In the marketing literature, the desire or need to participate in a music festival is triggered by various reasons. Some sponsorship forms have associated brands with music festivals. One of the counterparts of the sponsorship is the possibility of associating the name of the brand with the designation of the name of the festival—that is, the brand acquiring the naming right of the festival. However, this theme has aroused the academy's interest, and studies that show the importance of the festivals in connection with the sponsoring brand. Thus, this study (N = 306) was carried out through a research model, tested through the PLS-SEM methodology, which showed that cultural exploration and socialization have effects on trust and brand connection and that the congruence between the sponsoring brand and the festival's characteristics play a mediating role in this relationship. Therefore, recommendations are suggested that contribute to the theoretical-practical deepening of new forms of persuasive communication, such as sponsorship, applied to the creative and cultural industries.
Top2. Literature Review
The events provide participants with a unique, magical, and singular environment. However, they also have substantial impacts on the places where they occur, whether in economic, touristic, social, or environmental terms, as well as projecting the image of the place where the event occurs (Kim, Uysal, and Chen, 2001). Given the multiplicity of current events, defining the concept of “festivals” in this study is interesting. “Festivals are an essential expression of human activity that contributes significantly to our cultural and social life. They are also increasingly linked to tourism to bring business activities and profits to their host communities, generating increased tourism revenue (Allen, O'Toole, McDonnell, and Harris, 2008, p. 6).
Festivals can cover various themes, including dance, film, music, arts and crafts, cultural heritage, sports, and products (Kim, Borges, and Chon, 2006). In addition to the themes, there is a great diversity of music festivals, taking into account the different musical genres, spaces, and places where they take place and provide exciting opportunities not only for artists but also for sponsors, providing a unique experience for participants and above all, to the fans (Dowd, Liddle and Nelson, 2004). The authors are unanimous in considering that festivals are an essential resource for destinations (Saayman, 2011), for which they have known remarkable growth and diversification in terms of their typology. For Kim, Uysal, and Chen (2001), events and festivals vary significantly in place, objectives, program content, and purposes, conditioned by the marketing strategy.
Hundreds of festivals are organized annually, leading to growing competition among organizers of this type of event (Kitterlin & Yoo, 2014). Thus, it is crucial to understand the motivations that drive audiences to participate in a festival to carry out strategic planning and design a more effective marketing strategy (Kitterlin & Yoo, 2014).