Episode 2

Season 2

Leveraging Sponsorships to Grow Your Brand & Revenue

Welcome, Charmaine Hammond to Saturday Soundbites! Charmaine is a highly sought-after business keynote and workshop speaker, entrepreneur, and author who teaches and advocates the importance of developing trust, healthy relationships, and collaboration.

Join Charmaine and Veronica as they discuss the various ways that brands can leverage partnerships and collaborations to not only grow their visibility but to also grow their revenue. She and her team have more than 30 years'’ experience in helping other nonprofits grow and she shares her top tips!

[00:00:00] Veronica: Hello. Hello and welcome to Saturday soundbites. I'm your host, Veronica Sofer. And I'm thrilled to be with you for another phenomenal episode where we talk all things, visibility strategy. We're talking about marketing, advertising, branding, networking, public relations, my favorite part, and how all these things come together to grow your brand here at Saturday soundbites, we know that there's a lot of different ways we can share our products and our.

[00:00:29] But in our services, but really it's about sharing your story. And that's why we bring guests on, who helped us put all those things together so that we can grow our visibility strategy, share our story and do what it is we're supposed to do for the world. So with that, I'm going to get us moving. If you are listening on the podcast, make sure you hit subscribe.

[00:00:48] We want to make sure that you don't miss any episode of Saturday sound soundbites when they are dropped. And if you're watching on Facebook, drop us some comments so we can pop in and engage with you and know where you are watching. And if you catch the replay hashtag replay, so we can go back and connect.

[00:01:03] Let me bring on a phenomenal guests that I'm very excited about. Ms. Charmaine Ammon is joining us this Saturday soundbites. Welcome.

[00:01:11] Charmaine: Good morning, Veronica. Really excited for this conversation with you two.

[00:01:15] Veronica: As am I, I, you know, I saw your content and I realized we hadn't talked about this unique way of growing our visibility strategy.

[00:01:25] And I like how you have really taken it on and been able to incorporate how sponsorships collaboration. Partnerships all really important words and growing your business really make a difference in all the different spaces. So I'm just thrilled that we're going to be able to chat today. So tell us a

[00:01:41] Charmaine: little bit about yourself.

[00:01:43] Well, you know, my first career was completely different from what I do today. I was a jail guard. I started my career working in jails as a correctional officer. So knew nothing about sponsorship and collaboration in the jail system is really about keeping you safe. And then I had left the group. I started working for nonprofits.

[00:02:01] That is where I started to learn about sponsorship. It was a big part of my job to find money, to keep the organization afloat. And then fast forward, I took a different job and that job was as a sponsor. I worked for government and my job was providing local organizations with grant money, sponsorship and funding.

[00:02:22] And I was giving away about 2.5 million a year. And it was my job to determine with the team who. How the funds were allocated. And I learned so much, I wish I actually had the jobs in reverse. It would have been very helpful to have that job. And then fast forward. I opened my first business 25 years ago and everything I learned about sponsorship and collaboration, I took with me into my business and I have been a sponsor.

[00:02:50] I have secured sponsorship for my business, my project. As well as my clients and that's how I got started into it. And you know, the one thread Veronica that's woven through all of this is all about relationship. And one of your favorite words, visibility. That's

[00:03:06] Veronica: right. Yeah, absolutely. And relationships are key because even if someone isn't looking for your services or your product, or if you're in the nonprofit space they may be, they may know people who are called to the work that you're doing and they can connect you.

[00:03:20] And I tell people all the time it's about connectedness and networking. So I love that. You said that you mentioned nonprofits. Do you feel like nonprofits are the. Biggest beneficiaries of some of these dollars, or do you feel like that's something any company can tap

[00:03:34] Charmaine: into? Well, the interesting part of that question, I'm so glad that you asked it is that many of the big brands actually have two purses.

[00:03:43] So if we think of. Big companies like banks and insurance and businesses that have multiple locations in your country or in your region, or even in your community like grocery stores, the bigger the brand. The more likely that it is that they have two purses, one that they call a philanthropic purse, which is where they provide sponsorship and donations to nonprofits and charities, service clubs, and community groups.

[00:04:08] Then there's another purse, which is the purse that I fall under. You would fall under. This is. And that's the purpose of marketing. If you think, if you think about a big business, they set aside marketing dollars, just like we do as entrepreneurs and small businesses. And they're spending that money on traditional media magazine articles costs of going to trade shows, digital campaigns, you know, Facebook ads, all of that.

[00:04:31] And many of them have a line item in that bucket. For sponsorship. And that's the, the, the dollar, the purse that we're tapping into Veronica as entrepreneurs and small businesses, and a lot of entrepreneurs and small businesses make an assumption when they hear the word sponsorship, they say, ah, you know, that's just for charities and nonprofits.

[00:04:51] And I'm here to tell you, you can, you can tap into that marketing budget. It is a marketing relationship sponsor. From the small business and entrepreneur side and perspective sponsorship is this is a marketing relationship. So that company, that brand is looking for some kind of ROI. You mentioned that word earlier, ROI return on impact or return on investment.

[00:05:14] And it isn't an investment like where they invest in you and you pay it back. But they're looking for some kind of recognition or some kind of support in their objective. From a marketing perspective by partnering and collaborating with.

[00:05:30] Veronica: That's amazing. And that is true. I think most people automatically hear sponsorship and they think non-profit so how could it let's just make up a scenario and if this isn't a good one to tell me, okay, let's talk about maybe a coach, a coach, someone in the coaching space.

[00:05:46] What would that look like for someone who's in that space who wants to connect with a corporation and tap into some of those sponsorships?

[00:05:53] Charmaine: Awesome. The first, the first element, and this is where it gets really exciting. And probably your listeners will start thinking in a couple of minutes. Oh, that could work for me.

[00:06:03] My first 40 sponsors were all what we call in kind sponsors, which means there was no cash. Veronica. There was no. Being sent over. It was all in kind. What did that look like? All of my clothing was sponsored for a number of years. I didn't pay for hairstyles, massages makeup when I would go on media and I'd stop over at the stylist they would do at my hair, my makeup, and get me ready for the TV performance.

[00:06:28] I didn't pay for printing. I didn't pay for a lot of my travel costs. I. Even had my dog poop bags sponsored and my dog and my business is not about a dog, just so y'all know that. And that's how creative we can be. So one of the first steps is to look at, for a coach to look at what are all the things that, that I spend money on a great way to do this as walk around your home and your office, and look at your visa bills.

[00:06:58] Where you were spending money. That is the first place to start. When I did that exercise, I looked at my visa bills and where I was spending money. I'm spending money on clothing. I'm spending money on makeup and hair. I'm spending money on massages, spending money on my dog. I'm spending on travel and printing and standing banners for trade show presentations that I do spending money on envelopes and office supplies.

[00:07:22] And whether you create that list, the next step for that coach is then to think. What would be great if I could get it sponsored and who do I know already? That could be that sponsor. In the case of the clothing, I went to the place where I buy 80% of my clothing. And I talked with her about finding a collaboration together.

[00:07:42] I didn't even mention the word sponsorship. I just said, said to Glenda, I'd love to be able to collaborate in some way. You love being in front of audiences with women. I speak in train audiences of many women, and she said, I should just sponsor all your clothing Sherman. And I said, okay, perfect. What does that look like?

[00:08:02] And that's how that's how. Even a podcast host can start to look at the same thing. So I'll give you an example of a podcast host. We had a podcast, a podcast house who also had a radio show and she was, she was saying she was getting tired of some of the, she was using virtual backgrounds and, and wasn't happy with how they were showing up on videos.

[00:08:23] And after a conversation that she and I had, and one of our coaching sessions, I said, well, What, if you, what do you want your backdrop to look like? And she described it and I said, well, who sells that kind of furniture? And she said, oh, there's a furniture store, literally five minutes from my house. I love going in there.

[00:08:39] I take selfies every time I'm in there on their lovely furniture. And I said, well, why don't you go have a conversation? Now, she, she actually was going to do some of her shows, start them earlier and record in the store. They were going to help her set up.

[00:08:54] Veronica: And then she'll know. I know.

[00:08:56] Charmaine: And then she thought, well, I need something at home too, because I don't always have the opportunity to be able to travel down to the store, even though it's a few minutes away.

[00:09:04] So they actually furnished her office and they swap out the furniture every six months. I think. So she's got a different, the whole office is, is her studio that's been sponsored in kind by the furniture. That's

[00:09:17] Veronica: amazing. That's a wonderful, wonderful idea. So when we talked about when we were promoting the show and we talked about sponsorship and collaboration, I didn't realize collaboration could look like this and you definitely got me excited.

[00:09:29] I am not a coach. I, but you got me excited because I know a lot of coaches who tune into the show and that's exactly the kinds of things we need to be doing. So you talked about. That's that's how you, you kind of got started. And those were some initial ideas and there wasn't a cash exchange, but I got the impression that they were, was there more to come

[00:09:47] Charmaine: there.

[00:09:48] That's right. The reason we want to start looking at some of those in kind sponsorships and dealing with people that, you know, like the first 40 sponsors, all of those people were people that I know and have done business with. I started there because when I started going to bigger companies and talking about how sponsorship could look in.

[00:10:07] Or cash and con in unkind perspective, it helped me having these other brands behind me. It didn't matter if it was a local coffee shop or a big chain store. When I started approaching sponsors, their comment was, wow, you're working with a lot of other partners. Wow. You've got experience doing this. Made them feel.

[00:10:28] I think that there, that the risk of partnering and collaborating with me was reduced because I understood how this worked. And obviously other brands had said yes. So the assumption could be made. Maybe she knows what she's doing, which I do. And then how, how the cash bonds. Started, I'm going to give it an example.

[00:10:48] Cause I find it it's always easier if we can wrap it around something. Absolutely. About six years ago, I decided to go on a million acts of kindness tour. I was promoting one of my new two books, which is about my dog. Toby. If you hear Toby, it's my dog and I needed to have an innovative way to get the book out there.

[00:11:08] Okay. I really wanted to secure a lot of media. So, you know, when the work Veronica that you do in PR how important that is, and it can be really hard to get in a number of locations because the media says you've already been in five other cities, what's going to be new. And so we, we had to create something.

[00:11:26] Long story short, we did a seven week tour across north America, 14,000 kilometers, which is 10,000 miles in a sponsored motor home for seven weeks. The motor home was sponsored. We had sponsors, we did a lot of presentations for schools because one of my books is for children and we had a lot of banks actually break banks and credit unions that were sponsoring the presentation for me to go with.

[00:11:52] The school, essentially, they were covering the cost of my speaking fee and they were covering the cost of purchasing a lot of my books in bulk quantities to give to their schools. And

[00:12:03] Veronica: then I have to stop you because my mind is exploding and I'm sitting here thinking. Really it's brilliant, especially cause I, I have a passion for the K-12 space.

[00:12:14] People know that and who will listen to the show, but tell, tell me more because this is exactly how people that don't have experience with marketing and public relations struggle with, how do I get my book out there? So when you said book, I knew people were going to jump in. So keep up

[00:12:29] Charmaine: well, and I like, I love what you've just raised because I know how important visibility is to you.

[00:12:34] It's a word that you use a lot. You're an expert in that area. Imagine this let's take one of the examples. So I'm in a community. I arranged in advance for this bank that I've never dealt with. Didn't have a relationship, had never been in the doors, but I started building a relationship. As soon as we have that tour route, I started reaching out to banks in that community saying that we're doing this tour.

[00:12:55] Here's the goals of the tours. The outcome, our goal is to get in front of X number of schools to inspire them, to do kindness in their schools, families, and communities. We have a way of getting involved through sponsoring a presentation and books and they loved it, but here's where the visibility piece comes in.

[00:13:12] Now I have me marketing my book and my tour. I have the school marketing, my book and the tour. It's going home in newsletters, order forms for books are going home and newsletters. The school is putting it on their social media. Now we have the bank who has said yes to sponsor the presentation. They've got a poster up in the bank with me and my book cover.

[00:13:32] They are sending that information to their banking, you know, their membership audience, their social media posting that they're a happy sponsor of this. Now my visibility has. Because of that partnership and collaboration. And one of the things that you, you know, and your audience knows already is that we have to, to be visible and to be marketing effectively our products and our services.

[00:13:55] We have to be reaching an audience that is bigger than our own because eventually. Our Facebook fans and our Twitter followers, they think, oh, there she is. Again, promoting her book. They tune it out and we have to get in front of other people's audiences. And that is what collaboration and sponsorship does it gets you in front of OPA other people's audiences.

[00:14:18] I love

[00:14:20] Veronica: it. That is so brilliant. And, and as you were talking through it it's absolutely what professional speakers do, what professional authors do, who are on this circuit? And I wonder too, if people get a little overwhelmed with the thought of reaching out to folks, how, how do you do the, do you have someone make phone calls?

[00:14:39] Do you just go online and do the research and find who the. Big companies are that might want to collaborate with you that are aligned to your business. How did you do

[00:14:47] Charmaine: that? Yeah. You mentioned an important word. Two seconds ago, research. I identify the companies or brands, businesses, whether they be small local businesses or large companies, I go on and identify them first.

[00:15:01] Here's my dream sponsor list. Here's the companies I want to partner and collaborate with. I write them down. So I've got. Then I spend a little bit of time researching them on social media, the website, I listened to some of their if they'd been on media or if they have a YouTube channel and I read their press releases.

[00:15:17] Now you're going to love this Veronica because you know about press releases and getting in touch with media. It can be hard and press releases always give you a contact

[00:15:25] Veronica: number. And I do is that the

[00:15:29] Charmaine: sponsor decision maker. But you can call that person. If you can't find the person and say, who do I talk to in your organization?

[00:15:36] And I've actually done that in many times, called the person on a press release, saying I'm looking to get in front of a person. And they always say, well, why? Because they're sort of going to help gate care. And then when I share my project, they're like, oh, this is, oh, I want to be in a call too, because they're thinking there's a real communication angle here for our company.

[00:15:55] If we got involved, So what's really important to know when we're thinking about sponsorship, we've got to research them and there's two reasons we do this. First of all, it's about confidence building. You're absolutely right. When you said earlier to people kind of, you know, they get overwhelmed with that.

[00:16:10] The out is uncomfortable for a lot of people. And so that is where they stall. That is where they stop. They do the research and they never pick up the phone. Or I use LinkedIn actually to get in touch with sponsors and. What I want to say to shift that perspective. It's just a conversation. The people that you're talking to about sponsorship, this is just, this is just their job.

[00:16:32] And there are people too. They have dogs or cats. They have children or not, you know, they have a life outside of their work. And if you can think about the fact, they are just people, and this is simply a conversation. I think most entrepreneurs are good at this. They have to be in conversation about their business.

[00:16:48] It's just one other conversation. And. The key in that first conversation is to learn as much about that sponsor brand, as you can. You're asking a lot of open-ended questions like who, what, where, when, why and how the goal is to hear what's important to them, what their marketing goals are, how they're trying to get in front of their audience.

[00:17:12] And that is one of the keys why they might say yes to you is that. Want to be in front of your audience. That's one of the driving forces. The more you learn about the sponsor, the easier it is for you on the other end of the phone, to hear the synergies that the common ground, how their need might be fulfilled by your project or your services or your audience.

[00:17:36] Veronica: Yes, absolutely. That makes complete sense. Cause when there was an alignment, then there's absolutely an opportunity to be had. And I have been on the other side of the desk and I have looked for opportunities that are going to get us in front of families in particular when our target audience, where I used to work in, in banking and starting kids with children's savings account was huge to me.

[00:17:57] So if that opportunity had come across my desk, I absolutely would have bought books from you. Yeah, then the sponsor and then maybe even attended the event so that I could pass out our little goodies that had the rulers and compass in

[00:18:11] Charmaine: it with my bank logo on it. Exactly. Yeah.

[00:18:14] Veronica: That makes complete sense.

[00:18:15] Now, the, the more technical part of that, what does it look like? When do you set up contracts? Is that something people need to be thinking about? How does that work?

[00:18:24] Charmaine: Well, the technical piece in sponsorship is going to look. Depending on the sponsor, who it is. I'll give you an example. My clothing sponsor my hair sponsor my printing sponsor.

[00:18:37] These were all colleagues and we didn't have a formal contract. In many cases, it was a verbal, I guess you could say it's still a contract, but it was a verbal agreement. In other cases it was an email exchange. You're going to do this. I'm going to do this by when and how, but the businesses that I partnered with that were at a higher level, the motor home, for example, definitely there was a legal contract that was written out.

[00:19:02] And when you, so it's, it's a way to understand this, that the bigger the brand, the, probably the more in-depth the contract. And a lot of them have their own contract that they use. The motor home company had their own contract. The telecommunications company that we worked with had their own contract.

[00:19:19] And they just gave that to us really important. If you're being sent to contract, get it reviewed by a lawyer, far too many people sign contracts. That it sounds good. But when you don't understand the legal implication of things and. You're held accountable to that. Anyhow, we had a our contracts reviewed by a lawyer and we're able to add a few things in.

[00:19:41] That also supported us and the contracts when you are having a written contract about sponsorship, what it really covers is what the sponsorship is arrangement. Is it financial? Is it in kind, is it both? So all of that will be spelled out if there is an exchange of money, products or services that how that will be done will be spelled out timeline.

[00:20:02] What happens if deliverables can't be met, all of that is spelled out. Many of them, many of your listeners will have contracts that they've seen that are similar to that for their products and services makes

[00:20:13] Veronica: complete sense. And how do you how do you know when you're ready? And, and I ask, because we've got a lot of listeners who are still in the corporate space who are maybe looking at transitioning to online, or maybe have that side hustles.

[00:20:27] And then we also have listeners who are. Develop and growing their entrepreneurship business. And they're not quite sure if they're ready. How do you know someone's ready to start collaborating and engage in some sort of sponsorship opportunity?

[00:20:41] Charmaine: I always say to people start sooner than later, because sponsorship can be a bit of a process.

[00:20:46] This is why I love it. When entrepreneurs or people who have the side hustle that are looking to move out of corporate. When they start working on even the research in the background, starting to list out the sponsors, doing the research so that when you're ready, you've you understand the brand enough to get on that phone call.

[00:21:03] The, the sponsors that are in kind like your clothing, your hair, your printing, those you can start to work on sooner when you have some kind of a relationship, whether that relationship be a transactional relationship like you, I don't know Mr. Visa, but I pay Mr. Visa money every month, or I don't know the telecommunications company, other than the people that work at the local.

[00:21:25] Dealer, but I don't know the people, but I'm in a transactional relationship with my telecommunications company because I pay the money every month. When you look, start to look at where you spend money and where you shop and the products you use and love, those would be ones that you could start to work on sooner and later and build.

[00:21:45] Relationship with them because it is a relationship and then start moving towards how can we partner collaborate? What could sponsorship look like? And, and I just say, get started, you know, get started with something, identifying your dream sponsors, listing them out, doing the research, building the relationship that, because that's the piece that.

[00:22:04] The time and without it sponsorship doesn't work, otherwise you run into the same mistake that most sponsorship seekers are making. They don't do the research, they don't build the relationship and they simply pick up the phone and say, I've got this great project. You'd be a perfect sponsor. And the answer is no, because sponsors are saying, how do you know I'd be the prime sponsor?

[00:22:26] You don't know what we need to think about me

[00:22:27] Veronica: yet. Right, right. I mean, you need to have some sort of metrics and you know, again, having been on the other side, when I was in the banking business, I wanted to be able to articulate to my VP how effective our sponsorship dollars went into. That makes a lot of sense.

[00:22:42] Yes.

[00:22:43] Charmaine: Yes. So I'm going to add one more thing, please be helpful for your folks in terms of where do we get started? The other word he gets started is to be super, super clear on who your audience is, being able to describe them. Because when you think about when you were with the bank, You had a very specific audience you were looking to get in front of you, describe families and you knew who your audience was.

[00:23:07] Families, families that had children in school. For example, the clearer you are on the audience, the easier it is for the sponsor to say, yes, this is a fit or it's not really a fit. And sometimes they'll try and figure out how they could make it a fit. When you don't know your audience, Are listening to you talk about your services, product or program, but they, they can't sort of say, oh, we could fit in there.

[00:23:31] Yeah.

[00:23:32] Veronica: Yeah. And this question has been nagging at me. Just because I'm intrigued your close sponsor, how, what what's in it for them. I mean, did you give them credit somewhere? How did you articulate that they were your response? At the time.

[00:23:46] Charmaine: Yes. Yes. When I started with that sponsorship, I, at the time I was doing a lot of work in that community where the clothing store was in the city, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada.

[00:23:57] And that was where the clothing sponsor wanted to get in front of because she knows people are not going to travel three hours to her store. She needs to look at local community and I. Speak at a lot of events in the local community for women audiences. And we're the return for her was that I would talk about Glenda.

[00:24:15] Not saying I'd like to thank my clothing sponsor Caprice consignment, because nobody listens to that. And it doesn't actually add value. What I would do is I would talk about. Glenda about being a business owner or leading a team or values, whatever the, the presentation topic was about resilience. And then I would interview my sponsors beforehand and I would weave a story about them into my presentation.

[00:24:42] I'll give you an example. When I was talking at one presentation about customer service, I would say, let me give you an example of a lady named Glenda. This incredible team that can't wait to come to work today. Why can't they wait to come to work? Welcome priest. Consignment has got such incredibly strong values.

[00:25:00] They engage team, they recognize team. And this is why. So if I was to say, Glenda, what are your top five? Here's what Glenda would say. And I kind of weave that story as part of my content in there. That's the way to do it because people are like, oh, I like her style. I like this. And then in my handout packages at the back, I put a special things I'd like to thank the people that I shared a case study about Glenda can priests consignment or Deb verb is salon and spa and there's information in there about them.

[00:25:31] And of course, people would always say, oh, I love your dress. Where'd you get it? Oh, let me tell you where I happened to have a business card for you. And I would just happen. Promote them. Yeah.

[00:25:43] Veronica: No, that makes complete sense. Charmaine I cannot tell you how exciting this has been. All the ideas that I have just going off, because this is a huge part of what nonprofits do and, you know, But many years volunteering with girl Scouts, many years volunteering with education foundation so that this is a language I know, but it never occurred to me that entrepreneurs and small businesses could use the same model.

[00:26:06] So very, very exciting. How, how do you work with people? How do you support your clients and how can people learn more about working with you?

[00:26:13] Charmaine: Thank you, Veronica. We've a number of training progress. We actually have a number of free programs on our website, raise a dream.com and people can go that debt, their downloads, some of the video trainings.

[00:26:23] We have a free ebook that actually explains the seven step model. And I talked about a couple. Steps today. And then we also work with clients on a one-to-one mentoring basis where we walk clients right through the process of creating their own sponsorship program, helping them seek the right contact people for them to reach out, to helping them create the scripts for the conversation.

[00:26:44] Basically walking them through the process. And then we often hold events like webinars right now, and and live events as well to train people because. What I do know to be true is that when you understand sponsorship, this is why I say, just do something after listening to this today. Because even if it's like read one of our blogs, but just start thinking about sponsorship, because once you start to think about relationships with these possibilities, you never look at relationships the same way.

[00:27:14] Veronica: Absolutely. It makes complete sense. Folks, if you have not written it down, it's a raise a dream.com. If you're listening on the podcast, the link is in the show notes. Charmaine you have been fabulous. The information you have given is just fantastic. And I know so many people are going to benefit from you being on and sharing your expertise.

[00:27:34] I can't. Thank you.

[00:27:35] Charmaine: Thank you, Veronica.

[00:27:38] Veronica: All right, everybody. That's it. I hope you took notes. I took plenty of notes. Trust me. In fact, I'm going to go back and rewatch because it was a couple of things I wanted to make sure I captured, I have lots of family who could and friends, Facebook, family, and friends, entrepreneurs who can use this information because there's a lot of different ways.

[00:27:55] To build on relationships at the end of the day. That's what it's all about. Charmaine really touched on it heavily it's about relationships and nurturing them. So your visibility strategy can, can include sponsorships collaboration as long as they're always built on authentic relationships. So take, take heed, make sure you listen to the opportunities that exist.

[00:28:16] Don't let them pass you by because there's a lot of different ways to grow your visibility straps. All right. I hope you enjoyed this episode of Saturday soundbites. I know I did. If you're listening on the podcast, make sure you hit subscribe. We don't want you to miss any episodes. If you're watching on the replay, hashtag replay.

[00:28:31] So Charmaine and I can go back and connect with you and thank you for engaging with us and answer any questions you might have. So with that, I am sending you lots of positive energy and light.