If you’re looking to get sponsored, you’re likely to rely on donations or sponsorships for funding. And making sure you’re asking the right way is integral to your success. You must make sure that you lead your sponsors to the decision to give you their money in the best possible way. Because this is so important, we want to walk you through some best practices to get the most out of your sponsorship page.
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Following the lead from WordCamp USA
First, we want to show you an example of how to get sponsored the right way. There are no hard and fast rules for sponsored pages. However, there are things that potential sponsors look for. Some common elements. We’ll show you a few highlights, and then break down what specific purpose they serve (and how you can best leverage them on your own sponsorship page) using the 2019 WordCamp USA Sponsorship Page.
WordCamp US is the national WordPress conference for the United States. It’s very important. Because it is a big problem, the organizers need a lot of money to organize it. Thousands and thousands of people attend WCUS each year. Some nationally and others internationally. Tickets for 2019 are $50, which is absurdly low for conference registration. That cost is subsidized by sponsors, so it’s important to make sure they have the best sponsor page possible.
So let’s see what they’ve done right so you can steal their design, use their page as inspiration.
1. Title Matters
For WCUS, the page is titled Call for Sponsors. At least until the initial time window opens where they are actively seeking to earn funds. The term Call for Sponsors indicates that they are actively seeking, that there is a time limit, and that it is important to the event. Some pages choose the title How to sponsor us, Sponsors or Sponsor my brand. Those are more passive titles that don’t create urgency for potential backers.
Usually when a Call for X goes out, whether it’s proposals, sponsors, documents or something else, that indicates there’s a deadline. and the potential to miss out. You want to generate a sense of FOMO (fear of missing out) in your potential sponsors. And the first way to do that is through a limited-time event they’ll regret.
If you’re running an ongoing sponsorship campaign (for example, for a blog, brand, or podcast) Instead of a one-time funding wave, titles like Advertise with MyBrand/Us work great. This is a sponsorship page. Advertisers are sponsors. But you may just be providing all the information they need to run monthly ads on their site or for their partner program. Choose a title that indicates your sponsorship model. That way, you’ll be much more likely to attract people who match you.
1a. Make the page easily accessible
As you can see in the image above, the Sponsors link in the header menu links directly to the Call for Sponsors. . No matter where your visitors are on the site, they will have access to the sponsor page with just one click. Also, if you include it in the footer or elsewhere, not only will potential sponsors be more likely to see it in the extra slots, but regular users will be more likely to click on it and see who’s sponsoring the event. or project. That gives you
2. Give a reason why you need sponsorships
In essence, sponsorships are you asking for money. Therefore, you need to make sure that they are worth the money. That’s a great question. Most people, by the time they get to the point where they’re ready to apply for sponsorships, have a clear idea of why they need the money and what that sponsorship money is going to do. If you’re reading this, you probably know this too.
For WCUS, they work to make an affordable conference that embraces the sense of open community behind WordPress. That means the tickets must be subsidized through sponsorships. The actual verbiage is:
Simply put, without our generous sponsors, WordCamp US would not be affordable for the vast majority of the WordPress community. A $50 ticket provides three full days for attendees to learn from our speakers, interact with others, and contribute to the WordPress open source project. By donating to WordCamp USA, you further the project’s mission to democratize publishing through open source, GPL software.
By following their example and putting your spending front and center, you are more likely to attract deep-pocketed sponsors.The more generic you keep your copy, the less likely people are to want you to manage their money.
For example, all your donations go to operating expenses could mean almost anything . But your donations will be used to pay for venue costs, technology rentals, catering expenses, and volunteer thank you packages will let them know you’re forward-thinking enough to manage their money. effectively and not waste it on unnecessary expenses. Use sponsorships to pay for things like accommodation, equipment upgrades, media, etc. for creative work like podcasts or YouTube videos. Reveal that. Let your audience know that they can sponsor you and help you improve your content.
3. Give sponsored options
The main way to get sponsored is simple: be everything to everyone. While that’s usually impossible, it doesn’t have to be in regards to your sponsorship page. Perhaps the most important aspect of finding sponsorships is making sure everyone can contribute. In the case of WCUS, there are 8 levels of sponsorship at the conference itself and the after party (which is always worth attending, by the way).
These levels range in price from $1 micro-sponsorship 500 (“You get everything you’d get from a general admission ticket plus a sense of satisfaction knowing you’re providing additional financial support”) to the $75,000 Diamond sponsorship (the benefits of which are listed in the screenshot from previous screen).
Even $500 is a lot for a micro-sponsorship for smaller events and brands, but you can have whatever prices you want and call it whatever you want. The community sponsor is a common one that includes a tax deduction, feels good about sponsoring an event, and gives you extra money to do what you need to do.
Also, if you’re curious about how to get sponsorship for a podcast or similar creative endeavor, you may have different levels of sponsorship for when your message is read/played/displayed. In general, podcast ads come in pre-roll (before the show), mid-roll (in the middle of the show), and post-roll (after the show). Usually their price goes down depending on how far along the episode is. So a backer with a smaller budget might go for a post-roll instead of one on a pre-roll which is pretty much a guaranteed replay.
Those kinds of options are important to maintaining a Varied income stream for whatever. for which you are collecting sponsorships.
4. Provide the Best Possible Leads
Benefits matter. A lot. It’s understandable that the advantages that sponsors get from being a part of the event or program or whatever are generally not going to be monetarily sound on their part. They could donate $20,000 and part of the package is 4 tickets to an event where tickets are 400 each. That’s a huge plus, but it’s not worth the price of admission (literally). You have to inflate the prices of the benefits you give to sponsors, otherwise their money can’t go where it’s needed.
However, when combined with advertising, booth space, social media mentions, logo being pasted on materials, signage, etc., the overall marketing value skyrockets. But not all sponsors want all of that. Not all sponsors can afford all of those things. That’s why you have multiple levels on your sponsorship page.
Even the lowest levels should offer something. Check out a lot of Patreon or Kickstarter pages. These are basically sponsorship sites, looking for investment in an upcoming project. The lowest level of reward tends to be something like you get a personalized thank you card or you get the satisfaction of knowing you’re great for helping . strong>. It doesn’t have to be much, but make the perks and rewards of being a sponsor worth it.
If you’re asking for $500, don’t tell them all they get is a thank you. you on your website. But at the same time, you can’t give $25 backers as many physical benefits as $500 backers. However, you can make the benefits equitable and proportional to the sponsorship and list them in detail on your sponsorship page.
5. Make Sponsors Visible
And finally, to make your sponsorship page as spectacular as possible, you need to ensure that the public recognition of your sponsors is of a high quality. Most sponsor packages include some form of website listing. Maybe it’s in the form of a simple link, or maybe your participation gets them a great clickable image of your logo.
Whatever it is, this kind of recognition is really important .It’s very easy to phone this aspect. Put logos and links in a block or bulleted list and leave it that way.
Don’t do it if possible.
It has the potential to make your sponsors feel underrated. That’s the last thing you want. While this method is common (and certainly works), there are better ways to handle it. The problem here is that your users will not pay attention to them. A block of logos just bleeds out. Sure, some may be bigger or more colorful, but they blur and basically become visual white noise.
So putting a little effort into showing off your sponsors goes a long way. If you offer email inclusion in your tiers, send out individual blast mailers for each sponsor in that tier. Bunching them all together in a thank you to our sponsors email is the equivalent of a logo block.
Now sometimes (as in the case of WCUS), that’s impossible. . You may simply have too many backers to give away that much individual real estate. But you can still separate them by level. And they have their logos in decreasing sizes. (800×800 for the top, 500×500 for the middle, etc.) And if you create text links (no logo images), consider breaking them into paragraphs with a short note (just a sentence or two that may even be provided by the sponsor itself) so that each one stands out from those around it.
Conclusion
If you can take all those elements and practices, wrap them up in an aesthetically good web page. nice, you will definitely have sponsors knocking on your door to give you money. Well, maybe it’s hyperbole, but by using these elements and best practices, you can be sure that you’ve put your best foot forward and that all potential sponsors have everything they need to decide if they want to partner with you.
How do you get sponsorship, folks? Let us know in the comments what works for you!
Article Featured Image by VectorMine / shutterstock.com
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