Page 92 - 101 Ways to Market Your Business

TRY A FEW UNUSUAL IDEAS

29 Take ownership of an event

An event is another name for the celebration of a special
occasion of some sort. It can be anything including a
wedding, a band in the park, a parade, a concert, a fair, a
festival or any one of a thousand other special occasions.

Everyone thinks that to sponsor an event you need to
be a major telecommunications company or an airline. This
is not true. Once again, look at what big business does.
Why do they sponsor events and competitions? Because
they receive excellent exposure. The amount of publicity is
relative to the value of the sponsorship.

Sponsoring an event can be anything from the local
school fete through to the Olympic Games. If it is good
enough for the Fortune 500 companies to sponsor events,
why shouldn’t you?

The degree of sponsorship you contribute to an event
could be anything from a few dollars to thousands of
dollars. You may be offering sponsorship in the form of
goods or services your business produces.

Look at the region you are trying to attract customers
from and then look at what events are held periodically
and, most importantly, advertised periodically. Send a letter
to all of the local schools expressing your interest in spon-
soring an event. In return you can offer cash, services or
products to a level that will make you the major sponsor.
In many instances this may only be a few hundred dollars.
Be a bit cheeky and ask for naming rights so that the local
beauty pageant now becomes your business name’s beauty
pageant. For example, the local beauty pageant now
becomes ‘Jan’s Salon Beauty Pageant’.

The exposure you can get from sponsoring events such
as this is widespread. Not only are you a good business for
supporting a local event but you also get mentioned in
advertising for the event, signage at the event, in media

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