Modern Obstacles to Sponsorship Sales (And How to Overcome Them)

The landscape for sponsorship sales and marketing has changed a lot in recent years. Previous generations of business owners clamored at the opportunity to connect their brand to an outside team, venue, or property.

Sponsoring even a single sport, cause, celebrity, or musical event proved an easy way to showcase your organization to hundreds (if not thousands) of consumers within a target demographic for an instant boost in brand reach and recognition.

Today’s entrepreneurs understand that the once fertile and relatively untapped sponsorship terrain has matured, bringing with it a new set of challenges and complexities. Modern sponsors are much more savvy when it comes to choosing the right events to sponsor, making it more difficult to sell sponsorship engagements to prospects.

Fortunately, success is possible for sellers willing to discern potential opportunity amidst marketplace disruption. Here are potential obstacles and how to overcome them to get your next event sponsored.

Thick Firewalls (Is Anyone There?)

Feel like you’re struggling simply to connect with a live person when prospecting? It’s a common occurrence. The influx of sponsorship requests, inquiries, and proposals have prompted many people to ignore the flooding of unsolicited calls and emails they receive on a daily basis.

Solution

If you’re struggling to reach the right people in an organization, it’s officially time to up your gatekeeper game. Step one? Ditch the small talk. Launch your gatekeeper engagement from a place of integrity and respect, use basic manners, and add a personalized touch to the conversation that lets them know you’re listening.

 

More Decision-Makers

Another major obstacle to selling sponsorship is that, in many companies, there are multiple stakeholders involved in the decision-making process, making it challenging to zero in on the right point of contact within each organization.

Some groups have an entire designated sponsorship department, while others look to C-level executives and other resources to make the ultimate decision.

Solution

Changing your approach is the best way to stand out in an oversaturated marketplace of sellers. Stop calling everyone and anyone just to hit your weekly contact goals.

Go through your prospect list to determine that the people you’re contacting are actual decision-makers in the process and refine your value proposition to best resonate with that targeted demographic.

Everyone Is Busy

Limited bandwidth is a major obstacle to companies selling sponsorship opportunities. Many teams and individual contributors straddle multiple projects and responsibilities, leaving little time to read emails, answer phone calls, or read proposals.

Solution

Put simply: get to the point as quickly as possible.

Also, get as visual as possible with any digital contact you make with your prospects. Eliminate long stretches of rambling text (no one is reading it), opting instead for concise, compelling copy, graphics, charts, and images that make your point in a single glance.

Contact Turnover

Rampant turnover can make managing your list of endlessly rotating decision-makers a full-time job in itself. Continuously recreating the blueprint of who is in charge of purchasing sponsorship ads can waste countless, precious prospecting hours.

Worse yet, many sellers begin the proposal engagement with a designated contact only to have that person move out of that position halfway through the process.

Solution

A well-maintained CRM can prove a formidable weapon against high volume contact turnover. Keeping your CRM database up to date as you continuously prospect ensures you’ll have access to the best information possible, whenever it’s time to check in on a potential buyer.

Proving ROI

Many sponsorship prospects have limited marketing budgets and an already perceived value of a specific event or venue, making it challenging to change their view of ultimate purchasing return on investment.

Solution

Go into every selling opportunity armed with as many metrics as possible that outline the overall value of sponsorship. Utilizing an innovative CRM system can grant you access to a diverse range of statistics and essential analytics, so you can quickly and effectively address client concerns and illustrate the many relevant benefits that come with a sponsor partnership.

How are you changing your sponsorship selling approach to command attention and close deals?

Believing Every Word the Sponsor Says 

You’re not sure what happened. Your prospect seemed excited by your asset and activation ideas, and they even asked you to send them a proposal. Then you did, and you haven’t heard a peep since.

Did you do something wrong? You don’t feel like you did, because after all, you only did what the sponsor requested, so what gives?

You didn’t recognize a brushoff when it was happening. In this case, the brushoff was towards you by the prospect. They weren’t really interested in seeing a proposal, but rather than tell you they don’t want to proceed, they said to send them the proposal as an easy out.

Solution

Sponsors will lie all the time. What you want to do is shake off your case of happy ears. I refer to happy ears whenever a client of mine blindly accepts what a sponsor asks of them early on.

And yes “early on” is the important qualifier here. If a prospect asks for a proposal after five meetings, they’re not saying it to get you to buzz off. They genuinely want to see it.

However, if you two have exchanged one or two emails or a short phone call and they mention sending the proposal? Don’t waste your time.

And know when to give up the ghost. If you’ve followed up with a prospect for a week and they didn’t get back to you, that’s not by accident. Let it go and move on.

Start-Stop Momentum 

Have you ever had a productive sit-down (or virtual, doesn’t really matter which) meeting with a prospect, and both of you seemed really excited? You can’t wait to continue discussing ideas, but then your emails don’t get a response, and you keep getting their secretary every time you pick up the phone.

Is this another case of happy ears? Not at all. You’ve lost momentum in the sponsorship process, and this early on, that can destroy a potential deal. If you think about sponsorship like building a snowman, that big snowball you rolled has now melted. It’s impossible to build upon it.

Solution

You need to follow the BAMFAM acronym, which stands for “book a meeting from a meeting.” I don’t only recommend this acronym to my clients because it’s catchy and sounds cool (and it looks cool too, let’s be honest). It’s because it’s a necessary part of building momentum.

You’ve experienced firsthand how busy the other party can get once you two exit a meeting with one another. Even if the meeting goes really well, if the sponsor doesn’t have the time right now, then they don’t have the time.

Following BAMFAM ensures you schedule a meeting while you’re right in front of them. The sponsor can prioritize time for the meeting right then and there rather than wait to do it later when they’re less likely to get back to you.

Dragged-Out Answers

Your prospect is gung-ho about working together, but since they’re merely one person in the sponsorship division of their company and not a boss or higher-up, they have to get the deal cleared with their boss.

Oh, and that boss has a boss, and maybe the second boss has a boss. You can see where this is going. Even if your contact gives you the thumbs-up, until everyone on the totem pole clears the arrangement, it isn’t a done deal.

Solution 

There isn’t anything you can do to speed people along, as nice as that would be. Rather, you have to plan your sponsorship program as early as humanly possible, especially if you have a time-sensitive event, program, or opportunity.

How early is as early as humanly possible, you’re wondering? I always tell my clients they can begin planning their next sponsorships the same day as their event wraps up, or at least the next day.

I know, it seems preposterously early, but preparing yourself with enough time means you can sit back and let the process of receiving an answer play out as long as it takes without stress.

No Budget

No, I don’t mean you lack the budget (although I assume you do if you’re seeking cash sponsorship). I’m talking about the sponsor having no budget.

A lot of sponsorship seekers think this is impossible. They imagine sponsors as these big, benevolent companies with the deepest pockets in the world. And sure, some of the Fortune-100s do have the deepest pockets in the world, but many of the sponsors you work with do not.

You would hope they at least have enough funding to cover your sponsorship request, but if you go forward believing it without any confirmation, you could find yourself at a wall when the sponsor tells you they don’t have the budget you were expecting.

Even worse, sometimes a sponsor had a budget, but spent it already because you were too late to ask. See why planning your sponsorship program right after your event is so important?

Solution 

The only way to know whether the sponsor can afford to work together is to ask them. Now, you don’t have to be that direct about it if that kind of talk makes you uncomfortable. Rather, you can ask during the discovery session what their sponsorship budget is.

They might only be able to provide a loose estimate, but even that’s better than walking around in the dark assuming the sponsor can afford you only to find out later that they cannot.

No Connections

Maybe you’re a small business or a new organization. Perhaps you’re a solo act like a podcast host or a motorsport racer. Your list of connections isn’t very long, which you feel puts you at a distinct disadvantage compared to other sponsorship seekers with miles of contacts.

Indeed, it helps to have connections in the professional world, as when you know someone who knows someone, it’s easier to get your foot in the door.

Solution 

Even if you’re a small business or a solo act, there’s no reason not to build your connections. Get out there and attend industry events and expos. Shake hands. Rub elbows.

And then yes, use the more common way of networking nowadays, the internet. Get on social media, especially platforms like LinkedIn, and find new connections. Broaden that network, expand that net, and see who you find.

 

Once you build relationships, maintain them. That goes for your new contacts as well as your vendors and other business partners. Drop a line every few months, sharing a resource you think is useful or something thoughtful that brought them to mind.

This way, if you need to ask for their help, or vice-versa, you already have a warmer relationship.

Making the Sponsorship Deal One and Done

This is a common mistake, as many sponsorship seekers assume they only get one deal with a sponsor. And sure, you do if you only ask for one, or if you go into the sponsorship arrangement assuming it’s a single-time deal.

However, sponsorship renewal is the far more appealing alternative. Working with the same sponsor for a second or even a third time is easier for both parties. You already know each other, so there’s none of that awkward feeling out.

You have a good idea of what you can earn from your working partnership, but if you’re willing to have another discovery session, ideate new assets, and value your sponsorship property all over again, you could make even more.

As you can see, foregoing renewal leaves money on the table and hinders future sponsorship sales.

Solution 

The best way to begin talking about a deal extension is by producing a sponsorship fulfillment report, also known as a wrap-up report.

This report details all the best facets of your partnership with your sponsor, including your deliverables, your audience data, and your attendance figures. However, it also shows the not-so-good stuff, like the deliverables you failed or which ones underperformed.

The report presents a great opportunity for a frank discussion of where you can go next if you continue working together. You’ll have pointers for improvement right out of the gate.

FAQs

Do I have to give up if a sponsor says no?

Not always. You can sometimes turn a no into a yes, but it all depends on why the sponsor refused you in the first place. For example, if it’s budgetary, there’s nothing you can do.

What if I forgot a sponsorship wrap-up report – is it too late to work with my sponsor again?

The only way to be sure is to ask, but sponsors are busy people. The further out from your event, the higher the likelihood they’re filling their time with other projects and possibly sponsorship deals.

Wrapping Up 

Achieving sponsorship sales, while not necessarily an easy process, is doable by understanding the most common mistakes sponsorship seekers make and correcting them. Well, avoiding mistakes is preferable, but I recognize that’s not always possible.

Unlocking the keys to sponsorship begins with you, not the sponsorship proposal. You’re the one who makes the sale!