May 24, 2018 at 12:00 AM
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The Five Questions Every Sponsorship Proposal Should Answer

Here at SponsorPitch, we receive many questions from members about how to get the attention of sponsors once they’ve developed a list of sponsor prospects using the platform. While no two proposals should look the same, answering a few of the following simple questions in your pitch may be just what it takes to get your proposal out of the pile and into a meeting.


1. How will the prospect benefit from sponsorship?

  • Show how the program is a fit by remaining relevant to prospect’s objectives
  • Include specifics around timing and deliverables - cater to the timeline of any campaigns the prospect may be running
  • Prove you’ve done your research and that you know the company’s target audience. Use statistics where possible to show the overlap between company’s demo and your own.
  • Mention the prospect’s sponsorship history in terms of scale, genre, or market
  • Play up the assets that seem most valuable to them based on previous spending history and current company objectives.
  • Refer to applicable industry trends
  • Keep your finger on the pulse of the industry and illustrate that you know what’s happening within their business category. The SponsorPitch dashboard is a great real time resource for that!


    2. What makes your assets more unique relative to other opportunities?

  • Focus on or create the assets that not all properties can offer. Sideline logos may be part of the deal, but chances are they won’t get you the deal.
  • Highlight the strengths of your audience and/or attendee demographics
  • Be creative with both traditional and nontraditional deliverables
  • Emphasize the loyalty of fans or attendees to your event. Use numbers!
  • Make sure you know what similar properties are doing, who their doing deals with and how their being priced so you can position your assets accordingly.


    3. Does the prospect have enough detail on the opportunity to sell it internally?

  • Cover all of the major who/what/when/where/why questions
  • Include key dates and location of activation in overview
  • Recap ticket sales, proof of performance, attendance record, analytics, etc.
  • Summarize demographics on target market page. Numbers! Examples: gender, age, annual household income, geographic location are some staples but more insight is always better.


    4. What is being asked of the prospect?

  • Outline package options or provide ballpark terms on the investment page so that the prospect has a sense for where/if the opportunity would fit into budget
  • Present a concise summary of assets offered at each sponsorship level
  • Define general terms and mention which aspects are flexible (specific terms can come in the contract)
  • Consider cash and non cash options
  • How will the sponsorship be fulfilled from the sponsor’s side? Will external agencies or other internal departments be involved and what will be asked of them? If applicable, state additional asks of the prospect. Examples: databases, cross promotion, social posts, etc.
  • Search the SponsorPitch deals database by sponsorship level and benchmark price using the Comparable Deals feature
  • Be sure to indicate flexibility with custom packages if that is an option


    5. How will the sponsorship be evaluated?

  • Include an addendum of case studies summarizing successful sponsor programs and their return on objectives (ROO) as examples of successfully measured programs with your property
  • Suggest some agreed upon benchmarks that could be used to evaluate at pre-determines points in time (year 1, 2, etc.)
  • Outline specifically what access the sponsor will have to real-time metrics vs. what will be provided in the renewal discussion. Examples: analytics, downloads, views, clicks, mentions, weekly recaps
  • Note any third-party resources that will be incorporated to relay objective metrics to the sponsor (Nielsen Sports, ComScore, etc.)