Question

Topic: Advertising/PR

How To Approach A Company To Sponsor An Event?

Posted by Anonymous on7/5/2012 at 12:53 PM ET 250 Points
My company is a new 'student tours' company based in the the north of England, and the first tour under our brand name will be in November to Amsterdam.

As the brand is new, i feel that sponsorship by a relevant company (such as an alcohol company, nightlife or other student related company) would add both authenticity and strength to the brand.

How can you approach large companies with these micro- advertisement opportunities? The benefits would be that the brand would be seen by thousands of students on promotional material, if the brand grows a loyalty to original sponsor would remain, low cost (I would not ask for a fee as such, merely permission for the brands association and a contribution of merchandise etc..) and a chance to really penetrate a new set of customers (first year university students looking to 'live the uni experience)

What I'm really looking for, is contacts into this seemily hard to approach world of sponsorship.

Any help would be greatly appreciated

Chris,
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RESPONSES

  • Posted byGail@PUBLISIDEon7/5/2012 at 1:10 PM Accepted
    You're going to be hard-pressed to get a large company's sponsorship for a November event. Advertising/sponsorship budgets of significant amounts are typically planned nearly, if not more than a year in advance.

    Since this is a first tour coordinated by a new company, you might consider approaching smaller businesses to experience the benefits that you listed in return for their dollars. You will likely need more of them, but they typically don't have to jump through bureaucratic hoops for event approval. It will also help you build your credibility and prove your reach.
  • Posted on7/5/2012 at 1:15 PM Author
    I agree that the time aspect is a challenge, which is why your advice on a smaller company is duly noted.

    但是你提到的“广告/赞助的significant amounts are planned a year in advance" would exceptions be made by the fact that this is not a 'significant amount' as the cost to the company would be minimal? (much less than £100)?

    Thanks,
  • Posted bymarketbaseon7/5/2012 at 3:37 PM Accepted
    Gail@PUBLISIDE is absolutely right, but there is no harm in approaching large companies with a proposal/presentation. Things change and opportunities crop up; you just might get lucky!
  • Posted byGary Bloomeron7/5/2012 at 7:58 PM Accepted
    Let's say I'm the brand director for a major brand of alcohol (I am eager here to point out that I am NOT, but let's suspend our disbelief for a moment, shall we?) and let's imagine that you contact me and that you're fortunate enough (or lucky enough) to get by my gatekeepers ... and let's also pretend for a moment that you're now sitting in my office, in a meeting.

    What do you have and what can you offer me that can possibly be of interest?

    That question's not being asked here with a snide edge to it, I need to know what you can offer me.

    If you get to ask this question note that you'll have under two minutes to frame your offer and deliver your premise. Think quickly ... the clock is ticking and you stand between me and my lunch ... and trust me, you do NOT want to be in that position with any major player ... ever.

    How are you going to frame and position your offer and how are you going to stop me dead in my tracks and woo me so that I simply CANNOT tell you to bugger off ... which is what most brand directors will tell you to do in this situation ... if you manage to get through to them ... only they won't be anywhere near as polite as I've just been. Just so you know.

    Your offer needs to be big.

    Your offer needs to be the dog's bollocks.

    Your offer needs to make me say yes.

    It needs to grab my attention, and it needs to resonate with me ... with my desires ... and with what I know (through hundreds of thousands of pounds' worth of market research) to be the desires of my ideal buyers ... my advocates ... the people who live, eat, sleep, and drink my brand.

    If you're talking less than £100 the odds skyrocket that you'll be laughed out of the offices of any major brand. Most brand managers spend more than that flicking open their laptop to check e-mail.

    Although you have a fledgling tour company (for which you are to be celebrated because this EXACTLY the kind of business that will take off, if managed well) what you do not yet have is a "brand".

    I know that's probably a tough pill to swallow but it's true.

    Like it or not, your belief that "sponsorship by a relevant company (such as an alcohol company, nightlife or other student related company) would add both authenticity and strength to the brand." is founded on nothing of substance (I'm telling you this for your own good ... bear with me and I'll explain why in a moment).

    Until you have something to sell ... you have nothing for people to tell ... no adventures, no incidents, no funny stories ... no cocktail party chit chat about the things that happened while people were on your tour.

    Until you have a track record of delivering great tours ... and until you have solid testimonials from happy, delighted, ardent fans and supporters ... until you've built some kind of neural architecture (real or imagined) for people to EXPERIENCE your tours ... until then, until you've built these feelings ... real or imagined ... as far as having a brand is concerned ... until then you've got precisely dick: no equity, no recognition, no buy-in, no fan base (and here, relatives and friends do not count), no social proof. Nothing. That's nada. Diddly. Jack.

    Go to any major brand, cap in hand BEFORE you have anything to offer of this kind and it'll bite you in the tush and it won't be buying you breakfast.

    Your assertion that "The benefits would be that the brand would be seen by thousands of students on promotional material ..." are baseless.

    What promotion material? Seen by whom? Where? How frequently? With what conversion rate?

    As well-intentioned as your next thought is, that "... if the brand grows a loyalty to original sponsor would remain ..." is at best, vague, and at its weakest, it's thinking that you need to change.

    Why might people be "loyal" to this sponsor? On what evidence to you base this assumption?

    Brand loyalty does not just happen. It develops over time as a result of sustained delivery by a brand of consistent, solid, emotionally pleasing solutions to a set of deeply embedded neural illustrations, illusions, and feelings.

    To present your offer and do so effectively you need to be 100 percent certain of what you're offering, and of what you're asking for.

    By all means go for the top dogs because you might just get lucky. But be warned that you'll need something of substance to offer as proof of an audience, of proof of experiences, and of proof that people want to do it again.

    Any sponsor, any buyer, any investor wants to know what's in the deal for them and what return they can expect on their investment. You need to be able to show and tell the people you're going for who it is that will be seeing their logo and brand name, where it will be seen, and what the result will be for them as the sponsor.

    Do this, do it well, and do it with style and you have every chance of doing really well. Good luck to you.


  • Posted byCarolBlahaon7/6/2012 at 12:34 AM Accepted
    First, its just perception they are hard to approach. In fact every site of the companies you mention have tabs in their website for "community involvement" and you'll see forms to apply for sponsorship grants.

    However this is NOT the route I recommend, especially with such short lead time. You need to get from just a form which they gets hundreds of in a month, to getting sponsored.

    What I do is sit with my committee and first brainstorm a "hit list". First, do not do specific companies, do types of companies. Then fine tune to company specifics. Then we break up the contacts into manageable numbers. You will find there is someone with an insider in a lot of them.

    To cut thru the red tape, I advise finding a champion in the org to put you at the top of the list. This is not as hard as it seems. For example, you mentioned a alcohol company. Do you have a favorite restaurant you patron regularly? Tell the manager your situation and ask for their reps (salespersons) contact info. Then contact them. Alcohol reps have deep pockets, especially for in kind donations. Do you think an alcohol rep who's good customer is xyz Pub will blow you off? Once you get a yes leverage that power. The next contact will be to say "xyz Brewing company said yes, can I count on you".

    I will also pass on that finding your media sponsor should be your first step. They will get the word our on your sponsors, and that is what sponsors want... exposure.

  • Posted on7/8/2012 at 4:03 PM Author
    @Gary Bloomer, I really appreciate your constructive criticisms, thank you for taking the time to feed back so much on the idea. Couple of corrections in my original post, i meant less than £1000, and secondly by brand loyalty, i meant by myself for future sponsorship deals, as i agree that customer loyalty could never be promised.

    I agree, i currently do not have a brand, and therefore the idea of a company supporting something that lacks evidence is high risk, and unlikely. This also ties in with your points about proof, of which you are correct i can give none, as this is a first time. You speak strongly, in a manner than cuts through all the BS.

    I'll lay the gauntlet down to you, how would you approach a company for a sponsorship deal, in which they are to gain exposure in purely student environment (through flyers/posters/sales reps and website that would be used to promote my business, saying XYZ sponsored by ABC/ fuelled by ABC etc..) but there is no concrete evidence of a brand, and currently no loyal fan base?

    Do i have to cut them an exceptional deal, or offer something exceptional for them to offer a deal?

    @CarolBlaha, thanks for the advice, its duly noted and seems like a positive approach to take, not to go the usual methods!


  • Posted byGary Bloomeron7/8/2012 at 5:18 PM Member
    Challenge accepted.

    To woo a company in this way you need to offer them exclusivity. You need to show them how your company will treat their brand like royalty, and how you'll guard their look and feel when it comes to your management of their equity.

    So, yes: an exclusive deal AND something exceptional. Do this with other brands in the same niche and then tell each head honcho that you're having the same conversation with someone else. This might just engage their desire to "one up" a competitor. There's no guarantee that this'll work, but you never know.

    If you can get to the head of the company and do this, do so. Not the brand director or head of marketing mind you. I mean the boss. You need to speak to the organ grinder, not the monkey.

    When you get to meet with this person, give them your honest to goodness, open, no BS truth.

    Tell them how you'll serve your clients, how you'll support THEIR brand, and how you'll add value to THEIR bottom line, or to their brand's equity.

    This conversation needs to be all about what's in the deal for them and for the betterment of their name.

    If they ask you why they should give a crap about you, simply tell them you're one of their customers. Tell them that you use their product (and here, be sure this is the truth), tell them about everything YOU aspire to when YOU use their brand and that the same will hold true for YOUR clients.

    Tell the truth here all the way. When you're telling the truth you can shut up any time you want. But when you're lying your head off, there's a tendency to keep talking, to make the deal sound even better. Good business people are attuned to this.

    Then hold your breath.

    They MIGHT turn you down flat.

    But then again, they could just say yes.

    如果有人在这个位置不尊重你or speaking your mind then ask yourself "did I really want to do business with them in the first place?" If your gut feeling is no, move on to the next prospect. Get used to hearing "no" and moving on. The sooner you develop this skill, the sooner you'll develop a thick skin and the less hearing "no" will bother you.

    Keep asking. Don't give up until you hear a "Yes!" Then your victory will be all the sweeter. Once you get to this place, THEN you need to follow through on your promise to treat the company in question like royalty.

    I hope this helps. Good luck to you, and bon voyage.
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