Chris Baylis is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of The Sponsorship Collective.
After spending several years in the field as a sponsorship professional and consultant, Chris now spends his time working with clients to help them understand their audiences, build activations that sponsors want, apply market values to their assets and build strategies that drive sales.
Chris studied at Trent University and Mohawk College before he began his sales career in high tech and insurance. After several years in the sales industry, Chris decided to make the move to sponsorship.
The reason for Chris was simple:
“Sponsorship means you have to be an expert in sales, marketing, experiential, lead generation, account management and strategy. This challenging blend of skills is what makes sponsorship so fascinating but also incredibly complicated.”
Chris has been active in the sponsorship industry since 2007 selling sponsorship for a variety of organisations and every type of sponsorship opportunity as an employee, department leader, board member, consultant and volunteer.
After five years as a consultant with international consulting firm IFC out of London, England Chris decided to launch what is now The Sponsorship Collective. And the rest is history.
And it all began with a blog.
The problem, according to Chris, is that there was simply no information about best practice sponsorship when he began in the industry. Everyone was guarding their secrets and there was nothing by way of blogs, publications, or networking groups. And this is exactly what Chris decided to change.
When it was first launched, the goal of the blog was simple: to share sponsorship best practice with the world. Today, The Sponsorship Collective has been featured in countless publications, podcasts, websites, blogs, magazines, webinars and books. The Sponsorship Collective has also produced hundreds of YouTube videos, webinars and hundreds of thousands of words on the blog (at last count, enough to fill five business books on the topic).
In addition to speaking at conferences and stages across North America, a sample of publications featuring Chris Baylis include in Hopin, Blackbaud, several articles and references in Eventbrite, Inside Sponsorship, Cause Talk Radio, CSAE, The Partnership Conference and The Selling Show to name only a few.
Sponsorship is, at its heart, a marketing practice and marketing is nothing without audience experience as the main focus.
This is exactly how Chris thinks of sponsorship.
“Everything has to start with audience data and experiences focused on creating value for audiences. Most people think of sponsorship as simple logo placement, which could not be further from the truth” says Chris.
Because of Chris’ focus, The Sponsorship Collective takes an “audience first” approach to sponsorship. Starting with audience data, then moving to creating engaging activations before moving to valuation, sales material and then a “discovery based” approach to sales.
Here is a sample of the most recent articles written by Chris:
Valuation is a critical part of your sponsorship program, but it’s also one of the trickiest areas to master. I often have first-time sponsorship seekers ask me how much to charge for assets and whether they’re charging too much or even too little. I’m here to help...
When it comes to documents that sponsorship seekers spend the most time on, do you think it’s their assets or case studies or even post-event reports? Nope! In most cases, they get caught up on the sponsorship proposal. A proposal is but one part of the sponsorship...
Festivals usually attract a bevy of sponsors, including promotional and cash sponsors. With so many partners on your plate, it’s integral you measure the success of each sponsor to gauge whether you’ll work with them again. What kinds of data do you need to measure...
Before you dive in, if you are interested in podcast sponsorship, check out these titles in our “sponsorship for podcasters” series: Resource Page for Podcast and Influencer Sponsorship The Complete Guide to Podcast Sponsorship Maximizing Sponsorship Opportunities for...
Before you dive in, if you are interested in motorsport sponsorship, check out these titles in our “sponsorship for motorsport” series: Resource Page for Motorsport Sponsorship Motorsport Sponsorship: How to Get Racing Sponsors Companies who Sponsor Motorsport Finding...
What do sponsors want? If I had to boil it down to one thing, the answer is undoubtedly data. After all, any sponsorship seeker can say they delivered X, Y, and Z objectives, but talk is cheap. A sponsor wants you to prove it, and the only way to do that is through...
Multiyear sponsorship: to a festival owner and sponsorship seeker, those words are like music to your ears. Your festival planning would be so much easier if you didn’t have to pursue fresh sponsors year after year, but you haven’t the foggiest how to obtain a...
Social media is powerful stuff. It’s created celebrities, introduced memes, and dropped that next viral piece of content right into your lap. Moreso, social media is an excellent tool for finding sponsors. How can you use it to beef up the sponsor list for your next...
I recently published a post about making your festival absolutely irresistible to sponsors, magnetic even. What if you have a program or opportunity outside the festival sphere but still want to draw in sponsors like a magnet? Today’s post is for you. Join me as I...
There’s a quote I recently heard, and while I don’t exactly know who said it, its stuck with me ever since. Here it goes: “Amateurs have a recipe; masters have a cookbook.” So why does it matter if you come across as an amateur or a master? Sponsors don’t like to work...