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This is just a short one really with a thought that's been bouncing around in my head for a while. This is particularly application to online tournaments more-so than live LAN, though it is a concern for both.
Sponsorship, sponsorship makes the ESPORTS world go round. Teams exist because of sponsorship, they can pay their players because of sponsorship. Prizemoney isn't reliable or frequent enough to keep an entire team rolling, some teams haven't won anything yet and even the most successful teams lose far more than they win. Sponsorship money also keeps tournaments afloat and is by far the most sustainable way of doing so. HD passes have been around for a while, PPV is now creeping in, but in reality the most successful, sustainable tournaments run at existing LANs with sponsorship support. Tournaments have figured out how to give their sponsors excellent ROI, using parts of the UI which are non-essential to present sponsor branding. What I'm concerned about however is the sponsors of the players and their ROI (return on investment).
The more sponsorship money comes into the scene for teams the better. It will encourage higher level play because it is possible to play full-time and be salaried so you can focus on your practice. It also means that players are more comfortable because some teams aren't having to cut corners on travel (which often results in lengthy layovers and non-direct flights), accommodation (sharing rooms or otherwise crappy/noisy hotels where players can't get good rest) and general expenses (good luck keeping your mind focussed if you're just eating junk food). All in all, this results in better games for you to watch.
When you think about team sponsors, the chances are you think of EG. EG has done their sponsorship very VERY well. How many of EGs sponsors can you name? Monster I'd imagine, thanks to the Monster bottle being on the desk of every player. Kingston Hyper-X? Sure, they did those cute little commercials and IdrA did those pro-tips a while ago for them. Gunnar maybe? You've seen the pictures of Incontrol wearing those. The point is, they do a good job of getting their sponsors out there and it helps when players like IdrA can rattle off all their sponsors in every interview without fail. How many sponsors can you name for other non-EG teams? TLAF for Teamliquid I would imagine, but your average viewer isn't going to remember much else.
See, there's a bit of an issue with visibility. Online tournaments suffer from this heavily, because you don't get to see the player. Consider a football team, it's sponsors emblazened upen the chests of their players as they walk out in front of a 50,000 person live crowd and millions of TV viewers. Goldmine, right there. This can certainly happen in SC2 tournaments in a live environment, depending on how things are setup but it really does suck for online. There's no sponsorship visibility at all. It makes me wonder, should tournaments perhaps make an effort to make those sponsors visible? Off-line events are using player cams more and more which is great, though it does depend on the angle. I guess Monster were pretty happy during PuMa and JYPs games since the angle showed the Monster bottle, though if your logo is on the back of the shirt or the wrong arm good luck getting seen.
It's made me consider the idea that perhaps in future events that I organise myself (those where sponsorship conflict does not come into play), if it would be possible/non-instructive to have a very small sponsorship rotation somewhere on the nameplates. Perhaps have the scoreboard up (would have to be custom designed, not too difficult) and have the sponsors of the player integrated in there. If there are multiple sponsors, have it rotate through the names/logos, to give sponsors a greater return on their investment and the teams a stronger position to negotiate better deals with them. I guess it isn't really my or any tournaments responsibility and certainly wouldn't work in some scenarios (Steelseries sponsor a tournament, they wouldn't be happy about seeing Razer on the screen, though they'd have to regardless if the player's jersey was shown or whatever).
Does it make sense for online events to provide improved ROI for team sponsors rather than just the tournament? Is it intrusive to the viewer? Not a clue, but it's on my mind.
  
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As a viewer, I personally do not care that much. Typically, I am either intensely focused on the game or doing something else at the same time, such as homework or Minecraft. So to have ads that would benefit players and/or tournaments that I am watching, I am absolutely all for it. The quality does not go down for me if there are ads. Unless it becomes like what TSMDyrus does on his stream, which is typically spam ads over and over until the game starts, and considering he plays LoL Draft, that is quite a few ads -__-. But other than that, ads that benefit the tournament, players, and organizers are only good things to me.
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Also don't forget the possibility of including sponsorship plugs when introducing the players; so instead of saying like:
EGDemuslim
you could say
EG and Kingston Hyper-X's Demuslim
or
EGDeuslim running on Monster energy
It's more long-winded, but they do this sometimes in IndyCar in the states and it doesn't sound nearly as awkward as you'd expect after the announcers practiced with it a little bit 
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Let me see if I can rattle the EG sponsors off the top of my head just from memory. Intel, Steelseries, Monster, Bigfoot Networks, Kingston HyperX, Beyond Gaming, Gunnar.
Splitreason and Sixpoolgaming I had to look up on the main webpage, and there are some others that IdrA never mentions 
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Saphire Technology as well
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As a viewer, my most active reponse to sponsorship has been from homestory cup, and I'll tell you why. The tournament is primarily sponsored by XMG notebooks. You can see clearly everywhere that they are using the notebooks at the tournament and there are posters everywhere. I can see they are the main sponsor. Next, they have some short interviews with the XMG guy, which is actually really interesting to me, because naturally since I am watch a SC2 tourney, i am interested in computers and such things. If they were talking about for example the properties of some energy drink i wouldn't be so interested. Next, they have some special deal which is linked to the tournamnet. So I think to myself, these guys sponsor the tournament therefore I like them, they tell me about their cool stuff therefore I am interested, they have a special deal on therefore there might be something in it for me (if I am in the market for a new notebook or something they have).
The exact same thing for Roccat gear at Homestory. The posters, the interview, the special offers. Very convincing argument for me to buy their stuff.
Now, next to this you have what I would consider very soft poor advertising. NOS energy drinks sponsor MLG, Red Bull sponsor their own LAN, Monster sponsor EG. OK I know this, but what is really getting me out their to buy a particular brand? Is it supposed to be team/tournament loyalty? I don't think advertising really really works in that way. I would like to see these brands work with the organisations to provide a real deal or incentive for me to try out their stuff. It could be either an incentive to do with SC2 if you buy the drinks, or maybe to do with the drinks if you play SC2 (like a league specific tournament). Just slapping on a badge with the sponsor name isn't going to do anything really.
I know that in fighting games many teams are sponsored by mad catz. So when the name is on display it is shown as for example WW.MDCZ.Ryan Hart, right. The madcatz is part of his name on screen and this makes the announcer say it and therefore it is higher profile. Nobody bats an eyelid. its fine.
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It is certainly a question I asked myself too. It's a problematic I also want to integer more completely inside LP though I have no ideas as to how right now.
Maybe during a video presentation of players, you could list all sponsors.
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A good thought, TB, but you're missing an interesting side effect of the sponsorships that plays into it a bit. A lot of the sponsors are "gamer" brands, or PC components. You're talking expensive merchandise. Obviously, there's exceptions, like Monster, Dr Pepper, and Hot Pockets, but those are the sorts of products where most of us already have a preference and a taste, and we either buy it or we don't anyways, at least within this market.
Then you consider things like SteelSeries, Intel, Kingston... Sorry, I buy a LOT of computer stuff for an amateur gamer, and I'm still not exactly roofing my house in QXC+'s, you know? I do tend to buy enthusiast brand stuff myself when I'm building my PC's (also a lot more often and higher end than most gamers), but I go by performance, reliability, and warranty. I'm not letting a silly thing like a sponsorship affect a multi-thousand dollar purchasing decision, that's just stupid if the product isn't up to par. And in the utterly objective world of computers, I can't in good faith suggest to anyone else they do so either. Yeah, my last keyboard decision went to SteelSeries over SIIG for a basic mechanical. I don't expect to buy another one anytime soon, though, I can use my 6GV2 for self defense if I want to. And that was a decision where there wasn't much else to consider.
Yeah, there's some possible positive results for E-Sports overall, but at the same time, I won't buy an Intel extreme motherboard when EVGA covers everything short of hitting it with a hammer, for life, with the best customer service and tech support I've ever had the pleasure of dealing with.
Basically, you have to consider the market niches these people are dealing with. This isn't like picking up a six pack of a different brand of beer occasionally. These purchases, made properly, are products that last a while, and/or cost a lot of money, with some very objective selection criteria. Overall, expanding the community so those ads get to more people might be a more viable option.
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Its a good topic TB, but why havent sponsors "demanded" this attantion before?
When a caster introduces a player, he should also name he's sponsors, it should be a part of he's job really... Thats ofcourse if we want this little thing called eSports to grow even more... I think this is the next step, with this kind of "spotlight" for the sponsors I believe its going to be easier to catch new ones...
As you mentioned, EG have done a great job promoting theier sponsors, thats probably also why they got so many and good ones, I cant name one of Mouz, Empire, Complexity or Dignitas's sposnors, to name a few... For Liquid I know of TLAF and Razer...
But then again, this should come for the sponsors, they should demand it? If they dont care, why should anyone els care...
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If it is done in the matter that you are talking about, under the nametag of each player and just have it of a decent font and nothing close to as big as ther players names (or even larger as some sponsors prolly would like) I dont se anyhting wrong or odd about it.
To me it is a given that teamsponsors need to be seen, like you pointed out some teams do it better then others especially with EG having quite a few popular streamers they get their Team sponsors seen by the public alot more.
But there is ofc the reasoning you pointed out aswell, is it really the torunament managment that is supoce to make sure that other sponsors then their own get "face time" with the audience, I am not sure about that but I dont think it will lead to anything good if Tournaments would try to prevent teamsponsors from beeing shown. I belive there has been this cind of thinking from major turnaments before where they cind of wanted to ban players from wearing their own teamclothes etc.
Another thing that I would like but I dont know just how hard it would be to pull off is to use Webcams from the players homes (As many if not most) of them probably have this. Alternativly use a picture of the player in their teamclothes, then it would be up to the team to provide a picture where their sponsors show up on the picture/webcam.
I understand that it might not be possible/easy to pulloff using webcams to linkinto the stream with overlay like they did on forexample the last MLG with the players, but its something to perhaps be concidered.
/// Stabbe
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iNcontroL
USA29055 Posts
Love this topic.
I wish more people would get the word out on other teams as well. TL does a really good job of always listing their sponsors but outside of TL/EG I would be very frank and say with almost complete certainty all the other teams do a terrible job getting sponsor exposure. I don't need to name names but look no further than this past weekend.. who sponsors any of those other guys? There should be at the very least mentions in their interviews on a consistent basis.
Teams need to do a better job of connecting the sponsor with the people too. EG does giveaways on their twitter/facebook. That is so beneficial for both EG/the sponsor it is mind boggling.
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you could ask players before the tournament to send you pictures in their clan shirt. and when a match starts you take this pictures to put them into a layout. I made some very precise layouts in paintshop. check the spoilers.
screenlayout before a match
+ Show Spoiler +
screenlayout after the match
+ Show Spoiler +
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I heard clenching your fist gets rid of your gag reflex, might be useful in case we need to further increase ROI for the sponsors.....
for me there's a limit to how much of these things i can take. Am i the only one?
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On March 01 2012 01:54 zul wrote:
you could ask players before the tournament to send you pictures in their clan shirt. and when a match starts you take this pictures to put them into a layout. I made some very precise layouts in paintshop. check the spoilers.
I think it would be awesome if instead of using photos, a graphic artist could draw them instead (either very realistic like Glider does or cartooney like fishuu). It would obviously be a significant investment, but it would make a lot more people pay attention to it.
This made the last 2 TSLs look very special and it was very memorable, although the last one was portraits only.
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On March 01 2012 02:11 Talin wrote:Show nested quote +On March 01 2012 01:54 zul wrote:
you could ask players before the tournament to send you pictures in their clan shirt. and when a match starts you take this pictures to put them into a layout. I made some very precise layouts in paintshop. check the spoilers. I think it would be awesome if instead of using photos, a graphic artist could draw them instead (either very realistic like Glider does or cartooney like fishuu). It would obviously be a significant investment, but it would make a lot more people pay attention to it. This made the last 2 TSLs look very special and it was very memorable, although the last one was portraits only.
yeah, of course. The more you give it have a unique look the more people will recognize and remember it. You can also use short videoclip, gifs or simple 3d animations. My examples should just give you an idea of how one can give sponsors more exposure in online tournaments.
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Calgary25996 Posts
On March 01 2012 01:14 deathly rat wrote:
As a viewer, my most active reponse to sponsorship has been from homestory cup, and I'll tell you why. The tournament is primarily sponsored by XMG notebooks. You can see clearly everywhere that they are using the notebooks at the tournament and there are posters everywhere. I can see they are the main sponsor. Next, they have some short interviews with the XMG guy, which is actually really interesting to me, because naturally since I am watch a SC2 tourney, i am interested in computers and such things. If they were talking about for example the properties of some energy drink i wouldn't be so interested. Next, they have some special deal which is linked to the tournamnet. So I think to myself, these guys sponsor the tournament therefore I like them, they tell me about their cool stuff therefore I am interested, they have a special deal on therefore there might be something in it for me (if I am in the market for a new notebook or something they have).
The exact same thing for Roccat gear at Homestory. The posters, the interview, the special offers. Very convincing argument for me to buy their stuff.
Now, next to this you have what I would consider very soft poor advertising. NOS energy drinks sponsor MLG, Red Bull sponsor their own LAN, Monster sponsor EG. OK I know this, but what is really getting me out their to buy a particular brand? Is it supposed to be team/tournament loyalty? I don't think advertising really really works in that way. I would like to see these brands work with the organisations to provide a real deal or incentive for me to try out their stuff. It could be either an incentive to do with SC2 if you buy the drinks, or maybe to do with the drinks if you play SC2 (like a league specific tournament). Just slapping on a badge with the sponsor name isn't going to do anything really.
I know that in fighting games many teams are sponsored by mad catz. So when the name is on display it is shown as for example WW.MDCZ.Ryan Hart, right. The madcatz is part of his name on screen and this makes the announcer say it and therefore it is higher profile. Nobody bats an eyelid. its fine.
I agree with everything in this post. I don't want to buy a notebook but I clearly remember XMG and also watched it several times just because I found it interesting.
I also agree with you about Nos being terrible. I remember it clearly because it was a bunch of bros driving a car to hit a can of Nos, which really didn't work for me.
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Thinking about it, with stuff other people have said, I guess my thoughts on the best way to be reasonably unobstrusive but still get something out there, would be player introductions... But not just "EG.IdrA, playing for SteelSeries...", rather, mention stuff about the gaming setup that's related to the sponsors. So you could say "...will be playing with a Sapphire Radeon 6870 and a SteelSeries 6GV2, Xai, and QXC+..." or something like that.
If advertising gets too pushy and abnoxious during any one segment, I just know that a certain lead-in clip is a good time to mute, switch tabs, and do something else. A good example would be... I think one of the dreamhacks maybe, right before AMD FX came out. Those ads just pissed me off, even ignoring the part where I hate the CPUs.
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I don't know, as you said, these online tournaments are really different from live ones, and the sponsor plays a much lesser role. All these things the sponsor generally provides (travel, accommodation, general expenses) do not factor in the equation, because of the nature of online tournaments. All in all, I believe that sponsors should get maximum exposure during live events, but not necessarily when it comes to online tournaments.
Also, I agree with Incontrol; players ought to mention their sponsors on a consistent basis.
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On March 01 2012 01:14 deathly rat wrote:
As a viewer, my most active reponse to sponsorship has been from homestory cup, and I'll tell you why. The tournament is primarily sponsored by XMG notebooks. You can see clearly everywhere that they are using the notebooks at the tournament and there are posters everywhere. I can see they are the main sponsor. Next, they have some short interviews with the XMG guy, which is actually really interesting to me, because naturally since I am watch a SC2 tourney, i am interested in computers and such things. If they were talking about for example the properties of some energy drink i wouldn't be so interested. Next, they have some special deal which is linked to the tournamnet. So I think to myself, these guys sponsor the tournament therefore I like them, they tell me about their cool stuff therefore I am interested, they have a special deal on therefore there might be something in it for me (if I am in the market for a new notebook or something they have).
The exact same thing for Roccat gear at Homestory. The posters, the interview, the special offers. Very convincing argument for me to buy their stuff.
Now, next to this you have what I would consider very soft poor advertising. NOS energy drinks sponsor MLG, Red Bull sponsor their own LAN, Monster sponsor EG. OK I know this, but what is really getting me out their to buy a particular brand? Is it supposed to be team/tournament loyalty? I don't think advertising really really works in that way. I would like to see these brands work with the organisations to provide a real deal or incentive for me to try out their stuff. It could be either an incentive to do with SC2 if you buy the drinks, or maybe to do with the drinks if you play SC2 (like a league specific tournament). Just slapping on a badge with the sponsor name isn't going to do anything really.
I know that in fighting games many teams are sponsored by mad catz. So when the name is on display it is shown as for example WW.MDCZ.Ryan Hart, right. The madcatz is part of his name on screen and this makes the announcer say it and therefore it is higher profile. Nobody bats an eyelid. its fine.
this i think is something that many sponsors need to work on. the nos adverts at mlg are clearly aimed at halo bros but then its been 18 months now since sc2 was clearly the future, and nos and mlg havent done anything to entice this new audience. maybe a personal sponsorship for someone, an ad featuring a top sc2 player saying how he likes it, then maybe some special coupon through mlg that makes nos better value than competitors.
i dont know whos fault it is that they arent doing this but clearly someone isnt doing their job, mlg come to us and say sponsors need to see a roi, well so far mlg hasnt worked for that return but people who sponsor homestory clearly have. i too am not gonna buy a notebook, atleast for a while, but xmg is a name i didnt know before and now i do. next time i am in the market they will be one of the sites i will check, and if they have a comparable offer i would probably go with them over someone who didnt sponsor homestory. so all in all i can vouch that their ad campaign works.
On March 01 2012 00:36 TotalBiscuit wrote:
Does it make sense for online events to provide improved ROI for team sponsors rather than just the tournament? Is it intrusive to the viewer? Not a clue, but it's on my mind.
i think online cups could do a lot better with this. assuming theres no obvious conflict i dont think it would hurt for them to mention each players sponsors. maybe an easier way (atleast for more established teams) would be for them to film an intro clip and just email it to each organiser that asked for it, hype up the player, throw in the sponsors. it increases production value for an online cup at no expense, helps the roi for the player etc etc, and its only what? an hours work for the team...once.
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