Event sponsorship is arguably one of the most challenging and stressful aspects of planning a fundraising event. Part of that stress is driven by the fact that there are IRS rules about what you can and cannot do and there’s a fine line where sponsorship can unintentionally drift from sponsorship to advertising.

I discuss this fine line with my guest Jess Birken, of Birken Law. In this interview Jess and I discuss:

• When does sponsorship become advertising?

• What does it mean when that happens? What are the consequences?

• How can you prevent this from happening or plan ahead

Jess shares her best tips and advice for creating a win-win value proposition with your event sponsors

For nonprofits, sponsorship packages all tend to look the same; logos on websites and printed materials, tables at the event, social media mentions, etc. So how does a nonprofit stand out from the competition and create long term relationships with their sponsors? The answer…Sponsor Activations.

In this episode I share:

• What is a sponsor activation?

• Why a hybrid model of the tiered package + activations is preferred.

• A step by step process for coming up with activation ideas and pitching them to sponsor prospects.

Sponsorship sales is one of the most important, yet most daunting, tasks for your fundraising event.  It’s not just something you can dive into.  There’s a lot of prep work that needs to happen behind the scenes before you can begin.  I break it the prep work down into 7 steps.  

In this episode I share:

• Why you should have a clear definition of your target audience

• How to break down creating a budget and set your sponsorship goals into easy steps.  

• The importance of having realistic and measurable sponsor goals and benefits

• The best place to start when creating a sponsor prospect list