Sponsorship marketing is hard work! Nothing is more frustrating than spending countless hours crafting a sponsorship proposal, sending it out to your prospects and hearing…nothing in return. I see a lot of sponsorship proposals, good ones and bad ones (and some REALLY bad ones) but all of them suffer from one of these five issues, which are costing you money. Let’s dive in and see if we can make your sponsorship packages stronger and grow your sponsorship program!
Full disclosure: a fulfillment report didn’t actually save my life! It did, however, save me from a horribly embarrassing situation, saved a sponsorship relationship and saved me a lot of pain. Negotiating the Custom Sponsorship Proposal Let me set the stage here: I was selling sponsorship for an event…a big event. Our target audience was a group of professionals who had a lot of money and who had very specific needs to be able to participate in their profession. In other words, they had a lot of money and they had to spend a lot of that money to do their job. From a sponsorship valuation standpoint, this opportunity was an absolute gold mine! I negotiated a sponsorship package with a new company looking to increase their professional services business and our audience was their target audience. Excellent! We went through all of the assets, picked out the ones that made sense to them, and I created a custom sponsorship proposal based on that feedback. Sponsorship Fact: Good Fulfillment Starts with Good Activation The day of the event came and we were sold out! All of our sponsor logos were where I said they would be, we said all of […]
There is one thing that every single sponsorship property has to offer that every single sponsor wants…and very few sponsorship seekers realize they have it. What is this magical thing that will make your sponsorship sales so much easier? I’m going to tell you…but first a story! From “No Thanks” to “Sign Me Up!”
In part one of my corporate sponsorship gone wrong post I covered three examples of what NOT to do with your sponsors. If you liked those three examples, you are going to love these last two examples. Have a horror story of your own to share? Leave it in the comments!
The goal of this post is simple: learn from my mistakes! I have been doing corporate sponsorship deals for charities, private companies, and associations and not for profits for a long time and I have had some great successes but I have also had some disastrous corporate sponsorship deals gone wrong.
Many corporate entities make decisions for the following calendar year by the end of October/early November, which means that now is the time to act or you could leave some money on the table. Try these techniques and strategies for the next 30 days and you will be surprised at how much money comes in during the winter and spring as a result! Tip #1: Think Partnership, Not Philanthropy This one is less of a technique than it is a shift in mindset. Is your cause important? Absolutely! Will it come up in a meeting with a corporate prospect? Definitely! But if you spend the majority of the meeting talking about your programs and your cause, you may be in trouble. As a charity, you exist to achieve your mission. You mission and programs are your product and how you measure success for your shareholders (donors, board and volunteers). Companies exist to make a profit, that’s how they measure success and how their boards and shareholders measure their success. In all likelihood you are pitching to a marketing, business development or HR person, all of whom are being measured and held accountable for their budget. Good causes are important, but […]
The practice of sponsorship sales isn’t complicated, when you focus on the right activities. Unfortunately, the sector has become obsessed with the sponsorship package as the primary sales tool, which is definitely not the right activity! While the sector spends more and more time perfecting their standardized sponsorship packages, brands (ie sponsors) care less and less about sponsorship packages. In fact, most brands throw sponsorship packages in the garbage without ever reading them. There is definitely a disconnect between sponsorship properties (ie sponsorship seekers) and those looking to invest in sponsorship.
Before you dive in, if you are looking to determine the value of your sponsors , check out these titles in our “sponsorship valuation” series: Sponsorship ROI Metrics: Approaches to Measurement and Evaluation Tangible vs. Intangible Sponsorship Benefits Defined Seven Sponsorship Valuation Questions: Part One Sponsorship Valuation Best Practices Essential Guide to Sponsorship Valuation If you’ve only skimmed through the information in this guide (which, you really should take the time to read everything), then spend some time with this section at least. It’s a recap of all the steps needed to complete your sponsorship valuation. I recently ran a session all about sponsorship valuations. I decided to write a post covering the answers to a few insightful questions that came up during the session, but there was so much to say I had to break this up into two different posts. In part one, we covered four important questions about sponsorship valuation – make sure to check it out if you haven’t yet. We’re not done yet! Here are three additional questions about sponsorship valuation that came up at the session that I think will be helpful to a broader audience. Let’s dive in! Q5: What do we do if […]
Before you dive in, if you are looking to determine the value of your sponsors , check out these titles in our “sponsorship valuation” series: Sponsorship ROI Metrics: Approaches to Measurement and Evaluation Tangible vs. Intangible Sponsorship Benefits Defined Seven Sponsorship Valuation Questions: Part Two Sponsorship Valuation Best Practices Essential Guide to Sponsorship Valuation If you’ve only skimmed through the information in this guide (which, you really should take the time to read everything), then spend some time with this section at least. It’s a recap of all the steps needed to complete your sponsorship valuation. I recently ran a session all about sponsorship valuations. In that session we had people from all over the world and sponsorship seekers of every size and property (from galas to sports to naming right…and everything else). Out of this session came some questions about valuing sponsorship packages that I think will be helpful to a broader audience.