My opinion:
The goal of sponsership/advertising is to get people to notice and recognize "the product". If you can can create some sort of product=fast, strong, cool, whatever recognition than that is even better.
My reading of crowds of mountain bikers is that you have 2 types of consumers (gross generalization I know but I want to keep it simple).
Group 1 - The less informed/inexperienced group. They look at the guy on the podium, look at his bike and says "wow that's fast". The problem for small manufactures is that there are a lot of podiums and therefore there will always be more Epics/Anthems/Top Fuel (or their hardtail siblings). The small manufacturers bike is likely to be forgotten quickly unless it is constantly in their face.
This group is unlikely to buy from a small manufacturer.
Group 2 - The "been there, done that, bought the t shirt" crowd. These guys realize the fast guy on the podium could have won riding a 1984 chopper. But they look at the bike and think "that bike looks like it's got what I want in my next bike". They log on to the website, check the bikes specs and if they like it they try to find or buy one.
What you want is these guys to look at closely at the bike. Wether the bike stacks up is up to the engineering dept. If it does stack up then you get sales.
Group 2 is not an insignificantly small group and they will spend the time and money to find the good stuff. They also have like minded friends.
Disclamer: This may be a big load of crap. I am a fitter and machinist after all.
