The Effect of Corporate Sponsor Image on Purchase Intention of Persepolis Fans With The Mediating Role of Brand Love And Sport Involvement

The Persepolis team has achieved many successes in the past years, both domestically and at the Asian level, which has made this team very attractive for financial sponsors. In addition, the Persepolis team has millions of fans inside the country, which provides a large market for sponsors to encourage the fans of this team to buy their products through financial support of the Persepolis team. In the meantime, the sponsor's image as a variable that is related to the supporter's behavior and the love of the brand and the fans' involvement in sports as variables that are related to the fans have a special effect on the intention to buy sponsoring products, but so far, researchers have not seriously have not been investigated. According to previous findings, brand love and fans' involvement are variables that can have a significant impact on purchase intention, but the way these variables influence the image of the sponsor and the intention to purchase sponsored products in the country is unclear, so the researcher is trying to determine the effect of the image. To examine the sponsor, brand love and fan involvement on the intention to purchase sponsor products in Persepolis fans through the following conceptual model. The current research is of a survey type in terms of applied purpose and in terms of descriptive method. Descriptive in the sense that it presents a picture of the current situation and survey in the sense that the collection of the desired data is done through sampling from the community and in a field research, and in terms of the relationship between the variables, it is of the correlation type. And in terms of time, it is temporary. The statistical population in this research was the fans of the Persepolis football team, who were the buyers of the sponsoring products of this team, i.e. Irancell. Due to the unknown size of the statistical population, the optimal sample size of Muller (1999) was used to determine the statistical sample size. were selected as samples. Research tools include standard brand love questionnaires with 5 questions by Karjalotu et al. (2016), company image with 5 questions by Ko et al. (2000), sports involvement with 6 questions by Ko et al. (2000) and purchase intention with 2 questions by Ko et al. Was. It should be noted that the questionnaires were designed electronically and distributed on virtual networks (Telegram and Instagram) related to Persepolis fans; So that the fans sent their opinions in the form of designed items (on a five-point Likert scale) to the researchers online. In this research, structural equation model and path analysis were used for data analysis using SPSS 23 and Smart PLS 3.2.8 software. The analysis of the research findings was done using the structural equation modeling of the variance-based approach. The use of this approach in testing the hypotheses and theoretical model of the research helps the researcher to deal with the main variables involved in the theoretical model as latent variables and to include the measurement errors in the estimation of the parameters related to the model test and in The results of the estimates are more accurate and reliable. PLS modeling takes place in two stages. In the first stage, the measurement model (external model) is examined through validity and reliability analyzes and confirmatory factor analysis, and in the second stage, the structural model (internal model) is evaluated by estimating the path between the variables. According to the obtained results, the value of factor loadings of obvious variables (0.900-0.582) was greater than the cut-off point of 0.3 and their t-statistic value was also greater than the cut-off point of 1.96 (P<0.05), which means that The variance of the indicators with their related structure is acceptable and shows the appropriateness of this criterion. The reported results show that the sponsor's image directly affects purchase intention (β=0.374, t=5.434), brand love (β=0.599, t=12.792) and sports involvement. (β=0.387, t=4.045) has a positive and significant effect. Also, sports involvement (β=0.307, t=54.735) and brand love (β=0.257, t=3.465) directly have a positive and significant effect on purchase intention. The reported results show that the sponsor's image indirectly and through sports involvement (β=0.119, t=3.788) and brand love (β=0.154, t=3.215) Purchase intention has a positive and significant effect, and sports involvement and love for the brand strengthen the effect of the sponsor's image on purchase intention. This article examines the effect of sponsor image on purchase intention of Persepolis fans with the mediating role of brand love and sports conflict. According to the research results, the sponsor's image has a positive and significant effect on the intention to purchase sponsored products, which is consistent with the results of Gharibi et al. (2019, 52), Alrais et al. 2016, 238) and Tissotto and Alexandris (2009, 358) are consistent. Measuring the return on sponsorship investments is a challenging task for most marketers. There are many reasons that companies decide to provide financial support, the most important of which is to increase brand awareness and create, promote or change their brand image. Consumers with higher involvement actively search for different products and alternatives. They search for different sources of information and spend conscious efforts to collect information, information processing is done more deeply and also the evaluation after purchase of these consumers is more deliberate and informed. Therefore, these people carefully examine the desired product and similar products to buy their desired products. Considering the positive image of the sponsor in the mind of the fan with high sports involvement, this causes him to pay special attention to the sponsor of his favorite team when he decides to buy products, because he is well-versed with its information. The product is familiar and has a positive image of the sponsor and its products due to the support of his beloved team, so this desire is created in him to buy the sponsor's products, so the sports conflict of the fans can influence the sponsor's image on the intention to buy the products. Increase sponsorship.