Fix Your Trigger Donation Sponcon Strategy

👋 Welcome back to Sponcon Sports, a weekly newsletter dedicated to sponsored content strategy in the sports industry!

Suggested posts on Instagram aren't always bad.

This Reel about booking an exclusive basketball court in a Chicago skyscraper was recommended to me and gave me an idea for real estate brand partners.

Create a content series where players, creators, or team legends visit the coolest basketball courts in homes, apartments, or commercial buildings around the city—whether for tours, competitions, or conversations. You could even host exclusive, in-person events at these courts.

This approach spotlights your partner's real estate through basketball, engaging fans and attracting new audiences who are intrigued by rare, hidden real estate features.

In Today’s Edition:

• When Donation Posts Go Wrong 😅 

• Best Built Sponcon From FC Barcelona 🔨 

• ‘Bama Football Puts The G In Great 🐊 

🏊️ DEEP DIVE
How To Fix Misaligned Trigger Donation Campaigns

One of the core tenets of my content philosophy is that content—whether sponsored or unsponsored—succeeds when it meets your audience’s expectations when they hit the follow button.

Dedicated trigger donation social media posts, where a brand donates based on in-game results, violate this principle.

Despite consistently underperforming in reach and engagement, these posts are still published frequently across the industry.

Why is this a problem?

This type of sponsored content frustrates content teams and weakens partnerships. It’s forced messaging that doesn’t belong, causing fans to scroll past team content, ultimately dragging down overall social performance.

From the brand’s perspective, whether they pushed for this content or not, it often underperforms, leading to disappointment during recap season.

How Do We Fix It?

Optimize the content strategy to fit the campaign’s goals.

The goals of trigger donation campaigns are to:

1. Give back to a cause and community.

2. Drive awareness of the campaign’s impact.

Trigger donation content usually lacks a fan call to action, meaning there’s no immediate action for them to take. The role of this content is simply to inform fans about how the team and its partner are supporting a cause.

Given this, poor-performing organic social content doesn’t align with the campaign’s goals.

Where should trigger donation content live?

Fortunately, there are plenty of places to share this information. Typically, aim to share donation updates about once per month during the season:

Team Community Social Account: Fans literally follow community accounts to hear about a team’s impact. For example, the Dallas Mavericks’ @MavsOffCourt account. You can also use collab posts on Instagram and TikTok to get this content on your partners’ accounts.

Brand Accounts: Speaking of partner accounts, they can be the perfect place for sharing trigger donation updates. This helps spread the word about the partnership’s impact on a cause or community and supports corporate social responsibility (CSR) efforts, which can also attract future employees.

Team LinkedIn Account: LinkedIn is a natural fit for CSR and employee engagement content. You and your partner can share this content with a relevant corporate audience, which current employees might share to celebrate the impact their company is making. Your partner could also attract new employees by showcasing their values.

Website: Share monthly updates via banner and pre-roll ads.

Paid Social: Run campaigns targeting your followers on each platform for the first half of the month. If budgets are tight, start with Meta, where you can reach fans on Instagram and Facebook without needing video content.

Mobile App: Utilize banners and pre-roll ads like on your website. Consider adding a live donation tracker if your app has an “in-game mode,” where fans can see donations increase in real time. This should look like the ROLEX clock module (see Sponsored Content of the Week) featured in the Wimbledon app.

In Venue: Share donation updates on the jumbotron, as often as once per game.

TV/Radio/Podcast: Schedule live reads from hosts on your TV, radio, or team podcasts focused on donation updates.

Email/Newsletter: Send dedicated emails providing donation updates. That said, if you want to limit the number of partner-dedicated emails, have a brand sponsor a monthly series (e.g. monthly schedule) where you can include donation updates via banners above the fold. You could also take a different route and include donation updates in something like a game preview or recap email where you show donations to date or donations added based on the games’ results.

What If Organic Social Is a Must-Have?

Now I know from experience even after providing all these options, at least one person is thinking, “But Alex, this deal will not close if we don’t get coverage of the trigger donation program on our primary accounts via organic social media. While I understand it doesn’t align with their goals, it simply matters for the client to see this campaign come to life there. Oh, and don’t just bury it on Instagram Stories where the content disappears.”

Don’t worry, I have you covered. Here are four frameworks I would use if organic social is a must-have on your team’s primary social accounts.

San Jose Sharks - Goals For Kids

Goals For Kids supports underserved youth and families in the Bay Area with $1,000 donations for each Sharks goal, benefiting local organizations dedicated to enhancing lives.

The San Jose Sharks showcase Goals For Kids updates on their final score graphics.

Look for content series where you can weave donation updates into a stat graphic. This provides fans with relevant information, and since donations are tied to in-game results, it feels natural to include them.

This approach also works well during game breaks, like the end of quarters, periods, halftime, or the seventh-inning stretch.

Seattle Mariners - Hits For Hearts

Raise campaign awareness by using an end slate on in-game highlights.

Optum donates to the American Heart Association for each Mariners hit during the 2024 season.

The Mariners share hit highlights with the Optum logo throughout the video and an end slate featuring program details.

I suggest two tweaks: Since all the info is at the end, use the caption to boost campaign visibility. For example, update the caption to:

“Five in the first 👊

Hits For Hearts | #TridentsUp”

Also, I would be sure to tag Optum in the video.

Build awareness for the campaign using an end slate on in-game highlights.

BYU Football - Interstitial Brand Cards

Place a branded card within a carousel (Instagram), story (Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Snapchat), or album (Facebook).

The branded card should feature the trigger donation campaign name and a donation total update. I wasn’t always sold on this strategy, but BYU Athletics’ Tyson Hutchins changed my mind back in January. The Los Angeles Clippers and Philadelphia 76ers have successfully used this approach too.

Just make sure the branded card matches the content. For example, if you’re posting a carousel of the top five dunks of the month, the donation trigger should be related to dunks.

With carousels, you can now have up to 20 cards, which makes achieving a balance between you and your partner even easier. I recommend placing the branded card in the third slot to increase its visibility if a fan swipes through most of the content. Additionally, when Instagram resurfaces carousels fans missed, it leads with the second card, so the branded card won’t be the first thing they see, which should improve overall performance.

Indianapolis Colts - Type 1 Diabetes

If you need a dedicated post for the campaign, focus on content that highlights the emotional impact of the trigger donations.

For example, consider this from the Indianapolis Colts’ @ColtsCommunity account: At Training Camp, AD Mitchell met Matthew, a seven-year-old recently diagnosed with Type 1 Diabetes.

If you had a trigger donation campaign with a partner where donations were made to a Type 1 Diabetes non-profit, this interaction could serve as the sponsored content for the partnership.

However, remember that these interactions can’t be manufactured, and there’s no guarantee how participants (players, kids, fans, etc.) will react, nor can you ensure a “viral” moment.

Therefore, if you take this approach, limit the partnership to just one contractual video. Authentic moments are tough enough to capture, so avoid increasing the frequency.

The Takeaway

Trigger donation content often underperforms on organic social media because it doesn’t align with the platform’s goals or audience expectations.

Instead of forcing it onto primary accounts, explore alternative channels like community social accounts, brand accounts, LinkedIn, or paid social. If organic content is non-negotiable, integrate donation updates into existing, relevant content series or focus on emotional storytelling.

🔍 SPONCONSPIRATION
Steal These Ideas

NFL teams keep finding new ways to create standout partnerships, as the Miami Dolphins did by featuring Paramount+ in their hilarious captains reveal video.

It might seem like a small detail, but I’m dying to integrate a brand logo into content as seamlessly as Alabama Football did with the Gatorade “G” in their cinematic game recap.

This is a perfect example of tailoring a content concept to fit a brand. From the name “Best Built Goal” to the hammer cleverly replacing the “t” in “Built,” FC Barcelona nailed their sponcon with Stanley Tools. We’ve seen a similar approach work well for Man City, customized for NEXEN Tire.

Speaking of great names, the Cleveland Guardians hit it out of the park with “Smoke Damage,” presented by Paul Davis Property Restoration—perfectly aligning the “smoke” of a fastball with the repair services of their brand partner.

And this UCF Football edit for EA Sports College Football 25? Absolutely insane!

🚨 ICYMI
What To Watch For

Green Room: In the first part of a two-part Q&A, I chatted with Greenfly’s Neil Horowitz about the latest sponsorship trends, strategies, and ideas that sports marketers and partnerships teams working with short-form content need to know.

Food Meets Football: Lega Serie A USA has teamed up with Italian-American food creator QCP (@itsqcp) for a video series where he'll travel through Italy, creating food-related content that highlights Serie A clubs and the unique flavors of each city and region [h/t Andy Mitchell].

NFL Creator Strategy: Check out how the NFL is leveling up its creator strategy for 2024, including an optimized version of its Creator of the Week program, building on last year’s success [via Ad Age].

Where is Gen Z: Digital partnerships in sports are more crucial than ever—four social media platforms (YouTube, Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat) now have a larger Gen Z audience than linear TV [via eMarketer].

Creator-Based Audience Targeting: You can now build remarketing audiences based on specific YouTube creator videos [h/t Keith Bendes].

Sports Tech Trends: Deloitte’s 2024 Future of Sport report highlights how industry leaders are responding to key trends, with AI (85%), Big Data (68%), and Zero-Party Data (56%) expected to have the biggest impact over the next five years.