Campus Multimedia has formed a strategic partnership with National Amateur Sports, Buying Sandlot has learned.
CM connects schools with regional and national brand partners; it has over 84K schools in its network across all 50 states. NAS is a marketing and media firm with 18 school districts in four southeastern states under its umbrella, accounting for close to 500 schools and over 200K athletes.
The partnership will include access to CM’s SponsorPlace platform, which connects organizations to brands.
“As district budgets and school budgets get cut, it’s more important than ever that companies like us come together to maximize revenue for everyone,” CM founder and CEO Karl Mawhinney told Buying Sandlot.
“We’re opening up access for local sponsors to support their schools while our sales team comes over the top and brings in regional and national brands district-wide down to the school level.”
The partnership will resemble how a college or professional league would operate, with both district-level and school-level sponsorships. Mawhinney said the “perfect win” is when a brand partner aligns with a district and then activates down the ladder at each school.
CM — which focuses on repeatable brand activations often enacted by the schools themselves — has worked with national brands like DoorDash and Jersey Mike’s. It will be able to optimize each district’s existing commercial sales rights, such as streaming and ticketing ads.
“They have the business relationships at the district level that include vendor relationships,” Mawhinney said. “That’s where we come in; we have the sales expertise and technology to solve that problem and support the districts.”
The partnership is currently focused solely on athletics. But Mawhinney said he expects it will eventually grow to include other student activities. About 50% of deals on SponsorPlace already come outside of sports; some youth sports organizations not tied to schools are also now on the platform.
“I believe (the partnership) can be a game-changer,” Mawhinney said. “It’s almost re-defining the business a little bit, so I’m excited about it.”
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