This week entrepreneur, Sheila Farragher-Gemma, is back with us to talk about about making money on your events. This was an incredibly insightful conversation for us where we learned a lot about the value of treating your sponsors well throughout the process, and ensuring they’re with you for the long term. Sheila’s experience as an event sponsorship consultant has given her a wealth of knowledge that she shares with us. This is a great listen for anyone who’s ever thought about getting sponsors for event promotion, but has no idea where to start.
Bekkah: Welcome to Business Talk, Sister Gawk. I’m Bekkah —
Ruthie: And I’m Ruthie.
Bekkah: — and this episode title is “How to Monetize Your Event,” and we are doing part two with Sheila this week. If you missed the first episode, you should definitely go back and listen to “How to Build Strategic Partnerships.”
She talked a lot about the benefits of doing that and being authentic and genuine in the things that you do, and it was just such a valuable conversation. Thanks so much for being with us today again, Sheila. We’re super excited to have you!
Sheila: I am super excited to be here as well; thank you so much. I’m so excited for this one.
Bekkah: Yeah, and we’ll give a little bit of background for if this is the first episode for our listeners. Sheila has done so much event organization with monetization; so she also has had many, many other businesses and done so many cool things in her life. So she has a lot of experience coming from many different angles of how to monetize things. So that kinda comes into — like,what would you say your business is right now?
Tells Us About Your Event Sponsorship Business
Sheila: So, right now, and for about the last 10-ish years, I’ve had a business called Connected Sponsors. And it is a business where I help event owners and platform owners find sponsors for their events.
When I started, I was doing it just myself, helping them finding sponsors. And I pivoted to creating a course around it so I can teach and consult more than actually doing the work so I can manage my time a bit better. So that’s pretty much it in a nutshell, yeah.
Ruthie: Yeah, so what’s your “Why” behind that? What got you into wanting to do this for yourself and then wanting to do this for other people?
Sheila: Right, so, I just briefly said the why, which we had talked about the last time, and for just being an entrepreneur in general was when my daughter was born. I just, like, desperately wanted to be home with her and not have to, you know, report to a job, and, you know, beg for time off and things like that.
So I kinda went out into business on my own. This particular business, I — it kinda happened almost by accident. I had a business with a good friend of mine, DeAnna Rogers, who — it was called Affiliate Mastermind Group, and it was for people who were kinda in the event industry doing joint ventures, having speakers come speak on their stages, that kind of stuff.
And towards the end of that business, she got recruited by Digital Marketer, which is a big digital marketing company. They run an event called T&C. And she went to be their director of events and she runs all their events now. The woman is, like, amazing.
But when she left, she asked me if I could come and help with sponsorship, and I’d always kind of done the strategic partnership side of the business. Sponsorship was kinda new for me, but I came in and started doing it for her, and helped out with T&C the first couple years she was there.
And people started to see what I was doing and asked me if I could come and do this for them too. So that kinda — it just kinda organically grew into a business. It wasn’t something that I sat down and said, “Okay, my next business is going to be this.” There was no business plan or anything like that; it was just — it just kind of happened.
Ruthie: Yeah, so that’s — I love that, and I love that you’re still friends with — like, consistently in talking with you, it seems like you’ve made these relationships and then just continued to have these friends that you’ve done so many cool things with and I love that.
Sheila: Right, yeah. Exactly. And sometimes the thing ends, but the friendship always continues, which is awesome.
What Kinds of Events Can You Monetize?
Ruthie: So now we are in this digital age where you can have an event and have — see nobody in person — so tell us a little bit about the different kinds of events that you it can monetize.
Sheila: So you can really monetize — I broaden this out from events to platforms — so you can really monetize anything. You know, you can monetize a newsletter, you can monetize your email list, you can monetize a virtual event, a live event, a podcast, a book. It’s, you know, anything that you — where you’re putting yourself out there to the world, there is a way to monetize it. And the way to think about it is, I kinda think from the end backwards.
So when — and I talk about events because it’s what I have the most experience in, so my examples would be events, but it really — you can translate it into any other platform. But the way I think of sponsorship is, if you’re doing an event, and you have a group of people coming, the people are coming to your event because they are looking for some sort of transformation; so you may be teaching them something; it might be like, a business event, and you’re teaching them how to run their business better, or how to manage employees better, or how to grow. You know, it might be a real estate event where you’re teaching them how to invest in real estate for passive income.
You know, whatever the event is, they’re coming there looking for transformation. And especially if you teach what you do, you want to think about you when you started, because when you started is very different from the you you are today; so you really knew nothing when you started because that’s how we all start; it’s like, “What the heck am I doing?”
And try and get yourself back in that mindset and start thinking about what do these — what did I need when I started this business? What were the big jumps I had that, because I found out about this resource or I learned about this particular thing, that helped me get to where I am today?
And then start bringing that in for your audience. And one of the best ways to bring that in is, especially when it’s resources, is bringing in the sponsors; and from the sponsorship point of view, they’re looking to get in front of a certain demographic. So somebody who needs their product. And if you — and that’s where sponsors are buying, so you can put together all these fancy, like, sponsor checks and things like that, but they don’t care about a lot of it. They’re looking for access to the group of people that you’ve gathered, whether they’re gathered on a podcast, or gathered at an event, or however you do that.
So you want to find that nice fit, and what you — you know, so there’s, like, three winners in this: So the sponsors are getting up in front of their audience, your audience is getting extra resources that, you know, you can’t have everything to give to them, so you’re teaching them, but they’re getting the resources to help them implement all the stuff that you’re teaching.
And then you as the platform owner; you’re, you know, you’re winning twice, because you’re bringing value to your audience, but you’re also monetizing it as well; so, like, when done properly, it’s a really nice win-win-win situation. And I know win-win-win is kind of cliche, but that’s what it is. And it’s all quite sustainable, because if everyone’s happy in that relationship, there’s no reason to leave.
Bekkah: Mm-hmm.
Ruthie: That’s a good point.
What To Put In Your Sponsorship Pitch
Bekkah: So I have a question about, like — when you’re creating your sponsorship approach — what exactly do you put into that to say, “Hey, this is what I’m doing” and what kind of data do you pull together to bring your pitch, basically, to a sponsor — potential sponsor?
Sheila: Yeah, that’s a great question, because that is just, like, the crux of everything. So what you — the data you really need to know and be very familiar with is who your avatar is. Like, who is your audience? If you can describe them as one person, how do you describe that person?
And I’m sure you guys know John Lee Dumas; he has a podcast called “Entrepreneur on Fire.” So he describes his avatar, and I can just say it off the top of my head, cuz he’s just — first of all, it resonates with me, but also, it’s just such a simple avatar.
So his avatar is Jimmy. Jimmy is a 40-year-old guy who’s working at a job that he doesn’t particularly like. He drives in in the morning 45 minutes to his job and listening to a podcast. He works for 8-10 hours during the day, and exhausted, gets back in his car and drives home about 35 minutes listening to another podcast, gets into his house, and, you know, has to, like, instantly be there for his wife; they’re getting dinner on the table. They’ve got kids; they’re making sure homework is done; everyone’s had a bath. And then everyone goes to bed; and that’s when he has two hours to himself to work on his dream, and that’s his business. He wants to be an entrepreneur; he wants to quit the job, and he wants to have a business.
And that’s just, like, such a clear vision of who that avatar is; so anytime John Lee Dumas has a question about, like, what guests to bring on, what sponsor to bring on, it’s like, “Would this resonate with Jimmy?”
So it’s very, very simple. So you want to, like, have a really good kind of idea of who that person is that your avatar is. Because that’s essentially what you’re selling to your sponsor. And then you start thinking about, as I said before, like, what are the resources you needed to get to where you are?
Because we’re assuming that if you’re — if you’re kind of the leader of this whatever it is — podcast or event or whatever, that you’ve kind of made some of that transformation. You may not — like, sometimes you’re only one or two steps ahead of your listeners, which is fine, you know, as long as you stay that one or two steps ahead. But, you know, what has helped you, because, really, you’re trying to share with them, “Okay, this is one of the things that just kind of gave me, like, a 10x leap into — like, once I found this out, it just gave me this huge boost forward until I came up with the next challenge.”
How to Find The Right Sponsors
So, you know, you’re kinda thinking “Who can I bring in to help my students or help my listeners or my audience, you know, implement and get the things done that I’m teaching them to do?” So when you’re kind of coming at it from that point of view, it just makes the planning very different.
When I first talk to people, a lot of times they’re, like, you know, “So how much can you get in sponsorship, and who can you get?” And they’re just thinking, like, random companies, like, “Can we get Marriott and American Express?”
And I’m like, “Okay, so why Marriott?”
“I don’t know; because they’re a big company.”
“Like, are they going to help your students?”
Ruthie: “They have money.”
Sheila: They have money, yeah. They’ll probably cut a check and not worry about it. But it has to be — it has to be something more than that. And that’s always a huge red flag for me, if I’m working with a client and they’re just, like, “How much can you bring in? How much can you bring in?”
It’s like, “What are we giving them? You have to think of it the other way around.”
Ruthie: When we were talking, kind of between episodes, you had mentioned a couple different things about, like, how to seek out the low-hanging fruit for sponsorships. So can you tell our listeners a little bit about that?
Sheila: Yeah, I can, and I actually created, like, a small training. It’s called a One-Sheet or One-Pager. I actually made the One-Page, but I used somebody else’s software to do it. But basically, going back to my BNI days — and we talked about this before as well — like, at the very beginning of my business, I joined BNI. One of the things that we used to do at BNI is that we’d have visitor days as we’re trying to grow the chapter, and one of the tactics they used was called “Follow your checkbook.”
So the thought was if you’re doing business with someone, maybe they’d be a good fit for the group, because maybe you can pass business back and forth from within the group, but, like, not just you, but the whole group can.
So, when I think of this in terms of — again, I’m just using events as an example, but if you are an event owner, and let’s say you’re teaching somebody how to invest in real estate, and you are also a real estate investor, so you’re teaching what you do, what are the bills that you’re paying on a monthly basis?
Like, who are the resources that you’re using to work your day-to-day business? And, you know, let’s reach out to them first because it’s going to be really low-hanging fruit and there’s reciprocity. Because the people you’re doing business with, you’re doing business with them. So it’s not like you’re just, kind of, out of the blue approaching them about this. So there’s usually a little bit of reciprocity there as well.
But these can be, like, great sponsors to bring in initially, like, trying to get used to the sponsor process. And then you can start, like, bringing in more, and it’s kinda like if you’re — I’ve never really go to the the mall, so I really don’t know how they’re done, but I’m assuming the anchor stores get brought in first, so you have your Macy’s and your Sears and — I think both of them went out of business, but I —
Bekkah: You need to — you need to update your example.
Sheila: I need to update my — yeah, you can tell I shop a lot, right? Like, “There’s a mall?” But yeah, then, the little stores fill in the spaces in between, you know. So they’re coming there because the big stores are drawing the crowd.
So it’s kinda the same thing with sponsors. So once you have a few sponsors in there, other people are like, “Oh, this company’s there. Maybe I should be there as well.” So it’s just kind of a way to think about it.
When Should Your Event Be Paid Versus Free?
Ruthie: Yeah, so, you — we’ve been talking obviously, about, like, paid events and stuff, but how do you know when it’s appropriate to have — to run a paid event and when should it be just free to your — to your clients that you’re just trying to add value? When should it be paid and when should it just be something that you’re giving?
Sheila: So, honestly, my whole thought about giving is “How much value do they see in it?” Like, I’m not saying that the information you’re giving isn’t valuable, but have you ever signed up for something for free and just never gotten around to doing it?
Ruthie: Yes.
Sheila: So I think if there’s, like — if I paid for something, you know, now I’m kinda more committed to doing it, because I’ve just paid money for it, and it just kinda gives that little bit more commitment that just being kinda like, “Oh, maybe I’ll get to that.” Or, you know, it’s “This thing came up and this is on my calendar, but this other thing is more important.” So you tend to do that. But if you — like, if you paid money for an event, you’re going to block it out in your calendar. Like, okay, I need to get — I need to, like, focus on this and I need to get the value out of it, because I just paid money for it and it’s a waste otherwise.
So I don’t like the idea of free because I think people can just blow it off too easily, and they’re not as committed and possibly not the best students for you anyway. A lot of times we kinda do a lot of free stuff and get people that are just kinda like, you know, half-in, half-out, not really committed.
So I think it’s always a better thing to just do paid, and if someone is paying you for something, they’re going to be much more involved and much more successful, which will make you more successful.
Ruthie: I’ve definitely never done dishes while listening to a free event before and half-listened to it.
Sheila: Yeah.
Ruthie: Never done that…
Sheila: “Oh, I’ll just do this while I’m doing five other things.”
Ruthie: Yeah.
Sheila: “What did he say? Oh, never mind, I’ll listen to the replay.” That never happens.
Bekkah: Yeah. So I guess I have a question for you — this is kind of, like, off on a side tangent —
Sheila: Sure.
Bekkah: — of something I was thinking about. Do you think that it’s getting harder to do events, like, paid events when you have so many more people coming into this same space and — so for me, I guess, I’ve experienced paying for something and sitting through the entire thing, and being like, “I just paid $70 to listen to somebody’s pitch.”
Sheila: Yeah, so, it depends. That’s the thing as well, like, if an event is free or almost free, it’s probably kind of a pitchy thing versus if it’s, true content. Like, there’s a lot of events out there, and I don’t see them happening as much anymore, but it used to just be, like, speaker after speaker after speaker just pitching on stage for something. So you want to kind of go to events where it’s — there’s more value. Like, I’m okay with pitches if it’s going to help you get to where you’re going, but if it’s just, like, a pitch-fest and you’re not really learning a lot, that’s not helpful either.
So I prefer to spend, like, thousands on an event and walk away with, like, a clear plan of “Okay, this is what I need to do, and this is — this is the thing” versus, just, kind of, going cheap or free for, you know — “You get what you pay for,” is the thought process that I have, so —
Bekkah: Yeah, I hear you. Yeah, I just kinda feel like it’s sometimes almost, like, we’re at the point where there’s so many people running Facebook ads and doing stuff like that that it’s almost like, you get a bad taste in your mouth where you don’t want to do that.
Sheila: Yeah, I agree. It’s like, I was doing Facebook ads for a while, and I stopped, and — because I was interested, I think I kept clicking on ads, and now I think I just get more and more of them in my feed. It’s like, every single day, like, my whole feed is ads. I’m like, “Come on.” So —
Ruthie: “I have friends; I promise.”
Sheila: Yeah, I know, really. “My one friend, where are you?”
But then, the other question is, like, if you’re starting a business, how do you start? Like, those are the things you have to do, like, this thing that I just talked about, the “Follow your Checkbook,” that’s a free lead magnet. I’m trying to list-build with that.
So, you know, like, if I came on here and I was like “Yes, I have this thing and it’s a thousand dollars, and you can get it right now,” you know, everyone would be like “I don’t even know you. Why would I give you a thousand dollars?” So it’s, like, hard to find that happy medium. And I don’t know the answer to this either, like, I’m still trying to figure it out. But, like, finding somewhere — like, the middle ground of that is tough.
Ruthie: Yeah.
Sheila: I guess you just want to give loads of value, even with the free stuff, and that people resonate with it. That’s probably it; it’s probably like a sifting thing. Like you have a whole bunch of people come on because it’s a free thing, but the people it resonates with will continue to, kind of move along your funnel and do more.
Is The Speaker Lineup Important in Getting Event Sponsors?
Ruthie: Yeah, so when you’re looking at gaining sponsors and stuff, how important is it to have a good speaker lineup to be able to actually get good sponsors?
Sheila: They don’t care.
Ruthie: Oh. Okay. Really?
Sheila: And I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be, just like, brash, but they are there for the people attending the event. So, you know, if, like, the — I don’t know — the Pope was speaking, they’re like, “That’s great, but, you know, who’s going to be at the event?”
So, like, they are truly there for access to your audience, and sometimes, it’s like, people put a whole bunch of time into creating the perfect offering and the prospects of the deck of, like, “If you do platinum, you’ll get all these things, if you do gold, you get all these things.”
And, you know, I always advise, first of all, just ask the sponsor what they want, and it may be totally different to the thing you agonized over for weeks and created, you know? And second of all, they just — I really — they just want access to — if you’re gathering the demographic that they’re going after, if you’re gathering their ideal client, they want access to that ideal client, and the rest of it doesn’t really matter.
Bekkah: Yeah, so I have a question regarding, like, the logistics side.
Sheila: Yep.
Key Things to Know About Planning an Event With Paid Sponsors
Bekkah: What are some systems and processes that have been very helpful for you when planning for an event, either in person or online?
Sheila: So in terms of bringing sponsors in?
Bekkah: Mm-hmm
Sheila: Or in terms of managing the sponsors once you get them there?
Bekkah: Whatever you think that would be best for us to know.
Sheila: Yeah, so bringing sponsors in is just — it’s just keeping up with everything. And we kinda talked about this earlier a little bit, like, you reach out to a whole bunch of people and then you drop the ball because you just forgot to kinda, like, just — “Oh, what about that person I called, like, two months ago? Did he ever email me back?” And you go through your emails and realize, “Oh, crap, he did, and that was, like, two months ago.”
So just kind of using something to keep yourself organized. I use Google Sheets a lot. I have, like a whole kind of, like, per client, per sponsor, per event — I have a whole sheet with a couple of different tabs in it, of, you know, who I’m talking to.
I have a thing called “traffic lights” that shows me where they are in the process. So are they a hard “no”? Are they still thinking about it? Are they — do they have a contract? Have they paid and they’re signed up for everything? And then for after somebody has signed up as a sponsor, I have another Google Sheet that’s, like a deliverables. So we promise them A,B,C,D, and E, and then I just, I color-code them — it’s really simple, I color-code it. It’s like a pink-y color if they haven’t gotten it yet, and then once they get it, it’s green.
So it’s just kinda keeps me on track so that I can look at something quickly. And what I love about Google Sheets is they’re on my phone as well. So if I don’t have a computer open and I’m, like, in the car, and, you know, I start to have a heart attack because I’m look “Oh no. Did I do this or did I not do this or — ” or whatever, I can just pull it up quickly and see it and everything’s right there. But, yeah, I’m really low tech.
Ruthie: Okay. Yeah, so then, I just have one more question —
Sheila: Sure.
How and When Do Event Sponsors Pay?
Ruthie: — logistically. So when they — when you have a sponsor and they sponsor you, do they just cut you a check, or, like, how does that work?
Sheila: So it works a bunch of different ways. A lot of times, they cut you a check and they’re in, and that’s it. And, obviously, you want to, like, make sure — that’s the one mistake I find with some event owners that, you know, they get the check, and then they kind of forget about all the rest of it and all the deliverables.
And I feel like — and I don’t do a lot of this anymore — I really do more of the teaching and consulting, but when I was doing events, I felt like the sponsors were more like my client than the person running the event that hired me to find the sponsors. So I just wanted to make sure that they consistently got everything that they needed. If there’s any kind of an issue whatsoever, like, straight away, we were just, like, taking care of that and solving it. Owning it first, and then taking care of it and resolving it for them. Because this is a really long-term relationship. You don’t want to, you know, mess it up because something happened and you just kind of ignored it.
So a lot of times, sponsors will just straight up pay. Sometimes there’s kind of a hybrid of where they’ll pay a less amount of sponsorship, but you’ll have kind of an affiliate thing going on that you get a piece of their sales. Which is kind of good for both. So, you know, the event owners should be getting some money up front, but they’re also, like, have to perform a bit more to make sure that the sales happen. A lot of times, this is when somebody’s going to sell it on stage. And, you know, the event owner’s kind of supporting that as well.
And then there’s a third one where it’s just affiliate only, which is a great way — when you’re starting out, it might be a great way to just bring in sponsors, because the sponsors are still paying to get people to the event — if it’s virtual, obviously they’re not — but it’s a great way to get — kind of prove to them that you can bring them value so that then when you come back to them again, they know that, like, “Last time we made so many sales or made so much money,” or whatever it was, so that’s you’ve kind of proven your value to them.
And you can do any — it’s a very fluid thing. There isn’t, like, a sponsorship rule book somewhere that you have to, like, follow by the letter. It’s all negotiation.
Bekkah: Wow, I feel like you’re leaving me with so many more thoughts that I’m, like, forgetting to respond.
Sheila: I’m here all week, folks; I’m here all week.
Free Resources to Help You Start Monetizing Your Events
Bekkah: So what free resources would you recommend to someone starting to get started with monetizing an event?
Sheila: Sure. So the one I would — the one that I am going to give is the resource that I created, which is that “Follow your Checkbook.” It’s a 15-20 minute training, and it’s on a One-Pager, which is editable, so they can go in, and, like fill it out and start to brainstorm with people who they, like, would bring in to their events. There are couple of, like podcasts that I’m really, like, into right now. And in addition to yours! Because yours is amazing — I have to say that. I feel like I have to say that, like, when you have kids, you know? “No, I love both of you equally.”
I love the — and this one I tend to — I tend to binge listen to podcasts, so what I’m listening to right now is the “Email Marketing Show.” And it’s by two guys over in England, Rob and Kennedy, and they are teaching you, like, they give so much value in their podcast. They are teaching on how to do email marketing. Which is, like, a big thing that I’m trying to conquer right now, like, personally. So I just love that.
And then, there’s another podcast that I love as well called “Business Lunch.” It’s by a guy called Roland Frasier. He’s one of the owners of that company that DeAnna went to, so, Digital Marketer. He owns about 20 companies, but this is one of the ones that they owned — that T&C — actually, they partially own it now. They ended up selling it last year to another company, but I think they still own part of it.
But he has, like, amazing people come on and talk about all different aspects of business. So I get a lot out of that as well. I listen to these a lot in the car, and I’m like, “Crap, I need to write these down ” Because it’s just some really good stuff at times.
Ruthie: Yeah, that’s the danger of listening to really good podcasts while you’re driving, because you’re like —
Sheila: Yeah, yeah. If only they had, like, a tape recorder thing or something so you could record your voice — I don’t know. Maybe that technology will come along at some point. Kidding.
Bekkah: Mm-hmm.
Bekkah: I think we haven’t because then we’d be doing it while we were driving.
Sheila: Yeah, it’s bad enough that you’re totally engrossed in a podcast that you’re like, “Where am I?”
Ruthie: “Oh, I missed all of the exits I was taking.”
Sheila: Exactly. I do that if I’m on the phone with people. Like, I have phone through my bluetooth, but, like — I’ll be going — especially if I’m going somewhere different to where I normally go, and next thing I’m like “Oh, I totally went the wrong way.” And now I’m, like, miles away, and have to kind of do a different route to get there.
Ruthie: Yeah, I’m directionally challenged enough as it is; I don’t need to handicap myself.
Sheila: Oh, really?
Ruthie: Really.
Bekkah: Well, how about you tell our listeners where they can find you?
Sheila: Yeah. So if they want to download the OneSheet, it is at connectedsponsors.com/findingsponsors. So C-O-N-N-E-C-T-E-D-S-P-O-N-S-O-R-S dot com, forward slash “finding sponsors.” They can also find me on Facebook and LinkedIn. LinkedIn I’m Sheila Farragher-Gemma — sorry for the long name. Great idea at the time, but now it’s a long name. And on Facebook it’s @ConnectedSponsors.
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