When vetting potential sponsors for a media platform, managers should look for several factors. The main one is whether the sponsor’s product or service is a fit for the audience. But aside from product fit, it’s important to consider other aspects:
- Is the contact person reliable and timely with their end of deliverables?
- Do they provide the helpful information you need to build out a good sponsored post?
- Is the payment process smooth?
- Do they provide feedback, and is their communication good for collaborations on improving subsequent sponsored posts?
Some of these factors you’ll only find out after running a test campaign, but you’ll soon see if this sponsorship can be long-term or just a one-off.
Reliability is something you can judge before any sponsorship by seeing how they reply to emails and schedule calls. Several times, potential sponsors wanted to schedule a call and were a no-show or never confirmed the time. I considered those lost leads already.
I have two examples where the products were fine, but the human side did not work out.
1) In a call the potential sponsor was a bit late for already, they started off by pitching how much money they raised and how big of a sponsor they could be, only to then end the call trying to penny pinch and negotiate for very little money. That’s the kind of sponsor who probably wanted to make us dream about their future funds while trying to lowball us on the initial test. In my experience, no sponsor switches from low-balling to being generous, so if they start low-balling, assume that’s their default.
2) When looking for a test, a different sponsorship candidate said our prices were fair but still wanted to negotiate. I was very clear on our final price. They tried to counter twice, but we said clearly that they were not a fit for that price, so we wouldn’t be working with them. It didn’t end there: they then accepted our price for the test but were vague and unreliable with the creative process and thus never actually went live. So, in the end, we still didn’t work with them.
These two examples show that once sponsorships start on the wrong foot, they don’t improve much. My experience has always been that small improvements can happen, but complete mindset shifts do not.
Money doesn’t always factor in this decision-making process. Getting money one time but breaking trust will devalue your business significantly more. So, the one-time payment to promote a harmful product or service is a big no-no.
Two of the biggest factors to turn down a sponsor very quickly are their reputation with other publishers and their product quality. The latter is something where we don’t even bother following up with leads if they’re looking to promote some low-quality affiliate program or, even worse, some MLM program.
There are clauses and policies that you can implement to prevent these queries. A good place to start is no illegal and sexual content (unless you publish that kind of content). Luckily, those kinds of products aren’t looking for our readers, so we’re not a fit for them.
It’s important to leave these clauses to the end of your sponsorship deck. Leading with a list of refusals can turn away good sponsors because it makes it harder for them to find the relevant information. So, make sure you lead with relevant information about your audience and sponsored placements, then go into other policies and FAQs.
Utilizing one problematic sponsor can lead to issues with your other advertisers. You will have sponsors say, “We don’t want to be published in the same publication [other brand] is using.” This is not just for problematic sponsors that you can avoid through policy. There are also sponsors that have the policy of not working with publications their competitors have sponsored recently.
Even if you feel like you can’t choose your sponsors, you’re probably wrong. For the long-term health of your business, you have to say no sometimes. While these decisions may lose you money in the short-term, they’re ultimately best for your business.
