I've lamented on a few occasions about the bad news I often have to give to sponsorship seekers. A lot of it has to do with the quality of the sponsorship proposals they're creating, so I've decided to do this little self-diagnostic to see if your sponsorship proposals suck.
There are a hundred ways to get it wrong, but these are the big ones, and if you stay away from these warning signs, you'll do a lot better.
Search-and-replace
Do not EVER re-use a proposal for another sponsor simply by searching for one sponsor name and replacing it with another. It's a dead giveaway to sponsors that you a) don't know what you're doing; and b) don't give a crap about what they need to achieve.
Don't even do it for potential sponsors in the same category. Virgin Atlantic and British Airways don't need the same thing. Neither do Bupa and Medibank, Brother and Canon, or Kellogg's and Uncle Tobys. Their jobs as marketers are to differentiate their brands and encourage preference and loyalty in their target markets. They don't do that by marketing themselves in the exact same way as their competitors, so at the very least, sending the same proposal is counterproductive, and you could well be burning a bridge. Plus, more often than not, you'll miss one.
More than 25% is about you
If you're saying to yourself, "Of course it's about my event. What else would it be about?", you need to pay close attention here. You should only include enough background information about whatever it is that you're selling so that the proposal has context -- usually no more than a couple of pages. After that, the entire proposal needs to be about the sponsor, including...
- Who your target markets are, why they care about what you're doing, and how the sponsor can add value to that experience.
- How the sponsor can achieve their specific objectives -- research, research, research -- with this sponsorship. That's right, you need to include creative ideas for leverage.
- Fully customized benefits list and the investment required.
You use the term "general audience" or "broad audience"
Sponsors don't want to reach a huge audience of people who don't really care about what you do, but might cast their eyes on a few logos. They want to connect with an audience that is passionate and involved, as those are the people who will be receptive to win-win-win leverage activities and achieve big results for the sponsors.
"It's just a teaser"
I see a lot of uncustomized, often search-and-replace, proposals and letters. Often, the lack of effort put into these unsophisticated offers is dismissed with "It's just a teaser." Here's a bit of insight for you: Sponsors don't respond to teasing. They're not going to request a meeting. They probably won't even respond to your calls. They surely won't say "yes."
The mindset behind this is somewhere in the vicinity of wearing sweatpants to your first job interview, with the intent to wear a suit for the second interview. As with job interviews, you get one chance. You need to do your homework and put in your best effort the first time.
Online ad exchanges command higher rates when they have access to data about other Web sites that consumers have visited, per a Digital Advertising Alliance study.
"The results of our econometric analysis corroborate and extend an emerging body of empirical work documenting the value of information sharing in online advertising," authors Howard Beales of George Washington University and Jeff Eisenach of Navigant Economics write in a study commissioned by the trade group Digital Advertising Alliance. "Our estimates indicate that advertisers place significantly greater value on users for whom more information is available."
For the study, the researchers examined 3 million transactions conducted by two companies that run ad exchanges. One of the companies had cookie data for 89% of the impressions, with an average cookie lifespan of seven weeks. The other company had cookie data for 96% of ads served, but the average life of the cookie was just eight days. The study took place during a one-week period in August.
Overall, ad exchanges were able to command between three times and seven times higher cost-per-thousand impression (CPM) rates when serving ads to users with tracking cookies than without them, according to the study. Companies paid the highest CPMs to reach people with older cookies, the researchers reported.
The average CPM for all ads examined -- those served with and without cookies -- was 29 cents for the company with the shorter-lived cookies, and 47 cents for the company with cookies an average of seven weeks old.
The study only examined rates for ads sold by exchanges; it didn't look at how those rates compare to ones for ads sold directly by publishers.
Lou Mastria, managing director of the DAA, says the organization commissioned the study as part of an effort to quantify the impact of consumer data on the online ad industry. He says it shows that publishers can command more ad revenue when they have data about the types of products consumers want to purchase.
"Understanding whether someone's in market for a car, or in market for a vacation -- those are the things that are going to be important toward monetizing content," he says.
(Source: Online Media Daily, 02/10/14)
Needless to say, it's essential that sales professionals are
comfortable in their roles, but when comfort turns into complacency language
barriers can start to appear.
In sales training what to say to customers and how to say it
is covered extensively. These keystone skills are the backbone of any sales
career and every good salesperson knows that they need to be constantly
sharpened in order to remain effective.
Communication is the sales expert's main tool. In
negotiations a good communicator can make the difference between a non-sale and
hearing the words "sold." When following that age-old advice
"ABC -- Always Be Closing," the only way this is possible is by being
able to freely and naturally talk to clients and customers.
Becoming too comfortable can be just as much of an issue as
being too uptight, however, as complacent language has been found to be one of
the biggest complaints among customers. Here are the most misused words in
sales pitches which can turn-off clients in an instant.
Obviously
"Obviously" sounds vague at best and patronizing
at worst. If you have to explain something, it probably wasn't obvious to the
client. Dissect your pitch and find out where your explanations could be
clearer. If you are using this word just to fill up your sentences, don't. It's
a messy way to use your speech and off-putting to customers.
No problem at all
If you find yourself using this tired old phrase fairly
often, it's probably because you feel obliged towards your customers for the
job you are carrying out for them. Sales jobs can be challenging and some
clients can demand more than others, but in their opinion, what you are doing
for them is a part of your job. So naturally, it isn't (or shouldn't be) a
problem. Try to limit this phrase to once a conversation, towards the end.
Remember: The more you use it, the less genuine it sounds.
To be honest...
Either you're lying now or you were lying before. Your
entire conversation should be genuine and pointing out that you're being honest
only makes you sound dishonest. Honestly.
Erm
"Erm," "Umm" and "Ahh..." are
all noises a client hates to hear. Filling up the spaces in your pitch with
background thinking sounds appears unprofessional and can be very off-putting.
The worst thing is the more you say it, the less you realize how prevalent it
is in conversation. Practice confidence skills in telephone and 1-to-1
conversational situations and learn that short, snappy sentences and silent
pauses sound so much better than a long thread of unbroken speech.
Basically
A lot of the things said in a sales pitch might be simple
for the salesperson to understand, but especially in cold calling this might be
the first time the customer or client has heard of anything like what you're
proposing. "Basically" is often used wrongly in place of more helpful
terms like "in other words" or "to put it another way" by
well-meaning sales professionals. Unfortunately the word itself can sound like
quite a put-down, especially when combined with a confident attitude and pushy
manner. Your customers are not stupid, so don't treat them as such!
All of these words and phrases can easily be substituted and
omitted from sales pitches and conversations, so there really is no excuse to
be breaking the rules laid out here. All salespeople should be enthusiastic
about providing the best services to their clients and this relationship starts
from the very first phone call.
Cut these know-it-all phrases out and see what a difference
it makes to your sales figures!
