Hardly any event today can get along without one or even several sponsors. They are often necessary for the event to take place at all. Unlike donations, a sponsoring relationship is a legal transaction that should be treated as such. For each service a consideration in the appropriate measure must take place.
You need to find a sponsor for your event with whom you can use spill over effects.
Before you can start the actual search for sponsors, you must define the key data of your event and carry out an analysis of the demand and the budget.
So you have to answer the following factors before the event:
- Key data of the fair (date, time and location of the event)
- Aim of the event (topic and target group of the event)
- Forecast number of participants
- USP of the event
- risk factors
As soon as the planning and analysis of your event is completed and you have drawn up a detailed event plan, you can derive a budget plan from it.
- How much budget do I need if the number of participants matches my plan?
- How much budget do I need if only 80/70/50% of the planned participants appear?
- How much budget do I need if there are more participants than planned?
The result gives you not only information about the required budget, but also about the need for other external funds from exhibitors, partners and sponsors (e.g. material resources, services, know-how). Depending on the result, you decide whether you want to work with several small sponsors or involve a large sponsor with individual co-sponsors.
The optimal solution lies in a healthy mediocrity. In most cases there is only one main sponsor, but several small sponsors. In between, different packages can be tied as required.
After completing your needs analysis and defining the optimal sponsor mix, you have to look for the right sponsors for your trade fair.
As already mentioned, not all companies can be considered as potential sponsors. The optimal sponsor mix depends on several factors.
