Sneaky Tip to Scare up more Sponsorship

Hey there Navigators,
In my umpteen some years of consulting for businesses, many times I helped scare up some sponsorships for sports complexes and non profit companies. Potential sponsor companies are quick to say no, so you have to adapt and find ways to at least get them to talk to you.
Remember, a lot of times a sponsorship has nothing to do with an actual cash gift from a company. 99% of the time it is goods, product, service, or just plain ol' marketing. Sometimes its just getting a discount. All sponsorship gifts though, help your bottom line.

Usually getting a sponsorship from a company comes with a price. So when you approach a company make sure you have clearly written out a professional looking document that states what you will be doing for that company if they sponsor you.
Heres my super sneaky tip for you when approaching those big boys. You know, the big ol corporations that make billions a year. The big boys hate their competition. So... Use that hate as a tool to get what you want.

Heres an example: a restaurant that was opening up was trying to decide which of the two major soda companies they were going to carry. The owner of the restaurant told me he was going see which had the better pricing and that would be how he would decide which company he would go with. So I told him, before he decided, let me approach the two companies and see what kind of deal I could get him.
I went to the first soda company. I told them I was opening a restaurant and since they were my "favorite" kind of soda, I wanted to see what pricing they could give me. So they got me all kinds of price lists on equipment, and bottle and fountain sodas. Everything they gave me had their big old logo all over it. So I told them thank you and I would look their documents over and i'd get back to them. I had a binder and I placed all of their company propaganda in it. Walked out the door and drove straight to their number one competitor. Went inside with my newly stuffed binder and told them I was opening a restaurant and I was trying to decide which company to carry. And since they were my "favorite" kind of soda, I wanted to see what they could do for me. So I got ushered into an office to speak with a sales rep. Silly me, I had my nice new binder and well... I should have been better organized because darn it if that binder didnt just start dropping the competitions propaganda all over the place. I am kind of clumsy so as i went to scoop up my price lists, i dropped the whole darn thing and it was raining the competitions logo all over the office. Then of course I had to place the open binder on the sales person's desk to put all my stuff back in. I was so "embarrassed" that I just jammed the stuff back into the binder and closed it back up, but in my haste there were papers with the competitions logo just sticking out all over the place. I sat the binder on the desk and took my seat. I told the rep that I was looking to see what his company had to offer to my new restaurant that would make me their customer. I got the price lists from him and a free reach-in display case cooler for the restaurant and a free soda fountain if I was interested. I told him thank you and I would look his stuff over and I would get back to him.
Got back in my car, and took out the business card for soda company 'a' and gave my sales rep a call. I told him I was very interested but I wanted to meet with him again. Now my binder was stuffed full of both soda company A's and company B's propaganda. You see where this is going?
In the end, the new restaurant owner got a reach in display cooler, fully stocked for free the first time, a soda fountain for his bar area, picnic tables with sun umbrellas, menu boards, a couple clocks, a neon sign, and a couple hundred dine in plastic drinking cups. Of course all of these things were free but the price he had to pay was their logo was on everything. Me... I made about 5 or 6 trips back and forth to the sales reps.
I have scheduled meetings with sale reps where silly me, if I had been more organized, I wouldnt have scheduled them at the same date and time. Obviously, this is when they are scheduled to come see me. Having a sales rep sit in another booth watching you laughing it up with his competition seems to get you better pricing and offers. I wonder why?
A little healthy competition, never hurt anyone, especially your bottom line. Don't be afraid to ask for more. You walk away with the loot and some sales rep does a victory lap around his office because he beat the competition. Whats this have to do with sponsorships? I work 'em the same way.
Thats all for now, Navigators.

"If you are searching for Fear, I will Navigate!"

Scare up Some Followers! Are You Social Networking enough?

Hello Navigators!
Are you Social Networking enough? I hope you answered,"yes". Social Networking on the world wide web is the cheapest and in some cases the most efficient way to get your haunt business potentially in front of millions of viewers. Well your trusty Haunt Navigator here, has been traversing the highways and byways of the world wide internet to bring you the top Social Networking sites that you should be haunting.
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FaceBook- 750,000,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
Twitter- 250,000,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
LinkedIn- 110,000,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
MySpace- 70,500,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
Google Plus+ 65,000,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
DeviantArt- 25,500,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
LiveJournal- 20,500,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
Tagged- 19,500,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
Orkut- 17,500,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
CafeMom- 12,500,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
Ning- 12,000,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
Meetup- 7,500,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
myLife- 5,400,000 estimated unique monthly visitors.
*all of these figure are based on Alexa Global Traffic rank, Quantcast, and Compete U.S traffic rank
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Now you can see the multitude of victims you could be placing your haunt business in front of. And this is only the top 13. This is by far the cheapest marketing, with the highest number of viewers you can find anywhere. Some sites are free, most are really very reasonably priced. And... you dont have to be an expert to get a professional looking site rolling.
Well Navigators, what are you waiting for? Git on out there and scare you up some new victims. Any questions or comments will be happily replied too. Want someone to run your social networking campaign for you? Message me, and lets talk.
Until next time, Navigators...

The Scary World of Twitter

One of my favorite vices is Twitter. As many of you know, it can be strangely addictive. Scanning through the many tweets I follow makes me think that Twitter is the internets version of Attention Deficit Disorder.
Twitter is just awesome for getting quick updates on friends, businesses, news etc. etc.
The haunters have embraced Twitter, and I will follow anything I can find related to the haunt industry.
But... I have to just put it out there. Theres some pet peeves I have about twitter, and speaking with some other twitterers, they agree with me.
- I follow you because, I like you... Or I like the haunt related information you provide me. I may look up to you as a leader in the haunt industry, as an inspiration, or even a celebrity of sorts. So please...
- dont give me your political views- I may not agree with you. And if you are so far opposite of my own political beliefs, I might just unfollow you. Set up a separate twitter account and spew political nonsense from that. I definitely didn't follow you to feel berated because you have a deep seated hatred for a political party that is not your own. This might just be me, but I have boycotted certain movie celebrities, rock stars, tv shows, movies etc. because instead of just giving me the entertainment I was looking for they decided to make public political statements that I just didn't agree with. I don't go on twitter to hear political news, political commentary, political advice, or political opinions. If i wanted to I would look for tweeters in those categories. As HauntNav I want haunt friends, and haunt industry info. Promise, I will keep my political blah blah blah to myself if you do the same.
-same goes for religion
- The idea behind twitter is to get a quick quip out there giving info, a bit of humor, a link, an update. When you tweet 20 tweets in a row so you can write a paragraphs worth of stuff you are kind of missing the point to Twitter. Get a blog and link your twitter to it.
-STOP repeating the same twit over and over again back to back. I can see retweeting a post every so often through the day so you reach your audience. But the whole repeating the same one over and over again back to back just makes me think of a horrible paid tv advertisement where the coked up guy is screaming at you to buy the garden weasel/ nose trimmer for 19.99. Ugh!
-if you are going to add a link, make sure it works.
- stop begging for followers- obviously i am already following you and if you are worth following, I'm going to turn other people on to you. When i read something worthwhile from you, I retweet it to my circle of followers. If they choose to follow you at that point, hooray.
-stop trying to sell me something with every damn tweet you write. Seriously. Mix it up a bit. Go ahead advertise your product, but if every tweet you put out is an ad or a plea to buy something, go away.
- nothing turns me off faster, then someone who tweets about how much they love them self. Over and over again... Or just someone who hates others. Insulting others and self proclaimed greatness = douchebag.
If Im a follower of you then you probably don't exhibit the above habits. So with that I thank you for making my twitter experiences awesome. Comment and let me know some of your pet peeves about twitter. Folks, more navigations to come!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Navigations

You've come to the right place to navigate through the Haunt Industry. I will navigate anywhere the haunt industry touches, leaving no stone unturned to bring you my take on the happenings in the great world of Haunters, and the haunt industry. What you will read are just my humble opinions. Please communicate if you would like me to touch on a specific topic. Lets get started!


- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad