I failed my first sponsorship call

Finally reached 800+ subscribers. Feels the right time to actually make some money.

I started from the obvious place: my own list. I filtered out the personal addresses, did a bit of research on each, and started sending warm personalized emails.

I've received some replies. One of them felt promising.

A local B&B owner. She also did aesthetic treatments and ran events. She replied positively and we jumped on a call.

I love talking to local business owners. So we talked for like 30 minutes. I asked about her business, I was genuinely excited to learn more about it.

Once we finally got to the sponsorship, things went a bit south.

I entered the call with a proposal in my head: 200 euros, 4 or 5 editions as main sponsor. I did a bit of research via Perplexity, it seemed a legit price. So that's what I pitched.

Turns out, it was too expensive. She was mainly interested in promoting her events, but 200 euros upfront with her current pricing and margins did not work out. I tried to move the conversation to awareness and LTV, but she was not really convinced. Therefore we politely wrapped it up.

I got off the phone and I needed to cool down. I was kind of upset. I had hopes on this call, invested quite some time, and did not close it as I expected.

After a good walk, I realized I never asked two things: her goal, and her budget.

The budget part is obvious. You can have some guiding lines, but there's no universal price. Some businesses can spend €300 because their margins support it. Others can barely stretch to €50. Walking in with a fixed number and no idea which world you're in is just setting yourself up to either underprice or lose the deal entirely. I lost the deal.

The goal part mattered just as much. She mentioned events several times during our conversation. If I'd caught that properly, I could have built something around it. Highlight her upcoming event in the Friday edition for example. Instead I handed her a one-size-fits-all package that didn't fit her at all.

Next time: ask the budget. Deeply understand the goal. Think it out loud with the lead. Then make the proposal.

I walked out with zero. Probably could have walked out with something more if I would have done that.

Well...another day, another lesson learned.

Keep shipping,
Michele