor starts with understanding your brand. Littlepage explains that while 1Password started as a password manager, “it has grown into a multi-product security company, protecting over 150,000 businesses and millions of consumers around the world. As hybrid working is now widely accepted, the way we work has fundamentally changed and the way we protect that work must also change. To increase their productivity while taking advantage of the flexibility of modern work, employees use personal devices at work and use applications invisible to their IT and security teams – otherwise known as Shadow IT. Even as companies experience rapid growth in these new situations, traditional security tools have not kept pace with the modern workplace, leaving many companies vulnerable to data breaches and unauthorized access. In response to this, we recently launched 1Password Extended Access Management (XAM), a new security solution that helps companies secure every login to every application from every device – even unmanaged ones that often fall outside the control of IT and security teams.”

Why sponsorship

Littlepage explains that the rationale for investing in sponsorships has to do with increasing awareness. “When evaluating our marketing strategy, we wanted to strengthen top-of-funnel brand awareness among both B2B and B2C audiences. Our bottom-of-funnel trial and conversion rates were very positive – we just had to get the customer to these phases. So we did our homework and the research showed us where our target customers were most open to education and influence when they weren’t at work. Sweet spot? Sporting events.

We considered several variables before proceeding with the sponsorship. We wanted not only to work with an organization deeply connected to our brand, but also with a partner that would allow us to share our story with a wider audience.

President’s Cup Selection

Once I decided that sponsoring something sports-related made sense, the next step was to figure out what sporting event. Littlepage says that “Prior to formalizing our sponsorship, our research showed that golf was one of the best sports – and superior to other out-of-home (OOH) advertising and entertainment opportunities – that would help us reach our target buyer in a way that would create an emotional connection while giving us a platform to tell our story.

Sports fans are extremely passionate. The process of supporting a team or a specific player creates a deeply emotional connection that transcends logic. From the brand’s point of view, this is important because we know that people buy with their hearts and justify it with their heads. When we embed our brand in the sport that people love and the teams and athletes they support, the emotional attachment flows into our brand – that’s a great thing! TV commercials and social media ads simply don’t create that kind of emotional connection.

Additionally, the Presidents Cup is a unique global team competition featuring elite golfers versus individual competition. There are no cash prizes or prizes offered, participants play for charity, and as a Canadian-founded company, this year’s tournament takes place on our home turf, Canada.

We have also partnered with Mackenzie Hughes, a professional golfer, PGA TOUR member and long-time 1Password customer. Mackenzie has been playing on the PGA TOUR since 2016.

Maximizing return on investment

The challenge with sponsorship can be designing and measuring the program to maximize and prove return on investment. Littlepage points out: “We have created an integrated 360-degree campaign around the President’s Cup, which began several months before the President’s Cup launch on September 24 and will continue six months after. It was important to make an impression before and during the tournament through branding, television advertising, hospitality, as well as social media campaigns. The Presidents Cup provides us with both a scalable way to reach the millions of passionate golf fans viewing the event and exceptional VIP hospitality to entertain customers and partners on-site at the Royal Montreal Golf Club.

The on-site activation we are sponsoring during the Presidents Cup is Club 1Password, a premium hospitality facility – located between the 15th and 17th tees at the Royal Montreal Golf Club – that will host 5,000 customers each day. With places where participants can dine, meet golf fans and even take part in a putting challenge, this activation allows us to create a unique and long-lasting experience for tournament participants and our customers, as well as having them directly engage with our brand.

Following this event, we will expand our marketing efforts into 2025 and continue to leverage our long-term partnership with Mackenzie Hughes, who is one of twelve members of the international Presidents Cup team. Our goal is to continue to build awareness of the 1Password brand and encourage businesses, families and individuals to use our solutions.”

Tips for getting involved in sponsorship

Littlepage suggests that marketing directors can take steps to improve their sponsorship results. For example, he says that “the most important thing is telling stories. Craft your story in a way that will touch the hearts of your target buyers who are also fans of the sport you sponsor. Then, find a partnership that will give you a platform to tell your story as best as possible – and consider whether this partnership allows you to connect directly with your buyer audience, without any additional layers or channels in between. Do your homework and be data-driven – this is the key to confidently and successfully forging large partnerships, knowing that you will present your story to your target buyers in situations where they will be open to hearing your message to create brand affinity.”

Join the discussion: @KimWhitler