Are your members involved in corporate sponsorship? Are they investing sponsorship money or looking for sponsorship? Are they concerned about sponsorship-related issues, like ambush marketing, cause sponsorship, or sponsorship measurement?

From the Hong Kong Management Association to the International Festivals and Events Association, Kim Skildum-Reid has worked with professional associations serving everyone from brand marketers to non-profits to festivals to the meetings industry. If your association wants to provide best-practice sponsorship training to members, consider working with Kim Skildum-Reid to develop and deliver the right program.

You could...

• Provide your members with one or more top-notch, stand-alone sponsorship workshops
• Provide conference attendees with the option of attending a pre-conference sponsorship workshop
• Add on a shorter breakfast, cocktail, or keynote session to extend the impact
• Offer training to members at cost or use it as a revenue stream

There is a lot of information on association sponsorship training, so we have broken it into a few sections: 

• Why training?
• What we cover
• Client comments
• Look good? How to get more information

Why training?

By anyone’s estimation, sponsorship is a fast-changing industry, but the last few years have seen this change accelerate to the point where the industry bears little resemblance to sponsorship of just five years ago.

Corporate sponsors

There is a huge opportunity to create meaningful bonds with your current and potential customers, and sponsorship is the perfect medium for creating those bonds. If you're going to do it, it means leaving all of your preconceived notions about what sponsorship is about and the benefits of doing it behind, and embracing a whole new level of sophistication and creativity. Best practice sponsors are in the minority, so there is still plenty of space to stake your claim on this new marketing heartland. But don't delay. The opportunity to get ahead of the pack won't be around forever.

Sponsorship seekers

Corporate sponsors are expecting better, more cost-effective, and more measurable results and are seeking out sponsees who have the approach, skills, and professionalism to help them achieve those goals. Sponsorship training with Kim Skildum-Reid is a fast track to gaining the mindset, practical skills, and organisational buy-in to raise and retain more sponsorship in this increasingly sophisticated market..

What we cover

Depending on whether your members need in-depth skill-building or a more general, "light bulb" session, we can tailor a training program to meet your needs. Of course, we will take into account your members' level of expertise when developing your training session and can develop courses for every level from beginners to advanced.

All sessions include a wide range of case studies and examples from around the world. Some of the topics we cover are outlined below. Your session(s) can cover any or all of these, or any other topics that are pertinent to your members.

Modern sponsorship basics		Sponsorship leverage
The unique power of sponsorship Growth and trends The difference between bad, good, and great sponsorship		The sponsors' responsibility, the sponsorship seeker's responsibility Taking the catalyst approach  Creativity, resourcefulness, and throwing out the rulebook (AKA, getting to the big ideas) Gaining internal support  Funding leverage appropriately
Sponsorship's changing role		Sponsorship measurement
The new drivers of great sponsorship - and it's not brand needs The new model of sponsorship Its place in your marketing mix Changing your organisational approach		Measurement options that work Measurement options that don't work Benchmarking Using your internal resources Best-practice sponsorship research
Preparing yourself for success		Renewals
Policy and strategy development The best resources, systems, and tools Increasing your organisational skill base		Assessing partner performance Creating a renegotiation plan Timing Contingencies Negotiating in a bidding war
Choosing the right sponsorships (for sponsors)		Portfolio management (for sponsors)
Developing evaluation criteria Becoming pro-active - the art of invitation How to stop wasting your time with bad proposals Budgets and contingencies Alternative funding Creating your own events		Auditing your portfolio two ways Structuring the ideal sponsorship portfolio Alternative structures - umbrella, customer-decides, and creating your own event Downsizing your portfolio Exit strategies that will not make you look (or feel) like the bad guy
Selling more sponsorship (for sponsorship seekers)		Creating your own events (for sponsors)
Knowing what you have to offer and what has value Targeting only the most appropriate sponsors Creating a compelling offer The importance of creativity, customisation, and giving them the big ideas Pricing strategies and issues		Positives and negatives of creating and/or owning your own events Buying and event v. creating an event Management strategies Seeking other sponsors for your events (and the responsibilities associated with that)
Negotiation and contracts		Ambush marketing
The new wave in negotiation Cash, contra, and promotional support Structuring payments Other negotiation issues Agreement options Negotiating with a broker		Types of ambush marketing - which kinds work, which don't, and why The case for ambush and the case against How a successful strategic ambush is done How to ambush-proof your sponsorships Using ambush-style strategies to make your sponsorships work better
Sponsorship management		Getting cause sponsorship right (for sponsors)
Setting the stage for a good relationship Sponsorship planning Communication - What kind and how much is appropriate Reporting Issues and crisis management		Good corporate citizenship - getting past the euphemisms Achieving marketing, sales, and other objectives through cause sponsorship Issues and opportunities specific to causes The difference between cause sponsorship and CSR
Sponsorship servicing (for sponsorship seekers)		Using sponsorship to achieve workforce objectives
Your post-sale responsibilities and what a sponsors expect Adding value to the sponsorship Budgeting to add value What constitutes a value-add and what is just cosmetic		Creating and supporting the corporate culture Involvement, buy-in, and incentives - the strengths and weaknesses of each approach Sponsorship as a recruitment tool Sponsorship and workforce retention

Client comments

"If you're a practical marketer with real targets, then you and your team need Kim's sponsorship framework and tools.  Simple, sensible, effective... you'll be able to apply Kim's approach from day one.  We did."

                                 Tom Grealy
                                 National Manager, Customer Acquisition
                                 Telstra Country Wide
                                 http://www.telstra.com/
 

“Sponsorship is the most prolifically used yet least understood elements of the marketing mix. So often, we are guilty of buying into sponsorship but not making the extra 10% effort to leverage it into a truly effective asset. Having used Kim as both a sponsorship trainer and coach I/we gained the knowledge to make it effective for us, to allow sponsorship to become a significant catalyst for the rest of our marketing activity and, above all, it taught us how to find the time, resources and skills to get an effective return on our sponsorship investment. The answer to this lies within your organisation – This style of training will help you find out how to harness it”

                                 Donald McBain
                                 Head of Integrated Marketing
                                 General Motors UK 
                                 www.vauxhall.co.uk
 

"The training we received from Kim Skildum-Reid was invaluable in gaining buy-in to use sponsorship as a strategic marketing tool.  As a department, it quickly brought us up to speed on the power of sponsorship and was instrumental in our move to integrate sponsorship across all marketing activities."

                                 Sarah Beard
                                 Sponsorship and Public Relations Manager
                                 Telecom Directories 
                                 www.yellowpages.co.nz
 

"Kim Skildum-Reid's sponsorship training has transformed Habitat for Humanity Australia's approach to engaging corporations. Where we once used to ask for them for support, we now ask how we can help them achieve their marketing objectives. As a result we have developed deep, long lasting and mutually beneficial partnerships which deliver outstanding outcomes for both partners."

                                 Michael Pailthorpe
                                 CEO
                                 Habitat for Humanity Australia 
                                 www.habitat.org.au
 

"Kim did an excellent job educating and training our Account Management staff on the new rules of sponsorship.  Sponsorships have changed significantly within the past few years and Kim is at the leading edge of that change - she has shown us how to better leverage the sponsorship investment for maximum effect."

                                 Jim Moser
                                 Managing Director
                                 Clemenger BBDO Sydney 
                                 www.clemenger.com.au

"When Woolworths, Australia's leading food retailer, centralised sponsorship after working for years on a state-by-state basis, Kim Skildum-Reid was called in to give us direction and train Woolworths staff on how we should now look at business sponsorship opportunities. The training was invaluable and is still used today - almost 4 years down the track - and her books are referred to frequently."

                                 Julie Rush
                                 Sponsorship and Events Manager – Marketing
                                 Woolworths 
                                 www.woolworths.com.au

Look good? How to get more information