In this conversational episode, Antoinette and Speaker B explore how nonprofit organizations can discover and secure sponsors by looking everywhere—from high‑profile events like the Super Bowl to everyday products. They discuss the disappointment of missing expected Super Bowl advertisers, note the massive costs of ad spots, and suggest ways to research and rank commercials. The hosts introduce the idea that brands facing bad publicity (e.g., Chipotle) present unique sponsorship opportunities, as nonprofits can help restore their image. They also share a practical, on‑the‑spot method: identify any brand encountered in daily life (e.g., the drink "Evolution"), reach out for sponsorship or coupons, and track these leads over a week. The episode ends with a call to listeners to compile a list of potential sponsors from their routine activities and promises a deeper dive into sponsor leads in the next session.
Chapters
Pretty good. How about you?
Oh, pretty good, pretty good, pretty good. I'm still away from my home base, but I'm doing good. Missing home a little bit, but I'm doing good.
Well, today we're going to be talking about, um, when you said home base, I don't even know why, uh, it made me think about our topic today of where to find sponsors. Like, sponsors are everywhere. And I remember one of the organizations I worked with, we we had a golf event and we had sponsors sponsor each hole. So when you said home base, I think I was like, hey, I guess the sponsor could sponsor home base too.
That definitely goes along with our theme. Yeah, for the quarter of sponsorship. Yes. And you know, yeah, I get a lot of people asking me, well, how do I find sponsors, right? And I'm like, how do you find sponsors? Sponsors? I said, that's a doggone good question. You know, sponsors are everywhere. And so I was thinking, you know, I love it because like this past Sunday, um, was Super Bowl, right? And I was thinking, okay, let's see how many sponsors can we identify at the Super Bowl game.
Yeah, well, you know, the sad thing is, uh, there are certain sponsors you always expect to see, so I was a little disappointed not to see some of the ones that I'm used to seeing. You know, like, I don't remember a Coca-Cola ad. I don't remember a Coke— a Pepsi ad, even though I'm not, you know, into Pepsi. But, you know, usually there's a Coke and Pepsi, you know, like they'll even do one together. Um, I don't remember a Budweiser. I saw a Bud Light, but I don't remember Budweiser. So, um, I think an event like the Super Bowl does help you to sit down and realize— I mean, because, you know, for me, I go for the commercials, you know, and for the little, um, pizza rolls. But, you know, you go to the party for the commercials and, and the food, you know. Um, but this year I thought it was very interesting that, um, one, the commercials were not all that great. Okay, um, like not as memorable as I remember in the past. Uh, there was one commercial where we were all like, okay, that was a great commercial, but I can't tell you what it was.
Oh, and you know what's funny is that the people they sponsor, that those are sponsored, and they're paying millions to be seen and no one remembers it.
Yeah, I, I heard Yesterday that they paid upwards of $20 million for— and you know, it's just like everything, you know, like, okay, you got your first spots, you know, and then you got your prime spots in the middle of the game, and then you got your halftime spots, and then you have your times at the end, you know, toward the last half of the game, and then you have your, your spots at the end of the game. And, um, I don't remember. I'm, I'm gonna have to go back and watch, um, you know, like Super Bowl commercials. Then, you know, they always like rank them so that I can tell you what Super Bowl commercial it was that we were all at. And it was that toward the end, and we were like, that was good.
So that's interesting. I've never heard of that. So you, so you can go and they rank the Super Bowl, uh, commercials. So where would you find it? Would you find that on YouTube? Where would you— it's on the internet and Google it?
Yeah, okay, you could do one of, one of each. And also a lot of ESPN and NFL, you know, sports, the day after, they're also— those commentators, I mean, they can't talk too much, you know, like they could go on and on about the very same things, but to add a little bit of variety, they will also go in and talk about the different commercials, and they'll tell you what their favorite commercial was too. Oh my goodness.
Uh-huh. And I would say, oh my goodness. Now for me, I didn't even— I didn't really watch the Super Bowl. It was on. I'm not really a sports fan, but it was on, and I was trying to watch for the commercial, but I was busy working in the meantime, so I missed all of— I think I might have seen the M&M commercial, but I don't know if that was regular TV after the Super Bowl or was it the Super Bowl.
Well, if it happened anytime after 6 5 PM on Fox News— I mean, on channel— well, after— actually, I'll say if it happened anytime after 5 PM on Fox, it was Super Bowl.
Okay. Okay.
And all— and I'm even thinking it probably goes all the way up until— I think they actually had a show, like a, a regular TV show, come on after the Super Bowl. So up until that show starts, all of those are Super Bowl commercials, I would think. Yes. But you know, um, you and I had a little conversation about this, and, uh, a good friend of mine, she always says, um, there's no such thing as bad publicity. And I thought it was very interesting because more than anything this year a lot of the commercials seem to drum up controversy. So more than, you know, we said, oh, that was a good commercial, that was a bad commercial, I've heard more about, you know, some of the inappropriateness of some of the commercials, or, you know, just people making comments, uh, about some of the commercials. And, um, and you had a very interesting take, so Will you share that?
Right, yes. So we're talking about the bad publicity, and that when the bad publicity is also an opportunity for nonprofits in a way, right? So say for instance, I'm just going to bring this up, Chipotle. I am so sorry, forgive me for this, but remember back a while back Chipotle had— was getting a bad rap because people were getting sick at different locations with Chipotle, and they would get the bad rap. So as a nonprofit, I'd be like, hmm, now we know Chipotle is good, and so, but I would go to them and say, hey, we're having this event, would you like to come and bring your food and, and sponsor our event? Right? And they would come and they would do samplings, or they would just sponsor the whole event and feed everybody, right? So now they're getting better publicity because they're aligning with the nonprofit. They're out in the community, people are tasting their food, they're saying, well, no, Chipotle's food really isn't bad, they got this, they had this bad time right now.
Yeah.
And so bad publicity, I would— when I see people have bad publicity, I'm like, okay, because we know they could be a good company, they want to get back into the graces of the community, of the people align with the nonprofit.
Yeah, that's a good point. When you said that, I thought like, wow, that is a very good point. Uh, and we know that there are plenty of organizations that go through periods of bad publicity and would probably welcome— so that's why as a nonprofit we have to keep our eyes and ears open so we'll know. Yeah.
Oh, you said that— it just— I'm sorry, when you said that just triggered something to me. And because everybody goes through a bad time, even our nonprofits go through a bad time. And sometimes we're going through a bad time, we may want to align ourselves with something that when we're doing our event, like, oh, what's good right now? Hershey's or whatever, you know, to make it have good grace, find something in the community to help turn us around. So I think it's always a win-win situation.
Yeah, I love it. And also, this is just an aside What you're saying too, to me, is don't count anyone out, you know, offer everyone the same opportunity, and that's the opportunity to help you help your community. So offer them all the same opportunity. But you also said something else that I think everyone should hear, um, about your drink.
Oh yeah, so, so we answered that when I was talking about, okay, so where do we find sponsors? And for me, and we're going to elaborate more on this next week because our time is almost up, But we talk about where do you find sponsors, and I was like, girl, sponsor everywhere. I said, like, for instance, what this drink I'm drinking, it's called Evolution. So if I was having an event, I would be like, hmm, let me contact Evolution. I'm gonna look on the back of this, where's Evolution at? I'm gonna contact them and say, you know what, I love your drink. Let me make sure, let me test to make sure. This is a new drink, right? Let me test to make sure. I say, make sure you really like it, right? Okay, this is doable. I like the ingredients. I'm gonna contact and let— contact them, let them know I love their drinks, I'm having an event, would they be interested in sponsoring? If they can't do a full sponsor, can you give us coupons so we can keep on their drink? If they can't show up and they can't give money, ask them for coupons. Okay, yeah, so people can get free drinks. There's so many different things that you can do, and so it still shows that they're sponsoring you. So you can find sponsors everywhere. And this was just one of them. What do you— what's your drink today? Take that, whatever you're drinking today, write down the company as one of your leads.
Yeah.
And then follow up to turn them into a prospect. And that's our tip of the day. I had a hair in my eye. Okay, so that's it. So sponsors are everywhere. So we'll talk a little bit more about sponsors are everywhere, um, next week. But I'm going to encourage you all 2, over the next week is just start identifying leads so we can turn them into sponsors. Whatever you're doing during the week, whether you're eating, whatever you're drinking, whatever you're driving, write it down and we'll talk about some of those next week. All right, thank you. The Super Bowl was great. I want to— I want to hear some more about the Super Bowl. So Antoinette, you could look at some more videos and maybe we could look at some more commercials. Because another tip real quick, I'm gonna give this little tip, you know, I always got a tip. Another thing which is good is that, again, keep in mind Everyone that was at that Super Bowl, they are looking for marketing opportunities. When nonprofits are doing events, that's a marketing opportunity for potential sponsors. So you have to figure out what it is that you have to offer them. They're going to spend their money somewhere. So instead of spending millions and millions of dollars, they got a lot of impressions, but nonprofits can make sure they have a long-lasting impression. All right, so we'll talk about that too more next week. We'll see you later. Thanks, Antoinette. I love you. Love to everybody.
