Welcome!

The magic of this course is having the space and time to think and plan. As you do the course your thoughts will be challenged and shifted. As will your sponsorship plans. Be comfortable with these shifting sands. By the end of the course your mindset will have moved significantly… that’s when you’ll have the full picture to plan effectively. For that reason, we recommend listening to or watching the entire course first without doing the worksheets. That way, when you go back and do each lesson again you can plan with the end in mind.

It’s impossible to fall behind in this course. Some students do all the lessons in a few weeks and others take months. This is not a race to the finish line but a framework and methodology to change your sponsorship mindset and therefore results. Be comfortable working at your own pace.

We encourage you to make notes as you go and contribute generously to the coaching sessions - challenging each other, asking questions and sharing examples. The truth is that the more you put in, the more you’ll get out.

With hundreds of students completing this course over the last 10 years, we’ve seen some extraordinary outcomes as the result of embracing a simple possibility: that better is possible. Thinking differently about sponsorship can unlock opportunities for everyone to get what they want.

Here’s to your success. Let’s go.

LESSON 1 VIDEO TRANSCRIPT

Tim: Welcome to the first lesson in this core training entitled How To Attract, Engage and Convert More Corporate Partners. I’m your instructor, Tim Wood, I’m going to be taking you through this course. And I’m also the co-founder of Fit Sponsorship Academy along with Bruce McKaskill who you’ll talk to later on in this course.

I’m really excited you’re here.

What we’ll do in this first lesson is, I want give you an overview of the course. It’s important that before we start digging into the detail that you can see the big picture so you can do the work required knowing why you’re doing it and what results you can expect.

I also want to touch on the reasons that we created this course and the Academy so you can get a sense of the broader community that you’ll now have access to tap into.

This course and Academy, was created to empower anyone who has the task of selling sponsorship to do it more successfully. So, whether you’re an artist or an athlete, an Arts, Cultural or Community Organisation, a non-profit or a for profit – you’re in the right place. Regardless of your size, this course will give you the knowledge and processes to successfully sell sponsorship. Hundreds of others have used this course our tried and tested processes, methods and tools to generate significant sponsorship revenue. Now it’s your turn, so let’s get into it…

When we talk to sponsorship practitioners and dig beneath the surface the key word that comes up time and again is frustration.

·     Frustration that what they do is actually really hard and carries enormous internal pressure.

·     Frustration that there’s a heap of competition and a limited pool of largely indifferent prospects.

·     Frustration that they can feel like a solo explorer trying to navigate a complex, ever changing world.

But we also see incredible passion and work ethic. People busting their gut to succeed because they know what their organisation does, actually matters.

But unfortunately, in the sponsorship game, passion and hard work are not enough. You need smarts. You need to know where and how to channel your energies to maximise returns.

Believe me we’ve seen the problems. We’ve been advising and selling in this space for over 20 years now on behalf of many clients, small, medium and large. We’ve seen it all:

·     the merry go round of 1 year deals;

·     of selling sponsorships at bottom dollar a week before deadline just to try to get closer to budget;

·     of knowing that your assets are probably worth double what you’re selling them for but not knowing how to break through that glass ceiling,

·     and of pleading with board members to make meaningful introductions to corporations so you can get in front of the right people.

We found a way out of this malaise and over many years have developed and refined a sponsorship sales system that works again and again. It has delivered results for Arts Companies, Museums, Entertainment Companies, Festivals, Health Organisations and Community Organisations. And if you follow it, it will work for you too.

But there are no shortcuts. And we dare say many of your problems are the result of just that, of rushing to market without having done all your preparation.

This course will give you the structure, the methods and the tools you need to succeed. It will help you get out of those all too common ruts and avoid the classic sponsorship pitfalls we see people fall for every day.

Our commitment to you is we’ll help you build a sustainable, profitable sponsorship portfolio. In return we need you to commit to following the proven process.

So welcome to the Sponsorship Academy. I’ve got no doubt that you’re going to get a lot out of this course.

Now let’s dive into an overview of the course and walk you through the roadmap so you can see what we’re going to do, how we’ll approach it, and why the course is structured the way it is.

The Roadmap for this course is available as download link below. You may like to download it now and refer to it as we go through– up to you. You ready to get into it? Alrighty, let’s do it.

This roadmap actually breaks into three distinct phases called Attract, Engage and Convert. This is our proven process. When you follow it, it delivers results.

One of the biggest traps sponsorship seekers make is taking their offer to market before it’s ready. It nearly always ends in failure. Corporations are ruthless commercial machines. If you don’t present the right story, supported by the right information, at the right time, they will very quickly overlook you. Worse still you’ll feel exposed as you burn potential sponsors in your urgency to try and find a new deal.

The trick is to do the required work up front so when you go to market you not only have the tools at your fingertips to significantly increase your chances of securing sponsorship, but the added bonus is that you’ll actually increase the value of the deal as well.

So as I mentioned there are three distinct phases to this course. The first two phases are about getting you ready. The last phase is where you’ll see the money come in. Believe me – a little work upfront pays dividends.

Just like the old story of the 2 wood cutters. One rushes into the forest with a blunt axe and starts chopping. The other takes most of his time to sharpen his axe then chops down a number of trees while the first axeman is still struggling on his first tree with a blunt axe.

So the first two phases are where you’ll sharpen your axe if you like and as I’ve mentioned they’re called the Attract and Engage phase. The Final Phase is where the dollars start coming in and we call it the Convert phase – more on that later.

So the very first thing we will do in this course is learn how to make your offer more Attractive to potential sponsors. Sponsorship is all relative, that is, Corporations are looking to use a third party like yours to help them get what they want. So, who’s your competition and how do you compare? The reality is you must play a game you can win. To discover this we’ll benchmark your organisation. What does that mean? Essentially you will learn how you compare and what you need to do to unlock your potential.

Sponsorship Practitioners tell us that once they Benchmark it’s often like a light switch has been turned on. For the first time they can see what they need to do to be more attractive to sponsors and what has been limiting them in the past. They become an expert internally very quickly, simply because they have taken the time to understand the market and their organisation’s potential. This helps them plan effectively, gain internal support and importantly manage expectations.

The Attract phase is very powerful in helping you re-shape your story and your ultimate offer. It will be critical to take the organisation on the journey with you and we’ll show you how to do that using the collaborative methods and tools that often produce those ‘penny dropping moments’ across the wider organisation.

At the end of this initial Attract phase you will have a clearer direction on exactly what you need to do to leverage and maximise your sponsorship revenue, and also the internal alignment you need to do, to take it to market.

So having completed the Attract phase, you’ll then be ready for phase two, which is Engage. The is where most people actually start their sponsorship journey – and that’s their mistake. They don’t do the required preparation and instead leap straight to approaching prospects. So having done that work upfront in the attract phase, by the time you get to the Engage phase you’re going to feel super confident that you’ve done the right preparation to deliver results.

In the Engage phase you’ll define your ‘who and how’ – that is, who to approach and how to approach them. When you learn this powerful double whammy it can save you precious time and be the door opener to many fruitful conversations.

If you’re an organisation that sends out sponsorship proposals that receives at best a lukewarm or mixed response, then I’ve got some really good news. We’re going to teach you a smarter way to approach prospects that does not include proposals.

In the Engage phase we’ll walk you through exactly how we go to market. You’ll learn how to filter prospects by those who actually want to hear your story. Then you’ll discover how to present your offer in a way that will be heard. Getting that first meeting is a key milestone for every sponsorship professional. The approach you will learn will significantly increase your first meeting response rate and enable you to tell your story and craft the sponsorship deal.

The feedback we get is the proven structure and methods we apply in this Engage phase helps what can be a really challenging process, be far, far simpler. Make no mistake there’s no replacing the hard work of sales but when you go into battle with the right preparation, using the right tools, and knowing what to do with them and when, you know you stand a much better chance of signing the right sponsors to your organisation.

So, having completed phases one and two, Attract and Engage, you’re ready for the pointy end of the course, phase 3, Convert.

So, you’ve shaped your story… taken it to market and found people who want to talk to you… now what? How do you guide the conversations through to a successful outcome?

In sponsorship, we all work so hard to get that precious first meeting. So much hangs on ‘getting off on the right foot’. So what do you present? Who do take with you? What do leave behind? In the convert phase we’ll show you the proven structure for a first meeting. We’ll show you exactly what to present and more importantly what not to present. We’ll walk you through a meeting plan you can cut and paste into any scenario involving a first meeting.  

So much about the convert phase is about active listening. We’re all so eager to ‘sell’ that we forget to ask the right questions to ensure we selling what the other party actually wants to buy. After students learn the process to follow in the convert phase from first meeting to signed contract, they quickly gain confidence and increase their conversion rates.

This entire course is structured around a proven process. We’ve applied this process in our own work with clients for over a couple of decades with spectacular success. What you have here is that experience and wisdom bundled into an eminently learnable package.

So that’s an overview of the three phases of the course: Attract, Engage and Convert. Remember, it’s going to be good preparation that will give you the best opportunity for success. Do the work in the first two phases, Attract and Engage, then enjoy the rewards that will follow in the Convert phase. There are corporations, right now, looking where to place their sponsorship dollars. You need to be the shiny beacon they want to talk to. The story they want to hear.

So now some housekeeping to ensure you get the most out of this course….

As you progress through this course it’s important that you remember where you are in the process. At times we’ll dive down very deeply to help you access and analyse data.

Try not to become over-whelmed in these early sessions but rather just push through knowing that doing the vital work first lays the foundations for your success.

In addition to the Roadmap that’s a really handy tool to reference as you work through the course, we’ve also created a side-bar navigation here on this page so you know where you are at any particular stage. If you’ve signed up for Coaching we will address any questions you have as you move through the course to ensure you stay on track. We can’t wait to help you succeed.

So, next up are the 5 Key Principles for Sponsorship Success. Don’t zone out on this one, it’s critical. It’s important to know the core principles in creating a successful sponsorship response that seizes on the opportunities you have right now. And also the mindset of sponsorship professionals. It’s important to understand the fundamental principles of creating sponsorship opportunities that corporates are looking for and importantly how to stand out. That’s next, talk soon.