The Seven Deadly Sins of Sponsorship: 7 Costly Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

The Seven Deadly Sins of Sponsorship
By Chris Baylis of The Sponsorship Collective

About Me
Chris Baylis is the Managing Director of The Sponsorship
Collective, a boutique marketing firm focused exclusively on:
• Sponsorship strategy
• Inventory building and asset valuation
• Sponsorship coaching
Chris is a sponsorship expert and has managed the entire
spectrum of the sponsorship process, from multi-million dollar
campaigns to local event sponsorship….and everything in
between.
sponsorshipcollective.com/AFP
@CPBaylis
sponsorshipcollective.com

Goals
• Uncover seven of the most common and
expensive mistakes made in sponsorship
• Expose how each of these deadly sins manifests
• Identify solutions and best practices for each of
the deadly sins
• Some tricks to help you combine steps and
implement templates

Let’s dive right in…

Deadly Sin #1
Thinking of Sponsorship as Philanthropy

Common Manifestations
• Focusing on the cause vs marketing
outcomes in a proposal
• Trying to sell sponsorship to CSR or
Foundation staff
• CSR proposals containing “logo
placement”
• Using words like support and
donation
• Tax receipting sponsorship

The Solution
• Know and define your audience
• Track your web traffic
• Define your social media followers and
their interests
• Determine the interests and buying
power of your audience and ask “who
cares about this audience” or “who
cares about who you help”

Yes, but how will this open more commercial
bank accounts?

Deadly Sin #2
Lack of Sponsorship Valuation

• Tiered sponsorship
packages
• Doing what you did last
year
• Starting with how much
money you need
• Shoulder shrug method

The Solution?
• Make a list of every single asset you have to offer, without exception
• Look at how much it will cost your sponsor to get the same exposure
elsewhere
• Determine the value of your tangible and intangible assets
• Don’t forget to add a “bump” to the tangible items based on the
value of your brand
• Look to newspapers, digital media, social media advertising, a cross
section of similar properties

Valuation Case Study
• Two identical properties, different geographies…same sponsor!
• Property A is giving away space for product and samples as a “value
add”
• Property A is afraid to charge for this as they fear they will lose the
sponsor
• Property B did a valuation and that same asset, to the same company
for the same property goes for…

$50,000

Deadly Sin #3
In-Kind “Sponsorship”

• Getting products or services for free or “in-kind”
• Getting products or services discounted
• “Adding value” to an event only if you can get it for free
• Not charging people for giveaways, samples and product placement
• Going to wine companies as wine sponsors, food companies for food
sponsors etc.

The Solution?
• Run everything through your
valuation calculator!
• The power is your audience! Wine,
food etc. are tools to put people in
front of that audience
• Would you rather free stuff or free
stuff and $78,000?

Deadly Sin #4
The Proposal First Method

• E-blasting sponsorship packages and “one pagers”
• Writing emails longer than 2 sentences
• Not meeting your prospects at least twice before
submitting a proposal
• Giving your board a sponsorship package with values
and levels
• Bringing anything but my patented sales technique
with you to prospecting meetings

The Solution?
• Talk to your sponsors
• Understand that the only reason for the first meeting is
…to get the second meeting!
• Bring my top secret weapon to your first meeting
• Use my top secret e-mail template

Steal My Email Template
(my most controversial slide)

Steal this Template!
Hey Dave,
I saw on LinkedIn that you are involved in X, I would love to connect and ask your thoughts
about a cool project I'm working on. Are you free tomorrow at 3:00?
Chris
(no title here, just my name)
…why does this work?

Why Does This Work?
So short , they can't help but read it
You flatter them and ask for advice
You give them a date and time, changing the decision from yes/no
to whether or not the time works
It isn't a 20 page proposal!
It’s focused on them, not you

When You go to the Meeting, Bring the
Following…

When You go to the Meeting, Bring the
Following…
Nothing

The Following Things are not Examples of
Nothing:
One pagers
Proposals
Annual Reports
Buckslips
Infographics
Leave behinds
Bookmarks

“When someone hands you a
flyer, it's like they're saying
here you throw this away.”
~ Mitch Hedberg

Here’s What Else it Does:
You tell your prospect that you don't care about them or their
needs
You care about telling them something vs hearing something
You have assumptions about what they want and what they
can do for you, and what you can do for them
Most importantly, it robs you of accomplishing the only goal of
the first meeting: to get the second meeting!

Never go in Proposal First!
The tale of 10,000
sponsorship proposals!

Deadly Sin #5:
No Activation Strategy (or Budget)

What is Activation?

What is Activation?
• Doing what you said you would!
• It is your responsibility to ensure that your sponsor gets everything they paid for
• Tickets? Ads? Logo placement? Press? Not only do you have to deliver but you
are going to send them a report proving you delivered

• Not planning at least 10% of your budget
for activation expenses
• Not charging for this as part of your
valuation!
• Not coaching your sponsors to invest
money in activation
• If they have 10K to spend, don’t sell them
a 10K package! Make sure they can
activate properly
• Ambush marketing

The Solution?
• Get to know the needs of your sponsors
• Plan for the expense in your valuation
and charge your sponsors for it
• Make sure they are aware of costs for
travel, print, product etc.
• Use a template to plan your activation
strategy

Steal this
Template!
Asset Deadline Lead
Design signage 1-Feb Elaine
Logos from sponsors 1-Feb George
Approval from sponsor 15-Feb Kramer
Place signage at event 1-May Frank
Order tent cards 1-May Estelle
Approval from sponsor 15-Feb Babs
Placement of tent cards at event 1-Jun Morty
Get names of guests from sponsor 1-May Helen
Add logo to website 1-Feb Jerry
Add logo to invitation 1-Feb Elaine
Send branded invitations 1-May George
Design ad for program 1-May Kramer
Ad approval from sponsor 15-Feb Frank
Secure booth space 15-Feb Estelle
Get names of booth attendees 1-May Babs
Design e-blast for database 1-May Morty
Approval from Sponsor 15-Feb Helen
Invite sponsor to speak at event 1-Jun Jerry
Introduce sponsor at event 1-Jun Elaine
Write speaking notes for MC 1-May George
VIP meet and greet organising 1-May Kramer
Extend invitaitons to key sponsors 1-May Frank

Deadly Sin #6
The Missing Sponsorship Fulfillment Report

What is a Fulfillment Report?

What is a Fulfillment Report?
• Doing what you said you would…and
proving it!
• It gives your sponsors a tool to prove to
their internal decision makers that they
got the ROI they expected
• Sets you up for renewing the sponsorship
within weeks of the event or end of your
campaign

• Not reporting back to sponsors on their investment
• Not meeting sponsors within two weeks of your event or campaign
• Not asking for feedback or ways to improve
• Not knowing if your sponsors will be back next year
• Only talking to your prospects when you need something

Fulfillment Report Basics
• Take a picture of every single thing you promised your
sponsor: logos, program ads, people…everything!
• Get a sample of everything you promised your sponsor
• Take screen shots of web traffic and logo placement, social
media and earned/purchased media
• Put it all together in a report with stats from your
event or program along with all of the pictures
and samples and call a meeting!

Case study alert!
The tale of the texting
sales rep!

Deadly Sin # 7
Gold, Silver, Bronze Packages

• Any standard package with
levels by any name
• Predetermined levels with
predetermined assets
• The spaghetti method
• The belief that every sponsor
wants a little bit of everything

The Solution?
• Build a huge inventory of assets
• Do a proper valuation of those assets
• Meet your prospects and find out exactly
what they want
• Sell them that and only that!
• The sniper method

Bringing it all Together
• Thinking that Sponsorship is Corporate
Philanthropy
• Lack of Sponsorship Valuation
• In-Kind “Sponsorship”
• The Proposal First Method
• No Activation Strategy (or Budget)
• The Missing Sponsorship Fulfillment
Report
• Gold, Silver, Bronze Packages

The sponsorship proposal doesn’t make the sale…
…YOU DO!

Questions?
sponsorshipcollective.com/AFP

The Seven Deadly Sins of Sponsorship: 7 Costly Mistakes and How to Avoid Them

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