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Asking for sponsorship

By now you should know the targeted size of your celebration and have the first draft of your budget complete. This is an important step, because without a budget to work towards it will be hard to communicate your needs to potential sponsors and secure financial or in-kind donations. Sponsors are more willing to give if they know exactly how their donation will help your celebration and what they can expect in return for their donation.

Asking for sponsorship will vary GREATLY in different countries. Please defer to your customs and business practices and share with us examples that work well in your location.

Meanwhile, your regional directors should also be helpful to help brainstorm possible sponsors and partners.

Creating a budget

We find that successful celebrations create and maintain a budget. This document is to assist you in setting up your location’s budget and matching the budget against sponsor dollars and in-kind donations.

Regarding costs

The first step in budgeting is to determine the size of your World IA Day celebration. Some locations have well-established IA communities while other locations are just starting out. In either case, we believe successful events can be of any size and should be based on the needs and climate of your community.

Once you determine the size of your event, the next step is to determine

which costs/items are essential (necessary for the event to happen) and

which costs/items are non-essential (highly desired but not fundamental to your celebration).

You can begin to prioritize what costs should be taken care of first. A good rule of thumb for determining if a cost is essential is asking “Can I still have an event if this cost is not covered?” If the answer is “yes”, then the item is not essential.

As a general guide, we believe event venue, documenting the celebration (audio/video recordings and/or photography), and printing supplies are all important to your event. Non-essential items include lunch, a closing party, gifts for attendees or presenters.

What typically costs the most?

In previous year’s costs per location, the most expensive item has been the venue (except in the cases where the venue was free/donated).

Renting a space for a day that can accommodate 100+ people can be very expensive. If you can manage to find a venue space and get an in-kind donation for it from the owner of the space, it can greatly reduce the amount of funding you need to raise.

We often find that universities, schools, and libraries are good places to look for such in-kind donations of venue space. Big companies also will help in exchange for promotional benefits.

Below is a breakdown average for essential costs based on estimates from previous World IA Day celebrations:

Average Event Costs

The average total overall to run a World IA Day celebration was around USD 3,000 in 2016, but ranged from $600 - $9,000 depending on venue size, number of attendees, and types of expenses. In 2019, this average was a bit lower, about USD $2,200, ranging from $250 (for an event with 55 people) to $12,000 (for an event with 250 people).

We have also had organizers over the years secure in-kind sponsorship to fund their entire celebration!

Creating Your Budget

Especially for new locations or local organizers who have limited event-planning experience, figuring out an appropriate budget can sometimes be tricky.

We’ve created some budget templates that you can use to help structure your

Google Sheet:

Budget Template⁠

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Coda Table:

Budget⁠

Types of Sponsorship

Companies can help support your celebration by donating a product or service where the value is equal or close to the amount of the sponsorship levels you determine – this is called in-kind sponsorship. For example, providing the venue for your celebration is an in-kind sponsorship because the cost of renting the venue would be waived by the sponsor and the value is likely to equal a sponsorship level. Other examples are giveaways from the sponsor to your attendees, like books or pens.

A financial sponsorship, as the name indicates, is when a company or organization provides money toward your celebration. This is different from in-kind because no product or service is being provided; instead, a monetary donation is being made.

When asking for sponsorship you should clearly communicate what you will give the sponsor in return for their donation.

For example,

“We would love for our World IA Day event to be held at [location] and, in return, we will promote your company with [X number of tweets, brand recognition, insert other local sponsor benefits here].’

Find sponsors

When we design a product or service, it is important to understand our target demographic. Sponsorship is no different. Whether you are looking for a donation from an educational institution, a small business, a large corporation, or a government entity it is important to understand the needs of your target sponsors and what they value. We have provided some

personas⁠

that you are free to use to get your team thinking about different types of sponsors.

Remember, sponsorship is all about building relationships. People will appreciate the fact you took the time to better understand their organization before approaching them for a donation.

Here are a few steps to help get you started:

Make a list of organizations that will likely support World IA Day values and mission.

Many organizations have a desire to support initiatives that promote the betterment of society. It offers them a way to get recognition for being good corporate citizens who support the local community.

Start with your team and, as a group, identify organizations that you think might be willing to sponsor.

Once you have organizations identified, check out their websites and their social media feeds to learn more about how sponsorship might benefit them.

Determine who the decision-makers might be and whether you know anyone who could make an introduction.

Review similar events and take note of who sponsored.

Approach people personally, if possible. Individuals are far more likely to support our vision and be a champion within their organization. It also provides an opportunity to develop good personal and business relationships with them in the future.

Leverage existing relationships and attendee data.

If your location has hosted World IA Day in the past, leverage the relationships with previous sponsors and data from your location’s attendee list. Many times sponsors are willing to give again and they appreciate it when you ask them what you can do to improve their sponsorship experience.

Reach out to organizations whose employees attended last year. Use this data to help promote the success of your previous event and communicate how awesome your event will be this year too.

Look for grants.

Some local governments or organizations offer grants to help support community activities and economic development. Look for these opportunities in your location.

Ideas on Who to Approach

Hiring Agencies

Hiring agencies love to sponsor events so they can find good talent. These are good partnerships because you can offer services like the ideas below. This way the sponsor receives brand recognition and the attendees receive valuable advice and the local city receives a monetary donation from the hiring agency.

A portfolio review to the first X # of people who sign up

Panel from hiring agencies on how to interview and land a job

Include visual or link examples where helpful

Include sources if applicable

Educational Institutions

Because the nature of our celebration is educational, institutions are often available to provide free or discounted spaces for the day, and are likely to have a range of sizes of space available.

Partner with educational institutions that include IA and UX as part of their curriculum. Spend extra attention on looking into if any graduate programs in HCI, Library Science, Computer Science, Digital Media, Graphic Design, Data Science, and similar fields exist in your area.

Set aside a specific number of tickets for them.

Consider professors or instructors to speak or panel.

Inquire whether the venue has materials that you can reuse like whiteboards or chalkboards for sketching/designing, tables, and chairs, etc.

Offers students professional networking and learning.

Allows art school to be seen as a leader in IA space.

Partner with educational institutions that include IA and UX as part of their curriculum.

Spend extra attention on looking into if any graduate programs in HCI, Library Science, Computer Science, Digital Media, Graphic Design, and similar fields exist in your area.

Government and City Resources

Tourism Offices

Approach your local tourism office and see if they would be willing to organize and cover the hotel expenses of your out-of-town speakers.

Hack-a-thons

Lately, city hackathons have become increasingly popular. Look at your city’s governmental website and try to find a Departments or Resources page. Research what companies sponsored the hackathon and consider who on your team has an existing relationship. Typically, many companies will sponsor these kinds of events, so be diligent and research which companies are a good fit for World IA Day.

For example, here is a

story written by the City of Atlanta about a recent ‘govathon’⁠

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City Resources

A city’s Chamber of Commerce could also be a valuable resource. Look at your city’s Chamber of Commerce site and see if they have any articles or news about technology-related events or initiatives.

Consider your local library, or other government-funded public spaces, to host. Some cities that have not traditionally been thought of as ‘startup hubs’ have made great efforts to become incubators of startup activity.

Try looking at your city website and seeing if any partnerships exist between a city and an organization dedicated to encouraging start-up activities. Start-ups can be great sponsors as they are trying to build strong local relationships. This is an example of something that might exist in your city:

http://atlantatechvillage.com/⁠

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