Abstract: Brand image transfer is an important part of sports sponsorship marketing theory research. This paper sums up the main research achievements and latest progress on brand image transfer in sports sponsorship marketing activities over the past twenty years, reviews the main research contents on brand image transfer from the three aspects of celebrity endorsement theory, multiple sponsorship perspective and customers learning perspective and summarizes the internal logic of brand image transfer research. On this basis, this paper puts forward the future research direction on brand image transfer in sports sponsorship marketing from the four aspects of theoretical construction, research contents, subjects and methods in the hope of promoting the development of China's sports sponsorship marketing theory.

Key words: sports sponsorship marketing, brand image transfer, celebrity endorsements, multiple sponsorship, consumer learning perspective, inverse transfer