Stop Being Overly Nice To Your Sponsors

Don't be overly nice; be responsive.  I see this situation over and over in schools and on school district levels. 

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.



More concessions

If you can identify your biggest games of the season, try this:

Get a measurable bassline for sales (i.e., past sales from similar games) - if you don't already do this, you should be doing it every season for every game.  An easy excel file with something like the following so you can measure what you can expect in the future (trending) like:
attendance
weather
other events that day
team record
opponent
televised? Y/N
vendors?
concession sales?

These questions will let you plan accordingly for future games.  The answers will help you do everything from staff better and not waste money on unneeded personal to be able to charge premium prices for outside companies that want access to your fans.  You can also take it to the next level and put vendors at your largest games. 

Think about this:  If you are a parent and you bring two of your children to come watch the oldest play in their home varsity game, do you want to get up out of your seat and have to coordinate a trip to the concession stands?  I mean bathrooms are tough enough.  You don't have an assigned seat and you may not want to lose your seats so it would be absolutely convenient if somebody came to you.  I bet you'll see your profits increase and you'll get positive feedback from your parents that don't want to get up and stand in the long lines.  And, admit it, it adds great atmosphere to hear the sound of somebody screaming "peanuts."

Forums

We are going to be doing some forums for school districts to interact and have an opportunity to discuss what's working and what is not.  The first one should be in the middle of September.  Keep checking here for additional details.

The Size Of Online Ads Can Determine Your Worth

One of the most important factors that will determine whether a company (especially a larger company or an ad agency) will advertise with your school district is size. 

The group that dictates size is the IAB (Interactive Advertising Bureau) and the reason this is important to you is this:  If "my company" is going to spend money with your school district one of the deciding factors is the "ease of use" - meaning how much do I have to do to put an ad up on your site. 

If your website ad sizes are the same as the web sizes that my creative team is already producing for online websites, the online version of local newspapers, or anywhere else....then I don't have to do anything extra.  That means you should be using the web banner ad sizes found here:  http://www.iab.net/iab_products_and_industry_services/1421/1443/1452

You don't need all of them.  Just pick a few.  Work with your IT department to find out what sizes work and sync them up.  That way advertising agencies and major marketers won't have to pay a graphic designer $90 an hour more to design a web ad just for you...  and that should make you a buck or two.

The local dollar vs the district dollars

Don't forget the local dollars.  Schools are really good about getting them; school districts find it a bit more challenging.  Here's a simple rule of thumb:

The school should go to the franchise owner or individual location of the business.

If there is a chain or franchise, the school district should go to the regional marketing director, or franchise group responsible for all the stores in your school district.

The easiest way to find out this information is to call one of the locations and ask the franchise owner who their marketing representative is or who handles the marketing/advertising for that geographical area.

Identify Your Unique Selling Points

In Florida, Orange County Public Schools (Orlando, FL) has identified their unique selling points.  It's a fairly easy exercise but needs to be done.  Your unique selling point is whatever it is that you want to use to distinguish yourself to advertisers.  Whatever you think would make your school district more attractive than the next.

First, all school districts have unique selling points when talking to potential advertisers that should convince your advertiser that you are a better option than radio advertising, billboards, direct mailings, etc.  You should have a pretty solid list, but is should include:

• Ability to reach a targeted (and often hard-to-reach) audience of parents, educators, and students.
• Ability to segment these groups (by school, grade, zip code, etc)
• Ability to create an emotional connection with the community through the advertising sponsorship.

It pays off though to highlight your school district in more specific ways.  For example, Orange County uses  past athletes who have gone professional in their respective sports to highlight the history and pride in the county.  Last year, they had the ability to boast that they had the NFL MVP and the MLB Cy Young Award winner (Chris Johnson, Olympia grad) and Zach Greinke (Apopka grad).  

The next step is to push that information out to the public.  Here's what the ridiculously good video that theOrange County Public Schools Video Services team came up with to promote their programs:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rqzs-ILp2jU

If your school district has done anything similar, send them my way.  I'd enjoy the chance to see them.

Buses: The Inside Scoop and Outside Chance.

There's really a central question surrounding this one and it's simple Risk vs. Reward:  Does the revenue from advertising on your school buses justify the risk. 

Risk is the chance that the advertising on the inside of the bus while suffer the wrath of the public backlash and put the breaks on your program or that somebody reading that ad on the back of the bus isn't paying attention to the brake lights and now you have a much bigger problem.

Anybody that has talked to me about advertising in schools knows I'm not a fan of advertising to children in a "trapped environment."  That includes the insides of classrooms and school buses.  If they don't have a choice to leave the immediate surroundings then I don't think it's a good place to be putting advertisements. 

I don't like the locker wraps either.... too forced.  I don't like murals or mobiles either - blurs the line a bit too much for me. 

There's too much easy inventory out there to mess with the sticky stuff.  There's also two much more important groups your missing:  Parents and employees.   Most of the big companies have their own rules already in place about "advertising to children" and they are very strict.  Concentrate your efforts and focus on the parents and the employees.  There's good money in that and a lot less hassle.

Taking it to the next level

When you are ready to take the advertising programs in your school district to the next level, there's nothing like doing a lot of research.

Well, except there is the option of asking somebody who has already been through the first year. 

A lot of school districts are under the misnomer that as soon as you say "We're accepting advertising" that you'll be selling ads.

There's a lot of work between passing board policy and receiving checks.

We're going to start addressing these issues in upcoming weekly posts, including invoicing, operations, internet, policy, prospecting, and decisions on inventory.

We'll also be doing an online presentation around the second week of September.
Look forward to hearing from other school districts on how and what your plans are for 2010-2011.
I've been talking to a bunch of you and it looks like a lot of districts will be moving forward this school year.  We need to all stick together and teach each other so we're not all making the same mistakes.

Don't sell your jerseys just yet

Ever since I started at Orange County Public Schools, I've heard the murmors of how we're going to sell the naming rights on uniforms of athletes and make a lot of money. 

I've gotten several calls and emails from a few other school districts asking what I've thought about this.  I have also read in the local daily newspaper that I'll be selling the football team names to retailers and candy-makers.

Well, you can't do it. 

Before you try to pass school policy or before you approach a company to put their logo on your football teams jerseys, check the local High School Athletics Association webiste in their rulebook. 

Most have a rule that states you can not put third-party logo's on any game uniforms (yet you can do warm-ups.)  Here's an example when you get in to reading about uniforms for the sport of Track & Field:

"4-3-1 UNIFORMS: Competitors may wear a one-piece (singlet) or two-piece track & field uniform issued by the school... Commercial advertising, with the exception of the manufacturer’s logo, is prohibited on all athletic uniforms."

Every sport, at least in Florida prohibits any third-party logo/name/etc. on a high school athletic uniform.