Are sponsorships being finally exposed as the weak marketing discipline they’re known for or could they emerge as a powerful, stronger marketing tool?

When you hear the immortal words from your sponsor “can you make the logo bigger” it’s game over. You’ve just failed to demonstrate the value of your sponsorship. Sponsorships are, and always have been, one of the hardest marketing disciplines to prove, defend or measure. Now more so than ever.

Their weakness is now being severely tested with the number of recent sponsorship withdrawals here and overseas. Philips, after 15 years of sponsoring the Tri Nations, has pulled out. Ford is reviewing their supply of cars to the All Blacks. Swimming NZ failed to land a major sponsor to host the world FINA championships last year. If it wasn’t for Michael Hill, the NZ Golf Open would struggle. Sony pulled out of sponsoring the Wellington Phoenix citing the recession (are you sure about that guys?). And Eden Park are struggling to snag a naming rights sponsor for the 2011 RWC.

On the global front, Subaru have pulled out of the World Rally Championship – even though their brand was built on rally. ING and Royal Bank of Scotland have withdrawn from Formula One. AIG might disappear from Manchester United shirts. Exposure, brand awareness or stakeholder relationships are not good enough reasons to stop your sponsorship line getting culled. You need to think differently.

In easier times the CEO or board could get away with indulging company funds in their hobbies or interests citing brand awareness but the game’s changed. There’s no fat to play with. And people are asking, finally and rightfully, “what are we getting for our dollars?”

This recession has forced companies to look at their sponsorship portfolio investments – and the value they generate – as they would with other assets.

Sponsorships are partnerships of value

It starts by re-defining sponsorship. Sponsorships are about partnerships. Partnerships of value. Sponsors need to be provided with something of worthy commercial value. Changing from an old-school ‘dollar logo’ mentality to a new school ‘value partnership’ mentality will increase the chances of your sponsorship surviving.

There are a number of reasons why sponsorship proposals fail and as a former sponsorship manager I’ve seen lots. Some good, some bad, some plain bloody awful. I’ve also seen good sponsorships go bad due to a lack of professionalism, a change of team or complacency through familiarity.

So here are some pointers if you are seeking to improve your sponsorship hit rate as marketing budgets tighten.

How to infuriate a sponsorship manager

1. Pluck figures from thin air. Do your maths. How did you get to that figure? How will you pay yourself? Why do you need the money up front? Have you considered the leverage or promotional budget required?
2. Make unrealistic claims. Claiming you will have 5000 entrants for an unproven year one event demonstrates naivety and makes you look less credible. Instead manage expectations by under-promising and over-delivering.
3. “My event is next month.” That gives your potential sponsor no time to get budget approved, leverage it and invite busy, important stakeholders. If you turn up late your answer will be: “come back next year” which translates politely as “don’t bother wasting our time again”. Leaving pitches late signals that you have a distressed product so smart sponsorship managers will defer their decision, if they’re still interested, and beat you down on price.
4. Turn up without the team. Potential sponsors want to know the real people they’ll be working with each day. Meeting and checking out the fit with the team is key.
5. Not doing your homework. Think about strategic fit, brand alignment, commercial benefit to the sponsor, their sponsorship strategy, their stakeholders, who you can help influence and how you can improve their perception. Who else do they sponsor and why? Can you enrich the portfolio? Can you see a weak link?
6. Come round the back door. Good sponsorship managers invest time and effort creating evaluation criteria. They do it for a reason. So they can evaluate all proposals using a consistent and fair process. Coming through the CEO, GM or Chairman is the best way get a sponsorship manager’s back up. Follow the right protocol and approach the sponsorship manager first. Then and only then, if you’re still struggling, pull in your contacts to help nudge things along.

How to win a sponsorship manager over

1. Regular communication. Earn those dollars by communicating regularly and providing your sponsor with stories. Stories they can use. A sponsor has every right at any stage to ask what their dollars have enabled and you’ll need a good answer. Find out what your client’s communication preference is – email, phone or weekly WIP meetings? How often? They’re busy people and they’ll appreciate you thinking to ask.
2. Proactivity. Think of yourselves as commercial partners continually earning your right to the relationship. Be proactive by arranging regular reviews or post-event debriefs and work on refining measurement tools. Helping your client frees them up to look after other sponsors. If you’re low maintenance, you’re one less thing to worry – or complain – about.
3. Professionalism. Just because you’re a non-profit or charitable trust doesn’t mean you don’t need to be professional. Turn up to meetings on time, deliver what you said you would when you would, provide weekly work in progress sheets, be available at short notice, think ahead, anticipate their needs and most importantly – listen to your sponsor.
4. Long term thinking. Successful sponsorships are all about longevity. National Bank and Daffodil Day is a 17 year partnership and it’s gone from strength to strength. Same goes for the Weet-Bix Tryathlon which started 16 years ago with 500 kids and now represents the world’s largest children’s triathlon with 17,000 kids. A long term commitment allows you to confidently plan goals and invest in improving your product.
5. Have a media partner. This shows you’ve thought about the leverage side of things which gives your potential sponsor reassurance. With a media partner on board you can guarantee naming mentions as many of today’s media don’t recognise naming rights (even though it’s key to the survival and defence of many worthwhile community sponsorships). This partnership also gives your event a greater chance of media pick up, exposure, success and ticket sales.
6. Add value. Create a community of sponsors, run sponsorship workshops, make stakeholder introductions and develop network opportunities amongst your fellow sponsors. See them as allies where you all gain from working, rather than competing, together to create more opportunities for your client.
7. Provide an edge. How can you help them with a product launch or PR issue? Can you do the job better than advertising? What key performance indicators can you offer? Can you endorse and recommend their products to your membership? Give them something no other marketing channel can.

Sponsorships are not donations. If they are, they should be called cheque book charity or better still corporate altruism. Sponsorships are a marketing investment and if they don’t get the returns you’re looking for, drop them. An absence of sponsorship strategy means you’ll be left to the whims and biases of your CEO or Board (anyone get the link between Wattyl Paint and Round Lake Taupo? Pale of paint with your bike Sir?). Sponsorships are not exchanges of dollars and logos and they’re not a god-given entitlement not matter how worthwhile you think your cause might be. Sponsorships are an exchange of mutually beneficial value between two partners. You need to prove, and continue to prove, your value or you might find your sponsorship dollars disappear when next financial year rolls round.

As with all things in life you get out what you put in. Sponsorships are no different. Make the effort and you’ll get the reward.