“Anyone who lives within their means suffers

from a lack of imagination.”

– OSCAR WILDE

Paid advertising has generated sales for many years. It’s been television, radio, newspapers, magazines, movie theaters, billboards, buses, plastic-wrapped coupons, online, skywriting – you name it.

Each costs Money, frequently a lot of it.

Then there’s the publicity and editorial route to reach and attract potential buyers. Interviews at different times of day and night, voice, video, print, speaking on podcasts or at summits. This takes time and sometimes money, once the audience is identified and which media they prefer.

Social media tests your skill in search engine optimization or buying services from someone who knows and loves writing copy that attracts people you want to reach. 

Then there’s trade show booths for reaching the public one way or another. Worthwhile trade shows put substantial prices on the smallest booths, without promise of positive results for your business from attendees.

Then what’s a good business direction to go, whether you have money to spend or not?

Frequently you hear about sponsorships from a company or other organization donating money to cover the costs of what they deem a worthwhile cause. Numerous individuals and groups benefit from those transactions. It takes time, patience, and knowledge to craft a sponsorship proposal to those organizations. Once done, the proposal takes a journey through the bureaucracy maze taking months, still possibly landing at “no.” Not the most fun experience after all that, is it?

There are other ways, Now that you’ve seen less appealing approaches, how about this?

Rather than corporate sponsorship, an easier, faster, mutually beneficial path is PRIVATE donor sponsorship! Before getting concerned about damaging personal friendships and Relationships, take a breath. Rest assured no humans have been harmed by this approach. Actually, the opposite. 

Many people donate annually to nonprofit organizations for various reasons. The nonprofit’s mission may be important to the donor for their own reasons. The donor might also need tax-deductible donations to lower their tax bill to Uncle Sam. Many times these individual donors are the primary or only decision maker. When provided an opportunity to donate to something that matters to them, they can say “yes,” “no,” or “wait until after the first of the year” since they made the donations they want or need to make in the current year. 

Two examples of this approach’s success offer concrete ways this can work.

COVID and a Children’s Book

During early COVID, many corporate decision-makers went into hyper-cautious mode. A children’s book author planned to start a bulk sales campaign to relevant manufacturers. As months went by, the author and her advisor wondered what to do. The book’s story was about a sad little girl moving away with her parents, leaving her best friend, a tree at the end of her driveway. Thinking about that story line of this beautifully produced book, the book advisor realized military families move a lot. Their children would relate to the story. The book advisor knew someone learning to best use money left by her late husband. One way was  tax deductible donations lowering her tax bill. The book advisor contacted her friend to explore her interest in donating to the book’s distribution through two highly rated nonprofit charities whose mission was supporting military families. On the spot, the friend enthusiastically said “yes, would $5,000 help?”  $5,000 certainly did help send 500 books and the shipping cost through these nonprofits. The friend got the tax-deduction, the author made money on the sale, the military families received a helpful gift for their children, and the book advisor received a small agreed-up amount for facilitating the entire thing. This HELPED a lot of people! Notice the different experience than selling directly to the military?

Business Training for Disabled Veterans

A brilliant, personable IT guy, a disabled veteran himself, was recovering from personal challenges that negatively impacted his business. He was used to buying current software, gadgets, systems, or bright shiny objects. He never bottomed out before. He believed money could fix almost anything. Now the money was gone. His creative skills were flatlined. He visited a popular nonprofit’s website whose mission is helping veterans establish their own business. He saw several well known corporate sponsors. His reaction was to become a sponsor. The question was posed: “How do you plan to do that? You NEED money: you don’t HAVE money.” 

He remembered knowing someone like the earlier story’s donor. He contacted that person to explore their interest in sponsoring a workshop the IT guy would deliver, with the workshop fee covered by this donor. The donor immediately said yes. The nonprofit got the workshop teaching their people to run their own business. The IT guy had his $15,000 workshop fee paid by the donor. The donor got a tax deduction. Many were helped, again. What a difference than asking the nonprofit to pay for the workshop!

How creative are you in finding ways to help more people and make more money doing so?

© 2024, Paulette Ensign – All Rights Reserved

Paulette Ensign The Tips Products Strategist

Paulette is the Founder and The Tips Content Strategist at Tips Products International (the parent company of the wholly-owned subsidiary, Tips Products Publishing Agency.) Paulette has over forty years’ experience with small and mid-size business owners, corporations, and professional associations in numerous industries, worldwide. She and her team look forward to traveling part of your journey with you and serving you as she happily and proudly continues to defy getting old while getting older.