Sponsorship, So you want it.

 

Ever wondered how to secure that elusive sponsorship from a fishing lure manufacturer, how good that would be to get a lot of your angling equipment, tournament entry fees, travel & accommodation costs, etc paid by your sponsor.  On the flip side, have you ever thought about how many sponsorship requests a manufacturer gets daily, weekly or monthly & how to stand out from the pack.  The number of requests is quite high, every social media post we release, we get at least two to six requests for sponsorship, every post.  So you want us to put our hand in our pockets & give you heaps of product, pay for your tournament fees along with travel & accommodation costs, well this is what we look for.

 

So what gives us some insight into the right person to sponsor; experience with sponsoring anglers over many years.  We have had them all, really good sponsored anglers that listen to what we want to achieve & the ones that don't listen to our goals, anglers that do a short promotions for us in return for product, and even the sponsored anglers that can have a negative effect on our brand. 

 

Firstly you have to stand out from the crowd, be noticed, have form.  A simple example for us is when we get a sponsorship request from anyone & they direct us to their social media pages for us to have a look.  Well guess what, that is the first thing we go through & if your social media pages doesn't show our products at all (more than a few examples), then we go no further.  That tells us you are just "fishing" to see what free stuff you can get.  Think of it from our point of view, would you sponsor someone that has just hit you up & they do even have an angling photo with your products on their Instagram or facebook page, you get the picture.  Pretty simple really,  what gets our interest is if I open your social media page & I see our products being used in videos or photos, then we take notice & you have got past the first hurdle.  We can see then your are truly worth investigating.

 

Next, have a sponsorship proposal, tell us the story of your successes in tournaments & your social angling circles, how you have been noticed & what you are going to do for us, the benefits.   Don't just tell us you are going to promote our brand; we hear that every week, our brand is already a national brand which is well known.   The most important part of this step for us is that you are telling us what you want, how long, what for, where, etc.  Have the backbone to ask exactly what you want, show us that you know our products, what they are used for & that you already use them.  Lastly, tell us the benefits for us and how it will be measured - when, how often, how, where, etc.

 

Next, don't just send out hopeless sponsorship requests to every fishing shop, brand, lure manufacturer at the same time & risk a no before you even start.  I do know of two fishing shop owners that fish together & received the same sponsorship message whilst they were sitting in a boat having a day off.   You can only imagine the laughter as they checked their phones only to find the same message on each phone wanting them to put their hands in their pockets.  

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Finally, have some conviction with your sponsorship request.  We get so many requests via social media & email, but nearly none over the phone as a follow up.  So send us your request through social media or email & tell us that you will follow up with a phone call in a few days, then call us with your proposal, at worst case we are going to say no or not at this time.  So if you have bothered to read this far then we are looking for a new sponsored angler to join our team for next summer.  Ball is in your court, show us what you have.  Our final comment is that we will put as much thought into the response as we can see you have put into a sponsorship request. 

 

So you have now secured the sponsorship - well it does not just stop there; we view it as a two way street.   So what does that mean; in simple terms make sure you hold up you end of the agreement.  Promote our products, be an inspiration to other anglers,  provide what was agreed and lastly don't forget who sponsors who.  Keeping us informed of your achievements and issues is key to your success.

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Tight Lines.