Cultivating Authentic Partnerships In The Form of Sponsors | Chris Beaman, CAE (Episode 31)

As associations, we are all about forming authentic relationships, which allow us to expand our network and reach different audiences. Building those relationships with our members isn’t often any different than the connections and relationship that exists between associations and sponsors. 

Associations rely on sponsor dollars to assist with everyday operations, member events, and so much more. In turn, sponsors rely on associations to help promote their business and cultivate mutually beneficial relationships. As time has gone on, technology has changed, and associations and sponsor relationships have evolved.

Sponsors and associations may be looking for different opportunities. How do we ensure that the relationship stays strong? What can we do to understand their needs more and form new connections with sponsors to deliver stronger ROI? Our guest today will be able to walk us down the right path and share his expertise on sponsor relations.  

Chris Beaman (bee-men), CAE, is the Corporate Partnerships Officer for the Sigma Foundation for Nursing, responsible for cultivating and generating corporate philanthropic support for Sigma Nursing (formerly Sigma Theta Tau Honor Society of Nursing) events and programs. He has more than 10 year’s experience and progressive leadership in association management in a variety of functions.

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Hello and welcome to, you Should Hear This, a podcast for the Everyday Association Professional, I'm Nick Estrada, your host. As associations, we're all about forming authentic relationships, which allow us to expand our network and reach different audiences. Building those relationships with our members isn't often any different than the connections and relationships that exist between associations and our sponsors. We rely on sponsor dollars to assist with everyday operations member events and so much more. And in turn, sponsors rely on associations to help promote their business and cultivate mutually beneficial relationships. As time's gone on, technology has changed, and associations and sponsor relationships have evolved. Sponsors and associations may be looking for different opportunities. So how do we ensure that the relationship stays strong? What can we do to understand their needs more and form new connections with sponsors to deliver stronger roi ? Our guests today will be able to help walk us down the right path and share his expertise on sponsor relations. Chris Beaman , c a e is the corporate partnerships officer for the Sigma Foundation for Nursing, responsible for cultivating and generating corporate philanthropic support for Sigma Nursing. Formerly Sigma Theta ta Honor Society of Nursing. He has more than 10 years of experience and progressive leadership in association management in a variety of functions. Welcome Chris. Hi, Nick. It's good to be here. Yeah. We're excited to have you. I think this is a , a very important topic as associations look, especially at their budgets and what we can do to diversify our revenue streams . So this is gonna be a great conversation today. Absolutely. Yeah. You , you can't enter many association spheres or conferences without hearing the term non-dues revenue. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . So , you know, it's , it's certainly important conversation to have. Yeah, absolutely. So, before we get into some of the, the more detailed conversation today on sponsors, can you just tell us a little bit about your background? Obviously talked a little bit in your introduction about where you are now, but maybe where you've come from and, and how this has Lent experience to sponsor relationships. Sure. I'm happy to share a little bit. So, you know, I think the , the important thing to share is that I've been in the association world really since I graduated from with my bachelor's, and I've enjoyed every minute of it. I've spent time on a variety of teams from membership and chapter relations to marketing, to development and fund fundraising. It is important to note that my experiences limited to individual professional associations, though based in central Indianapolis and largely around honor societies and, and the professional space for teachers and for nurses. Still technically a young professional, but I'm getting close to that cutoff. Mark and Nick, I think we're in the same boat here . <laugh>, I think we are . I don't like to think about it though. I know it stinks. I've served Isae in a couple volunteer roles as co-chair of the Young Professionals Committee and also on the leadership development committee and annual convention committee. So I'm really excited to be talking to you today for the I S A E podcast, and I think that wraps up all about me. Great. Well, I think, again, it's exciting to have you here and I think we'll have a good conversation. So as we start to think about sponsors, I, I think we've used the keyword in , in the introduction. I think you've talked about it already a little bit, which is relationships, you know, it's not just this transactional thing, or at least I think we probably both would hope that no one's defining a sponsor connection is just a transaction. It is really developing that relationship. So can you talk about, in your own words, what that relationship between associations and sponsors looks like? What it means when it's working, what it, what it looks like? Absolutely. And I think this, this question itself is really at the core of successful sponsorships because in the question itself, you know, you, you identified the relationship. And the greatest success associations are gonna see in terms of sponsorships is really when they have that authentic and mutually beneficial relationship with a sponsor. For most sponsors, I think they've been used to having this sort of transactional relationship with associations and with, with organizations. They're used to paying the invoice, their logo goes up on something, and most are not accustomed to a truly an authentic relationship. But more and more are expecting it. And I think an additional challenge to this is that associations increasingly may not know the person evaluating a sponsor prospectus. You may have someone in a marketing function and role, you may have someone in business development, you may have the chief executive officer reviewing what you've put out there. And so your language in terms of a prospectus or what you're publishing really needs to, really needs to hone in on the opportunities that that you have and what, what benefits are associated with that. I also think in terms of relationship, it's important to note that associations have something that our sponsors want and need, and that's invested members and their data. There are very few companies that have the same data on our members that we do, and it's, it's actually gonna become more of a compelling value proposition with the rollout of Google Analytics for , which I know very little about from a technical perspective. But having looked at the impact, for example, Google Analytics four is no longer gonna provide the data and demographics, I'm sorry, data on demographics and interests, which may limit the ability of businesses to target specific audiences effectively. And in addition to that, Google Analytics four's focus on user privacy and data protection. There's actually gonna be limitations on the types of data that businesses can collect and how they're able to use that for their marketing purposes. So this is gonna impact the ability for businesses to create highly targeted, you know, ad campaigns and limit the effectiveness of their marketing strategies . So sort of using this as an example, to put it in real terms, you know, my association is likely to know exactly where they're gonna find a 25 year old white female registered nurse from California, or where to find the chief nursing officer of a major hospital system in Texas. And a sponsor's really going to be interested in that. They're going to want to know exactly who they're reaching and what the, what the opportunities are to turn that person into a customer. A lead, just someone who's vaguely aware of, you know, what they offer to start building that relationship. But we really have highly qualified leads and the data that companies are looking for. And again, you know, referencing back in my introduction, you know, I, I shared that I've, I'm focused on individual professional associations, but Nick, I know you have experience with trade groups and so I'm curious what, what your perspective is on this as well, the relationship between associations and sponsors . Yeah, before I get to that, I , you used a phrase that I use all the time, which is qualified leads. I think that's always a key differentiator, you know? Yes. My list of people that your email's gonna go out to may not be as large as some of these other data sets that are out there. Right. I know I've heard from folks before and they're like, well, how many people are visiting the site? Or how many people are opening the email and, and our numbers, I send back to them and they're like, well, that's not very high. I'm like, yeah, but the people that you're reaching out to are, to your point, much more invested, you know, automatically that these folks are in the industry that you're trying to target. And I think that that lends a lot more value to the communication and the people that you're, you're targeting. And I really like your conversation around Google , Google nalytics four . I I wrote that down. Cause I'm gonna have to do some reading of my own to figure out, okay, if that's going away, we fill that void and how do we market the fact that we fill that void for a lot of our companies to provide stronger value? Absolutely. Yeah. It really changes the value proposition and how we, how we pitch it and how we sell it and how we deliver on it. Yeah . To, to your question, I , I think the relationship looks probably very similar on trade groups, but I do think there are some key differences. I think on our side, a lot of our sponsors are also our members. And I think that that creates, to your point around relationships, I have to have an authentic relationship with them, right? Because the reason, part of why they're a member is to access that network of qualified leads, and I'm here to help make sure that that can happen. I think the other piece around sponsorships for our members is that a lot of the times, it's not just that I'm asking them for sponsorship money, I'm also asking them for dues money, right? And so they're being asked for money multiple times throughout the year. And so as we think about what we need to do to deliver on that promise as a sponsor, it's also always in the back of our mind, how does this help retain them as a member as well? You know, if they were to leave and they , and they still are a sponsor, obviously that's still dollars that are coming in, but we know that if we can keep them as a member, we have longer term revenue growth typically from one of those member companies. You also mentioned you may not know who is reviewing the information of her perspectives. I, I think on the trade side, we often do, right? We know who our primary contact is, we know what they're, they're looking at. And so we can craft some of that messaging in a different way, depending on who's reviewing it. And then the final thing I would throw out is, I think at the trade level, not that you can't do this perf for a professional group, but I think we have some stronger flexibility on how we adjust maybe a sponsor package to meet the needs of whatever that that company is looking for. Because I think we really try to sell that as we're , our job is to help you succeed. Our job is to help get you r i and if there's one small change that makes that better than we're gonna do that. Yeah, absolutely. And I think, I actually think flexibility is gonna play a key role in sponsor relationships moving forward across the board. We, we, we talk about oftentimes internally how one size fits all isn't working anymore. One, you know, again, it's a relationship, you know, just as I might have with my various friends, what one friend needs out of our relationship and our friendship is very different than what someone else needs and wants out of our friendship. And so, you know, I know it's kind of silly to think about it that way, but it kind of puts in perspective how we really need to be building these as authentic relationships as we do with our friends and friendships. Nick, I'm curious, and this is off script only, I'm allowed to do that. Yeah . Yeah. I'm curious if competition ever plays a role in, in your sponsorship work, because especially if your members are your sponsors and sponsors are your members, it almost seems like there might be some competitive spirit involved in some of those conversations they're having around what type of investment they want to be making and what other members and and corporations are making with your association. Do you see that? Yeah. Now that you bring that up, I was like, oh yeah, that definitely plays a part in this. I've, I've literally had an email from a member company before that emailed and said, how did this company get this kind of recognition in our weekly newsletter? And I was like, well, they bought this annual visibility sponsorship, and she was like, I will pay for it today. Call me. Right? Like, I mean, it was like, I need to be there. My competitor's there. I think we see this on the trade show floor a lot of the times with, we let them pick their booth locations, and so they're really trying to make sure they're in the best location possible. So I, I think we see a lot of that competition for sure in figuring out again, okay, if my competitors are doing this, do I have to do the same thing or can I find something else that gets me the same kind of impact in a different way? So I, I definitely think that is a, a key piece of this for sure. When it comes to how we do that. The other thing I'll always do as well, at least in my association, we've got some kind of key verticals, you know, so my primary association is in kind of the mid to long-term stay area , so it's still very hospitality based . We've got a lot of furniture vendors, we've got a lot of software providers, we've got some insurance folks. And so, you know, not that those markets are saturated, but we've got longtime members who've been around for, you know, a bit. And so they're well known . But on the other side, we've got folks who might come in now, you know, I've always tried to sell like a web developer, right? I don't have any web developer or website design companies. And so I always try to say, you know, without even sponsoring necessarily, that could be a great opportunity for your company because there is no competition for you right now. And so I think we see a little bit of that as well when it comes to Oh , for sure. That unique positioning, right? Yeah, I, I would say, you know, it's really interesting right now my association Sigma is struggling to get travel agencies to sponsor our events. But you would think being that, you know, Sigma has the best and brightest in nursing people either at the top of their career or seeking to be, those would be prime candidates to, to be in touch with. But it's, it's actually interesting that competition, I think plays a role in the sense that travel agencies haven't attended and sponsors our, or sponsored our event before. So there's not a, there's not a clear cut path to say, well, this agency did this, so we wanna come in as this type of sponsor. And so it , because no, none of those agencies have done it before. I have thought it would be an easy sell to say there's no one to , you know, to your example of the web designer, there's no one here. You would be the only one. And so then they begin to question, well, if I'm the only one, why is that? Why haven't other groups made this decision? There's sort of like this weird, if they haven't done it before, why would I wanna be the first one to invest? It doesn't seem like a great conference, which is, you know, some, it's just an uphill battle that I'm on, quite frankly. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , that's a, I mean, that's a valid concern. I think that could be seen. I , a lot of times when I talk with folks, I'll, I'll say it's, I don't know that anyone has made the connection, right? That this could be a good space for you at this point. And, and I'll use anecdotes from, you know, I've had provider members or I've had agency members who've come to me and said, Hey, I need somebody who can do this. And I, I don't have anyone to recommend to them because I don't have any members who do that. And so when I have those opportunities, I think that helps sell too, in some ways. Absolutely. You know, I think, I don't wanna paint this as a , everyone is losing sponsors. Cause I don't think everyone is, I think maybe some industries are, or some associations are, but for maybe in your thought here, for those associations that are seeing a decline in sponsorship dollars, do you have any ideas why? Or, you know, what's causing that potentially? I think that there are two, I see there being two main causes for this . The first is we also see in association, in the association world that, and I don't think it's any surprise that as membership goes down, sponsorships are gonna go down. You know, we just talked about how associations have something sponsors want, and that's members and their data. And as our spon or as our associations have less and less of that, I think sponsors are tending to say, all right , we're gonna try other routes. We're gonna try more digital advertising through these various channels. We don't necessarily need to attend the trade show and invest in the travel and lodging and meals and staff time, et cetera . We'll just throw some ads up across the, across the internet. So I think this is really kind of a chance to remind associations that growing and retaining your membership is ultimately paramount for all association business operations. And that includes sponsorships. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> , when your membership goes up, your sponsorship sales should also be going up. And the converse statement isn't necessarily true. You're not gonna grow your membership by growing sponsorships, for example. So, you know, you've gotta invest in membership recruitment and retention while recognizing that non dues revenue through sponsorship is also important. And Chris, you just brought up something that I think is really important to also highlight for our listeners, which is those ancillary costs that come with the things that they may support for your association. You know, again, if you've got a trade show hall, you know, I hear this all the time from my exhibitors, you know, exhibiting is really expensive. And I say, I, I recognize that, right? When they tell me how much it costs to plug something in , uh, I'm like, yeah, I know. Well , we plug in too, right? And I, I pay the same rate you're paying. But I think that's really important when we think about the decisions that our sponsors and our exhibitors or , you know , any of those folks are making, which is, if there are those ancillary costs, right? So maybe a sponsor gets the opportunity to stand up and speak or produce, you know, a little commercial that gets played, that's still time and energy on their side, right? Those are resources they have to invest to make sure that they're, you know, getting all of the information that they can out of their, their sponsorship. And so we need to think about, I think the work that we're asking others to put in when, again, there's a sticker price on the sponsorship, but then there, there may actually be additional costs behind it. Absolutely. That's, that's a great point. And I think too, it plays into, when you think about, so the next point I was gonna make is that sponsors are true , are looking for engagement and they're looking for roi . And oftentimes to your point, when they're having to pay for all those ancillary costs that bill racks up, you know, that's several thousand dollars to get to a trade show as opposed to being able to possibly invest just a couple hundred in Facebook advertising to get the same result . However, I do think that beyond just the changes with Google Analytics, four , I think more people are reason realizing post pandemic that in-person relationships are so much more valuable. And so they offer so much more potential in way of generating business than advertising. You know, Nick, we are so oversaturated with ads thrown at us constantly. I cannot think of a time I've opened my phone to Facebook and not within three posts. I'm seeing an ad for something that I don't really need and I don't really want. But somewhere someone decided I should be getting that ad. And so advertising the ROI on advertising, I think is going way down. I also think associations oversaturate their communications. And so that's another concern with, you know, sponsors are saying, well, you're sending out a hundred emails a month, mine's just gonna get lost in the mix, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And so associations need to think about their communication strategy as they're building these relationships. Because if you're offering every single sponsor a dedicated e-blast, you know, that's gonna rack up and your members are gonna say, what in the heck are we signing up for all these emails for? It's just, you know, it's not worth their investment to just be getting all these emails. So you've gotta be really careful as well. Yeah, I think that that makes total sense. You know, it's, it's funny you were , as you're talking about the, the importance of the in-person meeting and a in advertising in general. I was just talking to somebody the other day and I said, you know, I get these, get these little magazines, right? That tell me association meetings. And I, and obviously this is specific to our industry, you know, but I, I, I look through and okay , here's a , a visit a location, here's another visit a location, here's another one, like every other page, right? Is a advertisement for some individual location. And these won't make me make a decision at all to come to a place for listeners. I don't want that to make that seem like you should never do advertising. Because I will say, as I'm scrolling through here, I actually just recognized the name of somebody that I've met, but I met them at an in-person event, right? And so that's why I recognize her name and that is the thing that I carry with me as an attendee. And so I think that that's the same kind of thing that our sponsors and our exhibitors are hoping to get from those in-person experiences is name recognition, right? My brand is in front of people and that is much more meaningful than just some kind of digital ad that pops up that I scroll past really quickly because I don't wanna see it. We've talked a little bit, I think, about what folks are looking for and I , I think we keep coming back to this like roi , right? They want to know that the dollars they're investing mean something. I also don't think we can continue to just always do the, you know, here's your logo, it's on a sign. Congrats, that's your sponsorship. What are you hearing kind of in your space from your sponsors that they're interested in? What are they hoping to get out of their sponsorships? Are there new visibility options that they've shared with you that they'd like to explore? That's, that's a great question. And I will say, you know, it's, it's interesting because almost every sponsor I've worked with in recent history is saying something just slightly different. And so it goes back to this idea of the relationship and working to build customized proposals and, and packaging, which is really hard to do when you're putting on a massive event and you don't want to start piecemealing, this sponsor gets this little thing. And then you're worried about, especially for the small staff associations who are listening in, you know, that could be really overwhelming to fulfill all these sponsorships when you don't have a standardized process for doing so. But to the question, it's, it's interesting to think about name and logo on signage because you're absolutely right. That's not generating the roi , the brand awareness and visibility. It's not generating the leads for them, it's just their logos on a sign, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , uh, thinking back to that travel agency for nurses for example, they're obviously prime targets for me to reach out to, but when a logo on a sign is, you know, might be all that I'm able to offer them, that's not gonna get people to sign up to hear about job opportunities within their agency. So we've gotta think about how to engage them with our event attendance. All, all of the people who've invested in showing up to the event. And that's another reason why I think virtual isn't selling, you know, despite these new virtual fancy hybrid event software out there, sponsors just don't feel like they're getting the same return on investment. They do it at in-person events. But I think one of the things that I wanted to convey during our time today is how we position some of these and sort of a charge to the association professionals listening today to get creative around what the deliverable and tangible is and what it could mean for the sponsor. So let me, let me paint a picture for you. When I stepped into this role at Sigma, we had event prospectus that were published, they're several years out, they're established, everyone knows the process, they're out there and, and we, you know, expect people to go through them and read them and choose what they want and they'll just tell us. And side note, for everyone listening, people's time and attention is so limited. They don't have time to look through five pages of your event prospectus. They want, at least from my experience, a 10 to 15 minute productive conversation to tell you here's how we wanna invest our marketing dollars. And then you figure it out and you package package it all up into a customized proposal. Again, a lot easier said than done with, with a smaller staff. But when I first started looking at some of our event opportunities, I recognized that we are bringing in to give presentations individuals from our institutions of higher educations, schools of nursing, for example. And those are the same individuals who have an interest in sponsoring an event or exhibiting an event because they want to attract nursing faculty to their programs. And they also want to attract, you know, Nick, I don't know if you know this or not, but nurses never stop going to school, ever lucky it up . And I know , and so you've got someone with, you know, B S N rn, all of these different letters behind their name and yet they're at our conference looking for their next degree program. So our events are a huge win for schools of nursing and these faculty members are the ones presenting their sessions. So I said, what would it look like if we created an opportunity for schools of nursing to sponsor these educational sessions where their faculty and staff are actually presenting the workshop? And so when you think about it from a tangible perspective, yes, what we're selling is tangibly just a logo on a session sign that says, you know, session a faculty member and then underneath their, their title and their session description is the University of Pittsburgh School of Nursing logo proudly sponsored by. And for them, the way that it's pitched and from my perspective is pride in their esteemed faculty giving this presentation, this workshop at an international nursing conference. And so I'm not selling the logo on the sign, I'm selling the pride in, again, you know, their top tier faculty giving this presentation. And it has been wildly successful. And so I know that that's an example still of name and logo on signage, but sometimes I think it's about how we package it and how we frame it that is beyond even just the tangible and the benefits behind it. I do think that we have to pay attention though to , especially within non-event structure, if we're selling a sponsorship for a program, what authentic engagement are they going to get from investing in your leadership development program? Do they get to meet with the cohort? Do they get a dedicated email blast that goes out to the cohort? Anytime we can be in front of program participants is is gonna be a value add and a win for that sponsor. I really like what you did there, because I think you're right, it's the same delivery. It's still a logo, it's still a name, but you're right. The way it was packaged is different. And I think that that speaks to, because then you can still put the logo a name for a lot of different companies out there, right? It's where it's placed that makes the difference for some of them . Um , absolutely. And I, yeah, immediately there not even just pride in in their faculty, but I was like, oh, that's also showing we support this kind of education and that's really important for us, right? So there may be a , a topic of interest, you know, that you could sell, right? Like are you selling the track of education potentially those kinds of things. Cuz I , you're right, I think that becomes much more meaningful to them. And we, if we weave those kinds of things into, I always think about like, you know, session introductions, those kinds of things as well . Give them a , you know, a one sentence shout out , but that ties their name now to the education and the experience that folks in the room are , are even online are having around that. How are you, I think we keep talking about roi . How are you approaching the flexibility of this? So we helped with a , an event where the organization actually got rid of their trade show, which at first I was like, you did what? Like, oh my God, I don't know that my group could do that. And she said what we did was we transitioned to this. Like, you call me, you tell me what you want, we build it and we sell it. Which you're right, takes a lot of extra time, but she said, so far it's been really successful. So I think where I'm going with this question is, this lends me to think that I think we're starting to see as folks our age, right? So millennials who wanted this like highly customized experience to everything we do, right? I don't just want an email that says, join us. I want an email that says, Hey Nick, join us. Right? I wanna see my name there. And so how are you approaching the flexibility as again, we are probably now our, our peers are probably the ones that are making some of those purchasing decisions to be flexible. Well, I , I I won't say it's easy Nick, to be honest. I , and, and let's face it, we are, we're in a capitalist society and even even the most philanthropic organizations, there's a bottom line and there's a need to drive revenues and, and sponsors. Yes, they're seeking this marketing and ROI lead generation and business development. The way that I personally approach it is by listening both to what they're saying that they want out of a , a partnership and a sponsorship. And by listening to what they might not be saying. So let's think about an example, a sponsor a approached me recently about the opportunity to be in front of our members, nurse leaders with call to action, with a message around a program that they are launching and they can build this special landing page for Sigma members exclusively. And they felt like, oh, we just send it to everyone and sort of like a build it and they will come. And rather than say, okay, marketing team, how do we feel about this email? What I sent back to the sponsor was, why don't we try doing, and keep in mind this is a , this is an educational, a learning and development company. So they're , their strategy is to build learning platforms and content for nurse educators to do their jobs more efficiently. So they're wanting to reach, and I said, we're not able to do demonstrations because our webinars or in-person events, for example have N C P D hours associated with them. So we're, it's very strict and you know, we're accredited and I suspect many associations face a similar challenge. So we can't do sponsored sessions in the sense that a sponsor's gonna get up and give a demonstration. Right ? However, what we could do is feature your faculty and developers and designers and resource managers on a webinar talking about the importance of utilizing your research and your, your evidence-based practices , uh, to our nurse educators into our faculty, because that is going to help improve their skillset and what they're doing at the university level. But it's not a direct demonstration of why they should be using your platform. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . So you're getting the exposure and you're actually reaching, we've already talked about this Nick, those highly qualified candidates, if you're, if you subject on a webinar for example is supporting undergraduate students in nursing and you are talking about key strategies to do that and the people attending that, they're obviously invested in that topic. So you are reaching the right audience, but it's not necessarily an email blast to a hundred thousand people. You are getting 50 people to show up on this webinar, but those are the 50 people that you wanted to talk to anyway. So when I talk to , and you now made yourself the expert for them, right? Exactly . Displayed yourself as if I have a question on this topic, I need to reach out to Chris . Right? If you get an email on this, you're just another advertiser in my mind. But if you've done a presentation on a topic that's very important to me and I recognize that you're the expert and we've built that trust, even if it's virtual, you're the first person I'm gonna go to when I need that or when I'm having a conversation, you're, you are what I'm going to remember. And so they didn't articulate, they wanted to do a webinar sponsorship, to be quite honest with you. They wanted to do something a little bit lower, but because I was listening to what their needs were, they wanted to build that trust, be an authentic resource for our nurse faculty. We were able to ultimately upsell them to something that wasn't even on their radar. Right? Yeah . You introduce them to something that met their needs more. Really. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> , I like that a lot. Yeah. I've always been an advocate even in the trade space I've, where I don't think we're often as restricted as you may be around the kind of education. I mean, I can, I can put up a demo anytime I want, which is great and I have people who will buy those, but I've often always put out the showcase the expertise you have educationally and they will come to you for the product then that you have because you've shown that you're the one who can make that work for them. And so I think that that's a great, a great strategy as we start to wrap up. Cuz I, I , again, lots of conversations around this so we could go into a lot of different directions. I think the final question I have for you today is, you know, I think, I don't always like to talk about the pandemic anymore, but I , I do think one thing that it made a lot of us do right? Was think differently about some things. But I think on the other end of it, as in-person events have come back, I think so many associations just said, what did we used to do before the pandemic <laugh> ? Yeah . Dust that off and put a new ear on it and put it out again. And that's, that's our sponsored prospectus again. Right? This is what we do. How do you, how would you encourage listeners to approach those conversations to get away from that history and habit of rinse and repeat our sponsor program so that we can start to maybe re-engage old sponsors right? In a new way, but then also get new ones who've never sponsored with us before. Sure. I think, you know, to be quite honest, I am a fan of the sponsorship prospectus because I think it's, it's nice to have everything laid out in a clean format, but largely the way I view that document is very internal. I make the assumption as I'm building it, not a single soul is gonna read that thing once I publish it and put it on the website. It's for me, it's for my understanding of what all we offer as an organization and oftentimes within our event context. So all of our marketing professionals listening today are, are weeping <laugh> . Yes. So this is gonna sound rather simple, but my recommendation is to go directly to your sponsors and have a conversation with them around where they see the best fit for investing their available sponsorship and marketing dollars in your association. I think all too often we forget that these are busy and overwhelmed professionals just as we are. And I think more than anything, sometimes they just appreciate being heard . They might be willing to give you the $10,000 sponsorship to throw their logo on something, but at the end of the day, if it's just you've sent them to your website to look through all these options and you've not actually listened to what their needs are, they're , it's obvious, they're gonna feel like you're not really seeking to help them meet their objectives. Mm-hmm . <affirmative> . But I think that's a key question that you have to ask your former sponsors, new sponsors, what is one objective I can help you achieve? And once you have that conversation and you can position your sponsorship opportunity with, aligned with helping them reach that objective, you're golden. It's often a no-brainer for the sponsor to say, you know what, you're right. Let's, let's at least try it out. Let's think about it. Chris, I'm gonna jump in real quick though. Sure . I , I think one, one thing you just mentioned, and I'm not gonna say this is a one size fits all for every associate association by any means, we actually have an exhibitor and sponsor volunteer group that meets every year and we meet throughout the year and we talk about, you know, here's the trade show floor, what does this look like? Is this achieving the things that you want? It was, it was interesting this last time we actually met because the things we'd heard before were, we need all these new activations in the hall, we need more seating, we need to keep people in the hall, right? And so we put forth this, this floor plan that did all those things and they said we need more books <laugh> . And I said, well there's only so much space, right? Right . And so we've kind of gone round and round to try to figure out how can we meet all of those needs. But to your point, we would not hear all of those things if we didn't have a group that could meet and we could use them as a sounding board. And I tell them this every year, we're not gonna make all of you happy. Right? Some of you're gonna come in , you're gonna love our conference, some of you're gonna come in, you're not gonna think it was successful. That's we're we, were just not gonna be able to do it. But I would advocate for a lot of association professionals, if you don't have, you know, whether you call it a committee, whether you call it a work group, whether you call it a task force , an advisory council, whatever, have a core group of people that you can ask those questions to as you just mentioned. Cause I think it helped , it does help provide some immense insight into what you need to do. Absolutely. And I would, I would say too, I mean, so Sigma, we do a , we have a corporate committee and I oversee as the staff liaison of that committee. And that's a great, that's a great example of a way to have eyes and ears on the ground in ways that I'm not able to, as the single person who oversees this work at the organization. I've got a group of 10 people who are attending these trade shows, other conferences who can, who I trust, who I've personally tapped that to, to say, Hey, this group is doing this. You guys really need to think about trying this and this is something that actually my organization would sponsor if you're able to implement. And so when you build those relationships, you're absolutely right. They're gonna be willing to provide you with some of the insights of what's happening elsewhere. And, but I would say you have to be able to trust those people, right? Like yes, you know, you've gotta be able to, to trust them to provide that information. But also I need them to be very honest and frank with me when we host an event, if there's things that we should be changing and things that as a sponsor they don't like about it, I need them to be very honest with me about it because that's gonna hurt retention of sponsors if there's something happening within our event context that I'm not aware of, right? Mm-hmm <affirmative>. And that can be really, really tricky when there's all this other stuff happening around events and my sole focus is sponsor partner fulfillment and trade show. If there's something happening elsewhere that's, you know, disappointing sponsors, I need to know about that. So my group is, are the people that, that help provide that information to me. Yeah , absolutely. Any, just any final thoughts I guess? Yeah , I think this has been a really great conversation and I think there's a lot to think about as we look forward to the future of sponsors for sure . But any maybe parting thoughts to share with listeners today? I think the thing that I would relay the most is that now is the time to, if you're not already, get really creative with the conversations you're having with sponsors as well as what you're putting out there to solicit sponsors. Be creative in your messaging. Try new things as the world becomes less and less one size fits all . Your email blast to attract sponsors is not working anyway. So why not blow it up and try new things? Don't just constantly send the same message out and don't be afraid to, to don't be afraid to accept that you largely probably don't know what the sponsor wants out of your trade show. Don't be afraid to ask them. You're, you're not only putting them in a position to be able to articulate that but, and be very clear with you. But you're also putting yourself in a position to be able to listen to how they're describing your event and your value proposition. And when you can hear them put it in their own words, you have much more insight to build a customized package for them around your events, other programs that they're going to see in their own language. And you know, that's really gonna create some, some compelling opportunities. I also, I worked with a boss one time who constantly used the term win-win win . And her focus, the perspective was around the win for the member, your association member, they need to be winning in a partnership agreement. The association needs to be somehow benefiting from the partnership agreement. And of course the sponsor needs to be winning in this, this agreement, right? They've got dollars to spend, they're the ones investing. But if you don't factor in all of those three key significant areas, it's not really going to be that successful of a relationship. Because even if the corporation, your sponsor and the association have this great win, you know this this, they're giving you $20,000 and they're getting leads for a hundred thousand people. If their value add isn't there for the member, you're not gonna be successful. Your click rate's not gonna go up, people aren't gonna be stopping by the booth, they're not gonna be attending the cohort, the programs. So your sponsor's ultimately going to be disillusioned in the end and it's, it's just not gonna be, you know, the relationship that you thought. So always be sure and have that member in mind and even to the point of maybe even having a member on that corporate council , your exhibitor sponsor task force that we were talking about, because they're the voice, they're the person that we need to be keeping at the forefront of these conversations. I think that's a great, a great way to end today. That win-win win kind of mentality because I think it really helps drive home the success for all of those pieces, right? Each of those groups have to be successful or you're right, that sponsor relationship just at the end of the day isn't gonna work. Absolutely. And one last thing I would add to is, this is really hard for me. This has been a learn , a personal learning curve on my end. I am afraid of no as a person but as a sponsorship professional, I have to not be afraid of, no. I have to be able to put something out that I believe is in the best interest again of the member, the association and the sponsor organization. And if I get told no, I did what was best on behalf of, again all of those representatives and that's hard for me as a person, but it's something that I have to keep in mind that no is okay, no is perfectly fine and no is not a closed door. No. Just might mean I need to think about this differently and go back to the drawing board. Yeah, we just had some interns start that came from sales and they were saying, cause I was joking about, you know, getting cold calls from from vendors and whatnot and I said, you know, yeah. I would say, yeah, I'm not really interested in that. And they would say, yeah, and we would hear that as a no, not yet. Right? So I'm gonna pencil you in, I'm gonna call you again later because it just sounds like it just didn't work right now. I like that. I think if we take that mentality, I think that'll be a good way to continue to sell these things. Absolutely. Well thanks for having me today Nick. Yeah. Thank you for being here, Chris. I think this was a really great conversation and I, I, I know our listeners will get a lot out of this. If folks are interested in learning more or just having a discussion with you about their own sponsorship programs, how might they be able to get in touch with you? Absolutely. I'd love to chat. So I would say the best way to reach me is going to be my email address, chris sigma nursing.org . You can also find me, Chris Beaman on LinkedIn. Happy to chat that way. Just know that this is my full-time responsibility and my unique role at Sigma. So I don't, I , I have good perspective and I would love to chat with you, but you know, especially with the small staff associations I and leaders, I feel like the value I could add in conversation with you is helping you to build some systems and operations to be more efficient in your work . Again, it's my full-time job so I, I have the flexibility to do that. So if you're ever interested in hearing about how I'm doing that and keeping track of fulfillment and conversations and the sales pipeline, I would love to chat. So you can email me@chrissigmanursing.org and we'll make sure that that is available in our show notes. So please definitely reach out if you have any questions on that. Well, we hope you enjoyed this episode of you should hear this. If you have any questions you'd like answered or future topics you'd like for us to explore, please send us an email@infoisae.org.