Report: Marketers are Failing to Determine the ROI of Sponsorship Efforts

Marketers continue to invest in sponsorships to achieve their some of their top objectives, but research shows they are not adequately measuring and assessing the ROI of their efforts.

The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) and Marketing Accountability Standards Board (MASB) recently came together to conduct the “Improving Sponsorship Accountability Metrics” report, and statistics showed that just 37 percent of marketers have a standardized process for measuring their return on sponsorships.

“Despite the continued growth of sponsorship investment and the repeated sentiment from marketers that there is a need for improved measurement and assessment, there has been little progress toward this goal,” said ANA CEO Bob Liodice.

Most of marketers’ ROI metrics are focused on financial outcomes. According to the report, the top metrics used to measure ROI of sponsorship are total sponsorship investment financial return, total media exposure financial return, and product or service sales.

ROI for Social Media Marketing also challenging

Social media is another area where marketers have struggled to show ROI, according to previous research.

Social Media Examiner published the “2018 Social Media Marketing Industry Report” and discovered that 38 percent of marketers were uncertain of whether they could measure the ROI of their social media efforts.

Out of all of the social networks utilized for marketing, 94 percent of marketers claimed that they were using Facebook, and two-thirds said it was their most important social platform. However, just 49 percent felt that their Facebook marketing efforts were effective.