Naming rights used to be popular only with individuals, but now foundations and corporations are seeking such opportunities, said Terry Burton, a fund-raising researcher and consultant, in a presentation today at the annual conference of the Association of Fundraising Professionals.

Mr. Burton, founder of Dig In Research, in Vancouver, B.C., urged nonprofit groups to include naming opportunities in proposals to corporations and foundations. Companies, he said, are especially interested in seeking such opportunities “because they are running out of stadiums to name.”

For example, he noted that AT & T last year donated $25-million to the University of Texas at Austin after the university agreed to name an executive education center and conference center after the company.

He also noted that a growing number of naming rights are now offered for a short period of time — and at lower cost — than the opportunities that were once offered only in perpetuity.

He urged fund raisers to do more to publicize naming opportunities, for example by putting online a slide show showing all the features of a building available for naming. He said scorecards showing all the naming options are also a good idea, to get competition going among donors wealthy enough to make such gifts. While some fund raisers think it is unseemly to make such lists public, he said most donors already can figure out what naming rights go for since they are solicited frequently. “You may think donors don’t know, but they know,” he said.