The way to Get On-line Occasion Sponsors
With most events going online, you need to find strategies to find and attract online event sponsors.
Hosting an event, including online, is expensive. And selling tickets alone is unlikely to cover all of your expenses.
This is where event sponsors come into play.
What is event sponsorship?
Event sponsorship is an agreement between an external brand (event sponsor) and an event organizer. In this agreement, your event sponsor provides funding or donations in kind to preserve something of your brand – usually notoriety.
In exchange for brand awareness, they can cover your event costs and potentially bring you a decent profit.
But how do you get online event sponsors?
10 Strategies for Finding a Sponsor for Your Online Events or Conferences
Getting sponsorship for a live event is a challenge. However, sponsoring events for online events is a challenge on a whole new level.
Many brands are unsure whether their investment will pay off.
Because of this, you need to develop a strategy for finding event sponsors for your online events. Here are ten strategies you can use to attract event sponsors.
1. Find event sponsors who share your company values
One of the most important steps to getting sponsors for your online event is finding brands that share your company's values.
Finding common values can narrow your search – meaning you spend less time communicating with brands that may be a bad fit – and potentially help you find common ground to negotiate.
As a bonus, even if you sell different products or services, common values can mean common consumers. For example, if you and your event sponsors are focused on protecting the environment, environmentally conscious consumers may be interested in learning more about each of you.
By sharing the same values of your event sponsors, you can provide your attendees with a better experience as their messages and ads will seamlessly fit your event.
2. Find event sponsors who work in a related field
One benefit of finding sponsors in related fields is that you and your event sponsors are targeting the same audience. If you sell similar products and services, people might be around to look around, hear speakers on the same topics, and so on.
Sponsors working in unrelated fields can do more harm than good to your event. Showing brands and ads unrelated to your brand and the theme of your event can disorient your attendees or even contradict your messages.
3. Offer something valuable to your online event sponsors
Sponsorship is not a donation. It's a give and take.
This means that you have to offer something of value to your potential event sponsors. The truth is that sponsorship is an investment for them.
To do this, create an enticing sponsorship package for virtual events. A sponsorship package is a collection of benefits that your sponsors receive when you take your event down.
Examples of incentives you can offer are:
- Opportunities to work together: This includes the opportunity to be interviewed or to be part of a special panel. The cooperation offers your event sponsors maximum visibility.
- Virtual environments: You can create virtual environments in which event sponsors and attendees can interact.
- Social media exposure: You should develop special hashtags for event sponsors that will be included in the posts of event attendees. You can also add links to their websites in social media posts during your event.
- Brand waiting room: Most online events have a 15-30 minute wait before the event starts. Make the most of this time by creating branded waiting rooms. During this time, you can display your sponsors' logos or run short ads.
These are just some of the incentives you can offer your event sponsors. Create packages that will give your sponsors a chance to generate leads and they will likely take the opportunity to work with you.
4. Run a paid campaign to find sponsors and attendees for events
Paid ads on social media, search engines, and other platforms can help you attract sponsors for your online event.
One of the most important things you need to do is do keyword research to make your paid ads hyper-targeted. Use a keyword research tool to research phrases that your potential sponsors are using and use them yourself. If you target different types of potential sponsors, create separate campaigns for them.
Paid advertising can help kill two birds with one stone. You can use paid ads to reach and attract both event sponsors and event attendees.
5. Reach out to potential sponsors on social media
With nearly four billion active users, social media hasn't just connected people on a social level. It has become a powerful business and marketing tool.
Some ways you can do this are:
1. Create a public post
Share a post on your timeline calling for event sponsors. Don't be afraid to ask your followers to help spread the word too. You can also increase your reach by paying to improve your post.
2. Post in groups
If you are active in relevant social media groups, let them know that you are looking for sponsors for your next event.
3. Reach privately
In addition to posting on your timeline, you can also send direct messages (DMs) to your prospects. For this strategy to work, make sure that:
- Address target decision makers: Research the brands you would like to partner with for your event and find the decision makers. These are the people you need to reach out to.
- Personalize your messages: To do this, you need to research your prospects and adapt your message to appeal to them
- Clearly outline the benefits of sponsorship: Introduce your brand and the event and explain the benefits of partnering with you.
- Hold on short: Get to the point. Your prospects are busy. Plus, they get a lot of DMs and don't have time to read through a long pitch.
Don't underestimate the power of social media to attract your sponsors to your online event. Used well, it could help you generate a good number of leads.
6. Create, promote and update your online event agenda
Before people commit to something, they want to know what they are getting into. Because of this, one of the strategies you need to use in order to get sponsors for your online event is to create and promote your agenda for the event.
Make sure your agenda includes all of the key details like speakers, topics, and breakout sessions. This way sponsors can get a preview of what to expect from your event.
Design an epic events page and share it on as many platforms as possible. You can also create digital brochures and distribute them on social media and on your email list.
7. Use tools to find event sponsors for your online event
Thanks to technology, the use of tools has made it easier to find sponsors for events. These are platforms that help to connect organizers and event sponsors. Since most act like a match-making service, you will likely get good results using these tools. Some examples of such platforms are:
SponsorMyEvent
SponsorMyEvent is a platform that makes it easier for event marketers to find sponsors. A cool feature of this tool is the homepage with current events that are looking for sponsors. You can also set a minimum price for your event sponsorship packages.
SponsorMyEvent can be used as a complete sponsorship management tool. You can use it to sell event tickets, organize your data and much more.
SponsorPitch
SponsorPitch not only enables a quick connection between organizers and event sponsors. The brand gives you access to their extensive sponsor database and allows you to use their CRM.
You also get detailed analytics and data for organizers and sponsors, making it easier for you to choose who to work with.
8. Create case studies and receive testimonials from previous sponsors
Since sponsorship is an investment for your event sponsors, new prospective sponsors want to see evidence that your events will benefit them.
This is where the social proof comes in. It gives event sponsors the confidence they need to work with you.
You can ask previous event sponsors to provide testimonials about their experiences attending your previous events. Your testimonials should highlight what they have gained by sponsoring your events. Since video is one of the most preferred content formats, it is advisable to seek video testimonials whenever possible.
Another great form of social proof is by making case studies of past events. Ask past event sponsors if they can document their journey as part of your online event and how it affects their business.
These case studies and testimonials also make great marketing materials. You can post them on social media or distribute them through your other marketing strategies.
9. Offer different levels of online sponsorship for events
Create and offer tiered sponsorship packages with different benefits. For example, a parent sponsorship package might include collaboration opportunities that would not be available for child packages. By creating levels, sponsors can choose the package that best suits their needs.
Offering a variety of event sponsorships is also a great way to open up to potential event sponsors of all sizes. The diversity of the size of the sponsors not only benefits your event financially, but also creates a lively atmosphere.
10. Contact sponsors of similar events
One of the best strategies for attracting event sponsors online is to research events similar to yours and reach out to their sponsors.
This often works well as these sponsors understand and appreciate the value of marketing their brands through event sponsorship. As a result, they may be more interested in sponsoring your event.
Another reason to contact sponsors of similar events is that your audience is likely to be relevant to them, which can make your event more attractive to sponsors.
Conclusion
Getting event sponsors for an online event has its challenges. However, if you can take advantage of the strategies outlined in this post, you may get better response rates for your pitches.
To better improve your chances of success, you need to know about digital marketing.
Better still, work with an agency that takes care of the tricky aspects of event marketing like paid advertising, social media marketing, and SEO. If you do this correctly, you can also get sponsors for your next online event.
What other online event sponsorship strategies have worked for you?
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