Over the past 10 years I have worked for and with several brands such as Curls, Shea Moisture, Swarowski, Google, Uber, Hennessy, NYFW, Coca-Cola, Omni Hotels, Stila, Covergirl etc. I’m always being asked the question of how to receive sponsorships from brands. Some people wonder why brands don’t want to work with them or what they’re doing wrong with their pitching approach.
Here some pointers why brands don’t want to work with you:
- You don’t bring anything to the table: Whenever you approach a brand you have to make yourself interesting to them. What’s special about you? How will you help them make a sale or increase their popularity? Do you have an engaged audience? Do you create original or creative content? Do you have a unique perspective or a one-of-a-kind look? Are you involved with an event that could touch many potential customers in one sweep?
- You don’t target their target demographic: Let’s say for example you want to approach a premium brand but have only been promoting and working with lower end brands it’s very unlikely you will get a deal with that higher end brand.
- You’re unprofessional: The first impression counts whenever you are trying to contact brands. Always approach a brand with professional pictures, a media kit, highlights of what makes you special, and your specific value proposition. Also, clean up your social media since these channels will be the first ones they will check out. No brand wants to see an endless collection of selfies, you turning up in every other picture, or captions with foul language. They want to see that you will actually represent a brand and make them shine in the best light.
- You’ve been going hard for their competition: Even if you approached a company professionally and did everything right your proposal might still be rejected due to prior strong advocacy of a competing product. So you either have to let some time pass between the competitor and the new brand or take those posts off .
I hope this helps if you don’t know how to create a media-kit or a value proposition in your pitch feel free to send me an email sschirru@dynamicallybpr.com and I will give you advice.
XOXO,
Dynamically Branded