Corporate Sponsorship: Unlocking Potential Revenue

If you’re not telling the right story you won’t succeed in sponsorship. Find out how to unlock potential sponsorship revenue in Pro Bono Australia’s latest webinar – corporate sponsorship for NFPs.

Sponsorship is hard work. Being successful in sponsorship is even harder work.

When sponsorship practitioners tell us what components they think will lead to successful sponsorship they generally say passion, connections, hard work and support are critical. And they are. But there’s another component that is even more vital to be successful in sponsorship – and that’s telling the right story, yes, story.

And just for clarity, your story is essentially about the delivery of your goods or services. ‘But I am telling that story’ you may say. You may be, but are you telling it in a way that’s attractive to corporates, when you do it becomes the right story and generating revenue becomes easier.

So here’s the million dollar question – are you telling the right story?

Do the quick checklist above. Did you say ‘yes’ to all four? If so you’re on a winner. If you scored less than four out of four then let’s explore a couple of the critical aspects to get you moving in the right direction.

The Unlimited Power Of Finding Your Story

To understand the power of telling the right story, we need to start with a fundamental question – why do corporate brands sponsor? They sponsor for one primary reason and that is they will have a problem. Think about it, unless a corporation has a problem they don’t need sponsorship. It is only when traditional marketing has failed, that corporations choose sponsorship. It’s not their first choice because it forces them to market through a 3rd party and therefore they lose some control.

So when a corporate brand reverts to sponsorship they are keenly searching for the right third party to help fix their problem. In short, a corporate brand with a problem (and they all have one) is searching for a rights holder (that’s you) that is making a big impact on an audience that is attractive to the corporate brand. Then they will pay that rights holder to allow them to leverage that story. That’s what sponsorship is.

The Key To Unlocking Your Sponsorship Potential

So when a rights holder discovers their right story, and the whole organisation is committed to that story, revenue starts to flow. Why? Because other parties (including corporations) want to jump on-board to leverage the impact they’re having. Look at any successful rights holder, big or small, and that’s exactly what they are doing.

So how do you discover your right story? It must have these two key components; a high impact and a valuable audience.

When your story has a significant impact on a valuable audience then you become attractive to those corporate brands that share or want that audience but haven’t been able to impact them in the way you have.

As you can see from the diagram above, both elements are vital. You are only as strong as your weakest link. Both the scale of the impact and value of the audience must be significant to ensure success.

We’ve spoken about the importance of impact so lets talk about audience value and what we mean. Audience value can be defined by the influence that the audience has within their given circle. This influence can include brand choice, consumption, spending or simply influencing others.

The more influential each individual within your audience is, the smaller your audience can be. Are they influencing a household, a business, a community or a government?

When most people think about sponsorship they think about who they’ll approach and how much money they can justify asking for. Take this approach and you lose.

When you take the time to discover the right story and align all of your organisation to telling that story first, you set yourself up for success. Revenue sources, including sponsorship will open up. People will want to leverage the big impact you’re making on the influential audience you’re reaching.

Do the right preparation and the rewards will follow.

Learn more from brand marketing and sponsorship expert Tim Wood and co-founder of the Fit Sponsorship Group, Bruce McKaskill and become equipped with practical skills at Pro Bono Australia’s webinar ‘Corporate Sponsorship for NFPs’.

Held on 29 September, this webinar will arm you with the skills necessary to unlock potential sponsorship funding opportunities.