No More Rejected Sponsorship Letters for the Church

What do marketing managers want from a sponsorship application? Do they reject requests from the church straight off? How can I improve my chances of getting a yes from my sponsorship proposal?

If you have been stumped in trying to secure corporate sponsorship for your crusade, motivational conference or gospel concert, you’ll be interested in reading this article.

I managed to reconnect with a colleague of mine, through Facebook – the second largest online network in the world - a brand manager within a local conglomerate, who prefers to remain anonymous.

Being the ardent communicator, I probed her mind for some answers as to why it is so hard for many organizations, especially churches, to obtain sponsorship.

Is it that companies are evil doers who don’t want to assist us Christians in the work of the Lord? Or is it that we "do-gooders" don’t understand how to leverage our ideas in the business realm?

This is how the interview went:

Christal: I often wonder what you marketing managers want. Is it a nice blend of guerrilla marketing or just proof that we are tracking the metrics of our campaigns?

BM: I can honestly state it depends on the company. I worked at a company at the same post (different brands obviously) and their style of marketing is most definitely guerrilla (which makes sense). It is a privately owned company - no umbrella support.

Facts presented in a concise manner without fluff are always welcomed.
I like proposals which show break downs. Truth be told, you tend to give more when all the numbers are in front of you rather than the guesswork people tend to throw at you.

Christal: Hmm. This is fantastic and my neurons are truly firing! What I'd like to know also are the specific issues or guidelines you'd like to share with Christian organizations seeking sponsorship.

BM: Sadly religion is viewed like politics. Support one, support all!

The general attitude is that because it is a church or religious organization that you are obligated to donate.

If you call them or they call you and you decline/can't offer assistance, the first thing you hear is the higher power will do this and do that, bla bla bla... (totally unnecessary).

The funny thing is I find these churches normally ask for ridiculous amounts of money or product given what was outlined in the letter/proposal.

End of it all, we keep these kinds of donations small because we as a company don't want to be deemed tied to any one church, sect, religion, etc.

I’d imagine that many pastors and church marketing committees would want to pause here and reflect. Obviously this is hardly not a desirable reputation we want to have as the church and notice the blanket use of the term so that it doesn't take into consideration any particular denomination. This is the reality of it all.

Upon reflection this is what BM wanted to add to clear up any possible misunderstandings of her statement.

BM: Reading above, the info regarding donations to churches can be misconstrued:

Most companies’ fiscal period usually ends in September/October. Around this time, we are given a budget from senior management and this is the time we put $X aside for donations (churches, schools, charity) and the other money for promotions, sponsorships, etc. It is usually best to approach companies around this time.

Crop Over and Christmas (as with most Barbadian companies) yield the highest turnover rate for the company, hence why a substantial amount of marketing dollars are spent during this period. If you approach during this period, more than likely you will be declined assistance.

Christal: Well I have three more questions that I believe are important considerations for any entity seeking sponsorship, BM. Questions I believe church leaders have been asking themselves. They are:

1. What would guarantee that a sponsorship letter gets to the top of the pile?

2. What are some of the things that people have done that really made an impact for your business through your sponsorship agreement?

3. Explain the evaluation process. For example, do proposals over a certain amount mean more red tape in getting approval or do all go to a panel or just you?

BM: To answer your questions:

1. There really isn't any way to guarantee placement to the top of the pile truthfully, I can tell you what will move to the bottom :) (lengthy proposals that still leave you asking several questions).

For instance, I received a proposal from a group recently that was quite lengthy. The proposal stated the background of the group, a background of ALL NINE members and at the end, still did not state what assistance they required.

Not stating that background and briefs on members aren't welcomed, but do that and still state specifically what you want (E.g. 3 cases of X + $x,xxx) If a group has that many members, you can have silent ones and mention the face/s that I will be meeting with.

2. For people to understand that if I give $X to your donation that is $X less that I have to spend on a similar exercise. In other words, don't make me regret giving you $X if I could have received more mileage from another organization/ group.

If I spend $1 in advertising dollars, I would like to receive $1 in sales. This goes back to all proposals being viewed in the same light - which organization/group will yield the highest return on my advertising dollar).

3. The more money I spend, the more risk I put myself at :). At my company, there isn't a tier or anything of the sort. I keep my immediate manager informed of ALL marketing activity - even if it is just a case of product being contributed.

We meet internally if we believe it will be beneficial to all brands where we can possibly spend more money as a company but get equal split amongst the brands. We met recently on a political proposal from a local media house (just giving an example).

Hope this helps :)

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