Ambush Marketing - Impacts of Ambush Marketing

Impacts of Ambush Marketing

Increasing cost of sponsorships: The increasing cost of sponsorships has also increased sponsor's emphasis on return-on-investment. If sponsored events do not give exclusivity, the sponsor's interest on sponsorship property will be lost and the damage will extend to the whole sponsorship market. Yet when that exclusivity is lost, the value of sponsorship is also lost. When a company engages in ambush marketing the exclusivity intended to be conferred through sponsorship to a sponsor is lost. Hence, the value of sponsorship is also lost. As it is an undeniable fact that corporate sponsorship is one of the biggest money-spinning sources of revenue for the event organizers, the loss in sponsorship value will affect the financial strength of an event organizer.

Transgression on the intellectual property rights: Even when the ambush marketers are not making any direct references to the protected intellectual property rights, they in effect transgress those intellectual property rights by attempting to capitalize on such hard earned goodwill from an event. Direct and indirect references to the event symbol or the event itself are just different means for achieving illegal transgression on the rights of event organizers. Moreover, sponsors cannot get the return they anticipated.

Limitation to freedom of expression: Specific regulations (and or laws) demanded by sponsors to guarantee their exclusive rights limit the freedom of expression of visitors to events (e.g. those who have been given free goods by the ambush marketeer). It is still undecided whether the commercial rights of sportsorganisers and sponsors trump the universal human rights issues involved.