A company arranges a deal with the school district to either give the district money, product, and/or services and, in return, they ask the school to put up signage for their company.
It's done all the time and - at it's core - it's a basic advertising formula.
All of this is fine and the school is set to benefit and then this happens and it only happens because, I think, people working in schools and school districts are genuinely very kind and thoughtful, people.... Somebody thinks, "You know what Bob. That was really great of Bilbo Baggins Ring Repair Shop to give us $1,000 to hang that banner in the lobby. Let's keep it up"
And then, like steam off the ground, your profits will start to disappear. When you leave something up longer than agreed upon, you are essentially doing the following and you are telling your paying sponsor, advertiser, whatever this without saying anything.
You are devaluing your inventory. Whatever property you are allowing them to post on, whatever medium you are providing them space in, or whatever events you are allowing them access to, you are saying to them that this wasn't worth the original price we charged you. They catch on to this and you'll never get that same money again. If somebody calls my company and tells me "Hey, you only paid for one month but we're going to give you the rest of the year as a thank you for free" I'm thinking... whoa, why did I ever pay anything for that. I'm also wondering who is in charge because why didn't they just parlay my business into another month by calling and saying:Instead, be attentive and responsive. Answer any questions truthfully. If the banner fell on the field for half of a televised game, tell them. Once your programs lose integrity you might as well just stop doing them.
"We thank you for supporting Little Elf School District this month. Would you like us to continue posting your corporate logo and signage in our main lobby that sees 4,000 people per month. Please let us know. For your convenience, I'm attaching an invoice and a picture of your sign from last month."
Follow the simple paths... Offer to keep the partnership going (in yellow), give them a supporting statistic to show it's effective (in green), make it easy (in orange). Sure, I know you are busy, but so are they - very busy - and, think of it this way, who is giving who money here? Take the extra minute and put together an invoice and take a picture of the partnership. It shows initiative. It shows you care. And, in the business it is a proven close. It's called the assumptive close. You can call it the Hallmark close or whatever you want. It works and it's easy so try to use it when you can.
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