NCMC Sponsorship Bulletin – Issue
9 05/04/2007
Sometimes you have Sell Sponsorship in order to Sell a
Sponsor
You’ve heard it before, I’m sure: “We don’t
do anything like that.” The reference of course is to sponsorship. You have to
wonder why they don’t do anything like that. Could it be that they were absent
on the day they covered sponsorship in college? Or perhaps they just don’t
think it would be a valuable expenditure – too related to fun and things that
have nothing to do with doing business and sales? Maybe they’ve been hit up by
too many Little Leagues and Bowling Teams. It is hard to say why they don’t
sponsor but it wouldn’t hurt to find out.
The point is, sometimes you have to sell the
idea of sponsorship before you can get a sponsor. Ask questions like, have you
never thought of sponsorship because you aren’t convinced it can help you gain
new business? The next question is, “Would you like to learn how
sponsorship can help you gain new business?” This is where you have to educate
them about the value of sponsorship and that means you have to know how it can
help.
People have to know what sponsorship is
before they decide to do it. They have to understand how it can help them in
their marketing goals and they need to know they are reaching their potential
customers through it. Too often sponsorship is seen as a charitable donation,
an investment of dollars to help a particular cause or team. Viewed as such, it
is often perceived as community involvement but only secondarily as a way of
increasing awareness of the company’s existence. In professional sports,
however, a sponsor has to see some tangible value from the investment and you
are at a disadvantage if they have always viewed sports sponsorship as a waste
of money. This company could be a perfect match for you, and with your
marketing programs, you may be able to help them get more business back than
they spend on the sponsorship. But no dice, they don’t think it would be a good
idea. Are you going to give up? Not if you want to compete. You can’t afford
to have good prospects slip through your fingers because they don’t know enough
about sponsorship to make the right decision. You have to educate them.
We have some great tools for that education
process. One is my article “What is Sponsorship” that you’ll find on our
website at
http://www.insmkt.com/money2.htm. You can read the whole article online.
It wouldn’t hurt to print it out and give it to your potential sponsor (please
provide author credit and a web link in return). Or you can send them the link
by email. You can also cut out certain sections that might appeal to your
potential sponsor and send them to him/her in an email to get the discussion
going. The article is also a chapter of my book, The Fundamentals of the
Sponsor Search at
http://www.insmkt.com/money.htm. Here are some quotes from the article:
What is Sponsorship?
•
The sponsor provides the operating capital for
the team and uses the team's fan interest and media coverage to its advantage.
•
A sponsor can get its message across to millions
of potential customers, generate good will in the community, and most
importantly, increase market share and profits.
•
Pure and simple, sports sponsorship is a
marketing play, a way of getting more people to buy products or services.
Another tool is a Powerpoint presentation we
have created that shows what many companies seek to gain from sponsorship in
sports so you can ask them what they might be interested in gaining from
sponsorship. (http://www.insmkt.com/sponsorshipvalue.htm)
This presentation can be a powerful aid in your search for sponsorship. It
might be a good idea to have the first meeting with the potential sponsor about
The Value of Sponsorship rather than to just pitch your proposal. If you sense
any doubt about it, consider getting them up to speed on sponsorship before you
get up to speed on the dollars you need. Remember, the sponsor search is about
selling and not about getting a long list of “No’s.”
Sponsorship Sales Matrix
This document is designed for the team trying to decide
what services and programs will be offered to the sponsor. It is also used to
help the team decide what services to offer for different levels of sponsorship
and the prices to charge for each level.
Sponsorship Sales Matrix
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