3 ways to get deals without a big Instagram following
Our agency has closed several million dollars in athlete sponsorship deals over the past few years.
We have yet to have an athlete with 100k followers.
Some of our largest deals were for athletes with less than 20k followers. In some cases under 10k followers
How do we do this? Hint: It has nothing to do with us the 'agents', it's all the athletes. See below.
Here are 3 things these athletes did to get sponsors, without having large social followings:
Write your own blog about your journey: You can easily take the focus off of your IG following by creating a few pieces of evergreen content that you own. This shows your unique voice and it gives sponsors a tangible piece of content that they can assign value to.
Creating a simple newsletter: This is one of the highest return things you can do. Newsletters are hot right now. Start with a simple list of friends and family. A newsletter allows you to have a more personal connection with your audience and share new updates, photos, lessons learned, upcoming events and special business offers for how people can work with you. It's also an incredible resource to share with sponsors.We have had athletes start from a few readers and grow their list to several thousand subscribers, while generating tens of thousands of dollars along the way.
Film Video Content - IG Reels is one of the easiest ways to get started. Vlogging or starting your own 'interview' series hosted on Zoom has proven to be extremely powerful.
A great example of an athlete who had success with this is the Breanna Stewart of the Seattle Storm. During the first lockdown of 2020, Breanna started a simple interview series over Zoom (and then posted to IG). The show was called "Around the Block" and she interviewed other NCAA, WNBA and NBA players. Later in the year, the media company Uninterrupted launched a podcast with Breanna.
Finally, PUMA signed a deal with Breanna for their 'hoops' collection. The title and theme of her Puma release video was called, "Around the Block".
Creating your own content (even just 1-2 pieces) demonstrates to sponsors your creativity, understanding of marketing and that you bring much more interesting things to the table than your IG account.
What this does for your marketing team is give them fresh ammo to present to companies that will showcase why you are a good fit.
