Congratulations!

You have decided to pursue a career in skydiving as an individual athlete or part of a team. You have objectively assessed the value you offer and believe it to be of note. You also understand the transactional nature of what a sponsorship agreement means and are prepared to take on the responsibility. Here is a quick checklist of real-world things to get right, that might otherwise trip you up before you have even gotten started:

Contact Details: Get an email address that makes you sound like an adult. Using the one you got when you were learning to skydive like freeflysexypants1985@aol.com will get you nowhere fast as it projects that you don’t fully understand the system with which you are trying to engage. It is the equivalent of the band you were in at college with a terrible name that was never going to get you famous. Three white rappers from New York called The Young Aborigines was not going to work. The Beastie Boys was way better.

Something like jasper@toratora.nl demonstrates what is needed at the top of communications, plus includes both the team he is in and where they are from. If a company has several hundred sponsored athletes, this helps. 

A Place To Call Home:

Build a specific location on the internet where interested parties can learn who you are and what you do. It does not need to be a bonanza of grandiose web design, but it does need to exist. The basic athlete profile with a picture of your face and a little bit of history seems boilerplate and kind of dull in ten-second video world, but is highly conspicuous in its absence. If a potential sponsor contacts you and asks for directions to this and you reply with “Just have a look around our social media.” your application will very likely go no further because they already did that and are not interested in trying to Sherlock Holmes your life into a coherent, communicable form.   

Speaking of Social Media:

Posting things on various social media channels is like watering the plants in your garden – an essential part of having a nice garden, but utterly pointless if you don’t have any plants in it to water. Medailing in a competition is like planting something nice (or even entering and completing one with dignity and purpose). Running a course or camp is planting something nice too, as is organising at an event. Writing an article to share or making a boogie video is planting something also. Plant quality things and then water them. Plant some more. Pick a different analogy if you want, but don’t believe that your Instagram is going to be enough all by itself.  

Matchy Matchy:

Spending some time and effort to consider and align how you present yourself or your team can elevate you above the pack. Unless you grew up posh this will likely not be a head-to-toe affair until later, but something as simple as some photos wearing matching t-shirts in front of a wind blade or dropzone sign can be worth more than you think. In a world of never-ending streams of stuff happening, it is surprising how often you will return to a simple set of nice team pictures taken with good light by a proper camera. Cool kid fun jumpers will tease you about being wannabes with your matching shoes and such but just ignore them. Small forward steps in this area demonstrate intentionality of purpose and a good grasp of the process.

The Gambit:

If you have found a bit of success – maybe a nice shiny medal – steer well clear of approaching a sponsor to say that you wish to be sponsored and if not you will go to the competition. A company representative will smile-kill you in five seconds for this as it is a huge red flag indicating that your motivations lie in the wrong place. Sponsorships are foundationally about trust – earning it, developing it, and passing it on. Trying this on signifies a misunderstanding of how important this trust is, especially later as things grow and become more complex with higher associated stakes. 

Results:

Popular manufacturers get a lot of sponsorship applications. The process varies – you might have to fill out and submit a form online, craft a series of nice emails, or impress someone in a bar at a boogie. Whatever the method of delivery, present realistic goals upon which you can deliver. A huge percentage of applications promise the earth, and the road is littered with the bones of these promises. You don’t need to offer a litany of towering achievements, you just need to deliver realistically with a bit of purpose and consistency.

Get Out In Front:

Popular manufacturers support many teams and athletes. It can be difficult for the person dealing with all the admin to recall everyone’s recent activity and achievements.  Application of the steps above helps with climbing the internal rankings of an athlete stable to a place of friendly familiarity (this is goals), but should it require a search within an email server then try to have the most recent communication be you offering something rather than asking. The ideal result is a mutually beneficial give and take. Take care of the give and when you need to request something you will probably receive a yes. 

Don’t Blag:

It might seem like a good idea to start adding a desirable brand identity to your process as a sign of positive intentionality. Sticking the logo of a company on your stuff is free advertising right? Nothing to lose. The stakes of doing this are not huge, but also not correct. A company may be ambivalent about you doing so, but more likely it will lean negative. A manufacturer wants to see your action first, not their logo on your activity before offering you the first step of a relationship. Again, a wonky understanding of trust.

What Joely Thinks:

This stuff is based on my personal experience operating on both sides of the fence. Taking our sponsorship obligations as a skydiving team seriously ultimately led to a level of trust and support that allowed me to build a career behind the scenes in our sport. We found success with sponsorships by trying to offer more than we asked for, but crucially when we did ask it came with an easy way for a supporter to say no – that if it was not the right time we would carry on, do some more on our end, and catch up down the road a little. Presenting the idea that we were simply happy to be involved (we were) made us popular to interact with and easy to agree to for support requests.