How to Find Corporate Sponsors

Corporate sponsorship is a form of advertisement where companies pay to be associated with an event or cause. Finding the right sponsors helps make the event, and in turn your business, successful. Follow the steps to learn how to find corporate sponsors for your event.

Instructions

Difficulty: Moderate

1. Determine your audience—the people interested in your event. Once you have established your event, decide whether a large amount of people will be involved and whether professionals will attend.
2. Think about the businesses that would be interested in reaching your audience. For example if you are holding a bike ride event you may decide to target businesses involved in sporting goods, sports drinks and tire shops along with downtown businesses.
3. Set sponsorship levels. If you event is small, keep the levels small; the larger your business and event the more money and donations you can ask for and the more you will need.
4. Make phone calls and send proposal letters telling potential sponsors the commitment levels and benefits. Use bullets and "skimmable" sentences, including all contact information.
5. Follow up with the businesses and keep sponsors and non-sponsors updated with current event information and developments. Remember to send invitations to the event and let them know if there is any sort of VIP booth or seating designated for them.
6. Give sponsors publicity throughout the event. Create a sponsor banner, give announcements thanking sponsors, put logos in your organization's newsletter and event program, take out advertisements or mention businesses in a newspaper article and print logos on T-shirts.
7. Send thank you letters to sponsors after the event, letting them know you appreciate their support. List any charity donations and prizes funded in part by them and give a statement of where their logo was used, when their name was announced and any advertisements and articles where they appeared.

Tips & Warnings

• Ask for donations as well as money and let potential sponsors know that any amount counts. Approach printers for discounts or free printing of any signs and programs. See if grocery stores will donate bottled water. Talk to business owners about putting coupons into participation bags.
• Give more publicity to those sponsors at higher levels. This should be in accordance to your commitment levels and can be as simple as using a larger logo or font size for those who donate at a higher level.
• Avoid pressuring businesses.

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