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To you and me Counter-Strike is a game, something where we can channel our aggression, meet with friends or play for pure entertainment value. To companies such as Intel, Coca Cola, Gainward, AMD, Plantronics and many more corporations, Counter-Strike and online gaming is the doorway to a certain demographic market (Generation Y as the marketing strategists have named you all).
Most of the above corporations have a turnover in excess of $20,000,000 worldwide, so why do they look at our small grass-roots community to market goods and services and why do more teams not have sponsorship? The reason for this is simple; they look at the people who play and the teams that operate the players and they cannot see where they get some/any return for their investment!
Why do they not see how they can make a return? This is because they, the corporation, do not/can not see who they are dealing with. A bunch of guys with a Counter-Strike team asking AMD for some chips is going to get laughed at. AMD sit there and say “OK… So this sponsorship is going to cost us $2,000+, what benefit do we get from the relationship?†and the team does not know how to respond. This is the true reality of why teams do not get “true†sponsors.
So what should online gaming teams do to get sponsors?
For a start you should:
Understand that companies look at sponsorship as a form of marketing, part of their overall marketing strategy.
Understand that the company has a need to sell a product/service, get brand exposure or receive endorsement of their product or service from players/teams that have a need to use the best equipment or service available.
Have a plan to give the partner/sponsor exposure via any method you can; in the IRC topic of your room, on your web site (too big a topic to go into, but I will if the demand for wanting to know how is there), on team strips and in press releases.
Find out who is the correct person to send any sponsor requests to within an organization (Usually the marketing department).
Have a partner proposal document that you can send to the sponsor you want to attract. This sets out who you are and what you are offering the sponsor and what you want in return. This is the pro approach and the only thing a corporate will respond to.
Have a contract the sponsor can have ratified and sign to seal a concrete relationship.
Start a company that the sponsor can legally interact with (If you are to young to do this, appoint an individual, like me with Nocturne, that can help).
In my limited experience of online gaming, I have seen interest in marketing via sponsorship gain momentum and I feel that it will not be long before online gaming, CS, Q3 or what ever will be next, will come of age and become the biggest explosion in digital entertainment ever seen. WWF (wrestling) and that silly X-fire paintball game on the TV are tame and at best boring compared to the speed and graphics of Q3 and the pure teamwork of CS. Once the online gaming sport gets a break to the masses via TV and the vultures see the merchandising opportunities… The sport will be away.
IDTV (Interactive Digital TV) suits the HLTV system (like the bit they do with swapping camera views in the footy, but with footy you can’t do in eyes view). The players in online gaming have colorful names (like in wrestling, ish) and you have seen how the WWF guys have become superstars. I see that the corporations are edging their bets and know this explosion could happen or could not.
Fully sponsored teams in other countries are not rare and we are always slow to catch on but my advice is; get your house in order, give the sponsors what they want and you may get the support that only a few teams in the UK get, when there is much more to be had!
I hope that this helps in some way and you achieve sponsorship; I am not the expert, but I have gained contracted sponsors for my team and the team's new look web site will promote itself and the sponsors who support us in a unique way never done before in gaming.
One word of advice – Once you have the sponsor, look after them… They take a long time to get and they can disappear within weeks if you do not deliver your promises!
If anyone wants advice or help… Even help with documents or how to make the steps to become a team a sponsor can work with, I am more than willing to lend a hand.