Consumer research shows that, by a wide margin, charities connect with consumers better than any other sponsored organization. Why, then, must charities present themselves at corporate doors, cap in hand, while sponsors beat a path to the door, chequebook in hand, to far less effective properties in sports, arts, or entertainment?
There are many answers to that question, but most of them distill down to this: charitable properties do a poor job of presenting themselves to corporations as peers. Rather than present a business opportunity, they ask for help. If you are a supplicant, you are a poor candidate for business partnership and yet, it is ingrained within the charitable sector to ask that way.
Since 2010, Hilborn Charity eNews and The Sponsorship Report have helped charities reorient their approach to corporate Canada with a unique program called Pay it Forward. Pay it Forward invites registered charities to apply for a bursary to Sponsorship Week which, this October, will offer a series of intensive workshops on the business of sponsorship program development and sales.
This year’s program is particularly relevant to charities. We have confirmed five workshops already, and four of them are squarely within the wheelhouse of most charities.
Sponsorship Week 2017 leads off with The Sponsorship Boot Camp, day-long program on sponsorship program development and sales. "When charities fail at sponsorship, it is most often because they fail to make a transition between a donor mindset and a sponsorship mindset,” explains Bernie Colterman, managing partner of Ottawa’s Centre of Excellence for Public Sector Marketing and presenter of The Sponsorship Boot Camp. “The Boot Camp shows the difference between the two and provides participants with the tools and strategies to get their sponsorship program up and running.”
William Pitcher, Principal of Pitcher Group Sponsorship + Philanthropy, presents two workshops. Moves Management teaches a sorely neglected skill that leads to countless lost sponsorship sales. All companies have a process to evaluate a major expenditure. "Understanding this process, and having a plan to facilitate and track it, is vital to maximizing sponsorship success,” says Pitcher. “That's moves management, and too few charities give it serious consideration."
Pitcher also presents What Sponsors Really Want, which teaches charities how to look at their properties through a sponsor’s lens. “It's vital we understand the needs of a potential corporate sponsor, and identify innovative ways we can meet those needs,” says Pitcher. “It's like donor-centred fundraising dialed to eleven."
This year’s Sponsorship Week also welcomes charitable sponsorship’s most energetic and passionate advocate, Chris Baylis, from The Sponsorship Collective. Sponsors are overwhelmed with pitches, says Baylis. "The first and easiest thing to do when presented with too many options is not to look at them all but to remove the ones that don’t fit." Baylis’ workshop is entitled Building a Business Case for Cause Sponsorship, and it will teach charities how to offer, not ask.
More details on Pay it Forward, including a link to the application are available at The Sponsorship Report’s website at this link.
Mark Sabourin is editor and publisher of The Sponsorship Report (www.sponsorship.ca) and host of Sponsorship Week (www.sponsorshipweek.com).
