Podcasting Q&A

Podcast Sponsorships: How to create the perfect pitch

May 17, 2021 Buzzsprout
Podcasting Q&A
Podcast Sponsorships: How to create the perfect pitch
Show Notes Transcript Chapter Markers

Jacqui from the Sew Mindful podcast asks, "What's the best approach for pitching potential sponsors?"

TL;DR
Putting together a thorough sponsorship proposal helps you make an amazing first impression with potential sponsors. So what makes a good first impression?

In this episode, we're going to discuss the steps to putting together a solid proposal that potential sponsors simply cannot refuse.

Learn more about Podcorn and how it can help you monetize your podcast with brand sponsorships.

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Gilon:

In today's episode, we're going to be diving into what makes a great sponsorship proposal. Welcome to Podcasting Q&A, where you learn the best tips and strategies to launch grow and monetize your show. This week's question comes from Jackie. Hi,

Jacqui:

my name is Jacqui of the Sew Mindful podcast. I love Buzzsprout. And the fact that you have this great q&a feature. So my question is, do you have any tips on what makes a great proposal when pitching to monetize your podcast through advertising or sponsorship, I'd love to get started. But I'm not quite sure about the best way to construct an appealing proposal. Any tips appreciated? Thank you.

Gilon:

Thank you so much for your question, Jackie. So when it comes to monetizing your podcast, putting together a sponsorship proposal is really the first chance you get to make an amazing first impression with potential sponsors. So what makes a good first impression? In this episode, we're going to discuss the steps to putting together a solid proposal that potential sponsors simply cannot refuse. First things first, you're going to want to make sure that you do your research so that you find a company that's a good fit for your platform. What do I mean by that? It takes you being attuned to your audience, what are their needs, what are their wants, what are their desires, then take that information and go looking for companies that provide that product or service. That way you're providing an experience that's mutually beneficial for everyone, you're finding products that your audience would be interested in, you're providing opportunities for a company to have exposure to your audience, and you yourself are able to house this experience for everyone and therefore adding value for all parties involved. A pitch can be as simple or as elaborate as you want it to be. But it has to have some fundamental pieces. First, the name of your podcast. Bonus points. If you include the cover art, visuals are always a nice touch. From there, you're going to want to have like an about me section. Right? So what's the name of your podcast? What are the hosts names? What season Are you in? What type of podcast is it? What's your subject matter? those sort of basic identifiers. From there, you're going to want to provide some information about your audience demographic. So average number of downloads, where your audience listeners are listening from their location, age, and then gender. For the most part, you can find information about your average number of downloads, as well as the locations that people are listening from on your podcasting hosting site. But a little bit of a hack. If your podcast is listed with Spotify, you can also go to your podcast dashboard on Spotify to find out information about the age and gender of your listeners. Next, you're going to want to include some kind of social proof, right? So this could be reviews, emails, tweets event, essentially anything nice that your listeners have said about your podcast would be impactful and should be included in your proposal from their contact information. So how can a potential sponsor get in touch with you phone numbers, emails for you or your team, you can also provide a little bit of bio if that would be helpful. Now, pricing, a lot of us are a little bit kind of on the fence about how to price ourselves, we reached out to Agnes the co founder of pod corn to provide some insight into what a good number would be. That would be profitable, as well as comfortable for you

Agnes:

for hosted ads, whether it's like pre roll or mid roll, we see a range between 15 to$30. CPM. But when you're doing stuff that's more native, like an interview, or a product overview, or having a guest that's really, you know, maybe perhaps like you're not an expert in the brands field, but your guest is an expert, and they're a big influencer. So like that puts a premium on on your fee. So for that, when things are more integrated, and a little bit more longer form, we see creators take anywhere between 25 to a $50. CPM, or, you know, if you're smaller and you're under 1000 downloads, then I really recommend working off of like a flat rate. So just decide like maybe, you know, for$100 you will do the interview and like you charge more on the creative and your expertise in the field and sort of justify it that way. Or Or perhaps you could charge a bigger fee and just sort of do a package of like, Oh, I'm gonna give you five host read ads, one interview, and just figure out what what a flat rate fee might be for that for the content. Don't be afraid to think outside of the box and lead with the creative not with like your resume and your profile. Because I think like brands are hiring you for content. They're hiring you because they want to reach your audience. So I think like sharing as much as you can about that sharing, whether it's demographics or whether like what your episodes are about or like what episode you're thinking you might put the brands in just really thinking through that. I think a lot of creators that also get hired on popcorn are really creative and they already like pre create the after the bread. So they do like an audio proposal and they'll literally like create the the integration for them. And so you could see like, what they've done the research on the brand. They're super passionate. It's like an already made ad so all the brand has to do is like approve and hire and done. So so I think like the more you could just be creative and passionate, the more chances you'll have to get hired.

Gilon:

Now that we've talked about the pieces of your pitch, let's talk about composing this email that you're going to send to potential sponsors. So you want to start off by introducing yourself. Hi, my name is I'm the host of X y&z podcast. Your company has this amazing product or service that I think would be an awesome fit for my audience. And we're interested in partnering from there give information about your podcast. So my podcast is in its fifth season, it's about true crime, my audience, amazing 25 to 45 year olds listening to my episodes that are about 30 minutes long on true crime, they're highly engaging, I think it would be so worth your time to get in front of them with an ad. From there, you want to say, Hey, I love your product and service. Thank you for your time. If you have any questions, please feel free to let me know. That's the way that you kind of start off with a pitch and granted this is not a science, there's no formula, you're going to find your own way to figure out your pitch and what works for you. But this is a great way to start. These are the bare bones to begin with. And from there, all that's left to do is hit send.

Sarah:

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Intro
"How do you pitch sponsors?"
The right fit
The pitch
How to price your podcast
The email