Sponsorship proposal evaluation comes down to two major factors: What you offer; and who you submit it to. These are the factors that will tell a sponsor whether what you’re offering is right for them, whether you’ll be easy to work with, and whether you have the skills and approach… Read More
It used to be that 99% of sponsorship proposals were made up of the following four or five benefits: Logos on things Tickets to things Some kind of hospitality An official designation Some kind of exhibition space or speaking slot (if applicable) The result was that hundreds of thousands of… Read More
I have worked with a lot of big rightsholders, and one of their biggest challenges is how to get the regional offices to deliver national sponsorships on a consistent basis. This becomes even more complex when the structure is federated and the offices are operating as independent businesses. They have… Read More
How many times will you miss your sponsorship target? How many times will you scramble for rats and mice sponsorship to make up a shortfall? How many times will you ask your board to hit up their well-connected friends, because your business case isn’t getting money in the door? How… Read More
I was recently discussing sponsorship with a brand manager, when she said that she didn’t understand why brands would bother with sponsorship anymore, when they can use microtargeting to get their messages to the same people without sponsorship. She contended that unless a brand was using the sponsorship to secure… Read More
How to value contra, otherwise known as in-kind, sponsorship is a question I get almost every day. What is most interesting is how differently sponsors and rightsholders view contra, and they both overcomplicate what is really quite a simple equation. Rightsholders take contra for granted. Well, okay… most rightsholders take… Read More
Over the past few years, I’ve had several consulting jobs where I’ve been the second consultant hired in less than a year. Either the clients didn’t think they got the best advice or, upon implementation, they realised that the advice provided really wasn’t going to get them where they needed… Read More
This is a total rewrite of one of my most popular blogs. For years, this blog has sat squarely in the top five, and according to analytics, virtually everyone gets here because they’ve done a search on something like, “How to create sponsorship levels”. The problem is, sponsors hate levels. Gold-silver-bronze,… Read More
“Can you name any of the sponsors of this event?” If that question is never asked again, our industry would be better for it. It’s nothing but a leading memory test that has nothing to do with the changes in perceptions, behaviours, and alignment that a sponsor needs to see.… Read More
My latest white paper is all about how sponsorship broke the ground that Disruptive Marketing is now claiming, and how we’re going to stay at the forefront by bringing more meaning to the equation than any other marketing media possibly can. It’s full of big trends, bigger ideas, and keys to finding… Read More
With the huge, new focus on developing giant data sets – for analytics, for micro-targeting – some sponsors have lost their way on sponsorship, shifting the focus from people and passion to data acquisition. I can see the appeal. When data drives so much about marketing, more data is better,… Read More
I recently wrote a blog on The New Swear Words of Sponsorship for rightsholders. But rightsholders aren’t alone in this sponsorship swear-word caper. I’ve been in a lot of meetings and training with sponsors, with sponsor swear words fully on display – words that are totally counterproductive to getting good… Read More