When seeking festival sponsorship, you should first establish festival needs, identify potential sponsors, and develop various sponsorship opportunities and packages that can benefit both your festival and the sponsor. Once you have done this, you can then contact potential sponsors and ask if they would be willing to provide festival sponsorship. Be prepared to negotiate with potential sponsors, as the opportunities you provide may not always meet their needs, or they may simply be unable to participate at the level that you desire. In all cases, it is important to keep good relationships with potential sponsors if you want them to continue their festival sponsorship or sponsor future events.
Festivals, whether large or small, typically require a lot of financial and practical resources. By acquiring festival sponsors, you can offset some of your costs while providing a unique advertising opportunity for local businesses and service professionals. Although you may need a significant amount of cash to run your festival, you may also find that a sponsor is willing to provide you with some pertinent items carrying the sponsor's logo so that can allow you to reduce your costs. You may also find that a sponsor is willing to provide food and beverages to your attendees. If you can take the time to figure out what would be of benefit to your attendees, you can offer suggestions to potential festival sponsors.
Once you have an idea of your needs, you can then develop sponsorship packages in which you can offer different levels of recognition to sponsors in exchange for their supplying cash, food, or other needed items. For example, you can create various tiers of recognition according to the amount of cash provided by the sponsor. Sponsors that offer a minimal level of support might be considered bronze sponsors, while those that offer a considerable amount of cash or other support may be granted the distinction of being a platinum sponsor. You should incorporate a certain amount of advertising or promotional activity into your sponsorship packages. Companies that offer sponsorship should perhaps be offered links on your website, recognition in advertising or newsletters, or permission to place brochures or other items into attendee goody bags.
When you have sponsorship ideas ready to go, start considering potential sponsors for your festival. You may wish to approach local professionals and businesses, even if their type of business does not directly coincide with the theme of your festival. On the other hand, you may wish to solicit festival sponsorship from national and local businesses that are likely to serve festival attendees. This can be particularly important if you are placing a strong emphasis on advertising opportunities for sponsors, as you are offering these sponsors access to highly motivated customers who have already decided to spend time and money attending your festival.