Rule of Thumb for Selling Athlete Sponsorships

Cejih Explains: A good rule of thumb for selling athlete sponsorships

This week will mark 100 days until the start of the Tokyo 2021 Olympics. The market for athlete sponsorship deals is poppin' right now. While many deals will start to spring up, there is a good rule of thumb that I recommend following.

Can you make a case for why your athlete would be a good fit for this company, without relying on their athletic accomplishments. By this I mean, is there a good genuine story here that we can build a marketing campaign around - which will only be enhanced by what that talent has done athletically.

Opening the conversation with the athlete's medal count, records and social media following can spark an initial interest - it actually makes it harder to get a long term deal done once you're asked to put a proposal together.

Get a sponsor interested in what an athlete is doing outside of their sport and you will set the foundation for a strong partnership. With this model, when the athlete has a breakout performance it's the cherry on top of an already sweet deal. If they athlete has a bad performance, it's also not the end of the world because you have mitigated much of the marketing risk for the sponsor.

As we are seeing in the biz, there are plenty of sponsorships to go around - so make sure you're using this rule of thumb to find the best ones.