00:00.000 — 00:02.560
Will sponsors kill my content?
00:04.680 — 02:12.830
Welcome to Ho Ho Studios, guys. I’m here with Jonathan Karl, and today we’re going to talk about the difference between sponsors and collaborators. What that all means, how much control do they have, etc.. Scary. So can we start with what is what is the sponsorship? Typically sponsorship is typically a financial transaction.
Yeah. So and it can happen in different ways but it affects your bottom line. So it’s either a cash transaction or a trade exchange where they’ve traded you something that reduces your expense. Right. But I as a podcaster and benefiting so I have a reduced cost or I have revenue coming in and the sponsor is getting my audience and advertiser.
Yeah, they’re renting the audience and that’s what they want to do. They want to reach your audience with their message. Um, and there’s a little bit of brand association with that, of course. Um, but it’s a it’s a transaction. Yeah. Okay. And a collaboration. How does that typically work? What’s the definition.
So collaboration is typically more about, uh, mutual creative um, interaction. It’s about both of the parties getting mutual benefit and having mutual say in the content that’s being created. So so for example, you would have two brands that generate content maybe separately. And one day they decide, hey, we got overlap.
Yeah, we’ve got overlap. Let’s do a joint podcast over the specific topic. We bring our audiences together. You get to talk to my audiences, you get to talk to my audience. And it can only be a good thing. Okay. And what is the primary goal for a sponsorship? What are we. So are we after there. So again, as the content creator, you’re after money or,
02:13.910 — 04:15.899
uh, increasing your net profit or whatever it is. But with trade exchange, um, the brand’s goal is to use your audience that you’ve built. Okay. Essentially, it’s the it’s sorry. It’s it’s the business model of content. You create entertaining content to attract eyeballs, and then you sell those eyeballs off to brands.
It’s advertising. Advertising. It’s our traditional. Yeah. So every of every, every sports in the world world knows it. You use, you sell a patch on your pants. Yeah. Because a brand wants to reach the millions of people watching you throw a ball around. And that’s how it works. It doesn’t mean you play the game, but it means it’s get some association with you.
Support this thing or you you’re patriotic about a team or it adds those associations to your brand, but you’re renting audiences and it’s the core of content monetization. And how does the payment typically work? Like how would you approach someone about that and discuss the money side? Um, I’ve done a lot of this sponsorship kind of thing.
So it’s it varies brand to brand. So some, some content has very set defined, uh, valuations on their audiences. So me being from a TV background, it’s really easy. We know what the advertising value of every second is during a specific slot on a specific channel at a specific time. And so they work out how much does it cost to to have the logo X amount of times on that sponsorship, and then I get a bumper and a billboard and a live read and a this and that, and everything’s got a price list and a red card.
I think with the digital side, you quantify it the same way you’ve got X amount of engagement on your content, X amount of viewership, X amount of minutes watched. You can sell
04:17.260 — 05:34.100
your audience to X brand. It’s a little bit different when we’re talking about selling sponsorships and endorsements as a human being, as a talent, that’s a different thing. And I also think it depends on the size of if we’re talking about podcasts, the size of the audience. Yes, yes. The advertising value of the audience.
Yeah. You know, so I think, you know, when it comes to how you negotiate on the brand value of your audience, you know, when it’s massive, you can utilize like the cost per Milly, um, model where you’re getting per doll or per thousand downloads or per thousand views. Um, but when your audience is very small, you may be not getting 1000 views on one episode.
Um, and so there you would have to negotiate on other kind of value. So you might say, well, you can be the sponsor for this season. Um, and then based on your performance in the future, they might then decide, okay, we’re happy with this model or no, we’re going to remunerate you differently based on the growing audience or the not growing audience.
So I think it also depends on the size of the show or the channel. Yeah. And how effective it is at
05:35.140 — 09:47.520
doing the sponsors objective. Yeah, yeah. If the sponsors objective is to move product or units, they can measure how many units they sold through your podcast. In a sense, these metrics to calculate some of that. Um, and they all want to track things like that, especially in big sponsorships, small sponsorships.
I don’t think it’s not necessary, but it’s all about what is their objective. Why do they want to sponsor your podcast. And yeah, you can go from there. And and how much interference does that sponsor have and how much involvement does the host have to have. Yeah. So good question. It’s all up to you as the creator.
So often sponsorships are exactly that. They don’t get a say in the content. They get the package you give them, which is we will give you a live read, or maybe not even that you’ll you’ll get a bug that pops up in the bottom corner of the logo or whatever it is, and you’ll get a thank you or whatever. When you when brands start wanting to influence your content.
Um, there’s a few things to consider. You’ve got to consider. do I like that interference? Do my. Will my audience like that interference? Is it authentic? You’ve got to ask yourself all those questions. And I think that’s where the slope gets slippery for creators. Is this like, oh, I’m seeing this rant value being dangled here, and all I have to do is this little thing which I maybe wouldn’t have typically done if it wasn’t for the sponsors request.
Yeah. And I think the danger is then that if it doesn’t appear authentic, it doesn’t feel natural for the channel, then your audience will feel it. Yeah. And that’s what kills content, because our audiences are really good at seeing right through. Yeah. Advertising. Yeah. Um, so but it’s up to you if it’s a really good fit and I’ve seen some really good, um, fits, but then it’s a, it’s, it starts edging into the collaboration side a little bit normally where um, the, the brands also doing something for the podcasts somewhere and there’s a mutual benefit.
Um, it’s not strictly a sponsorship. I think there’s mutual benefit in a sponsorship scenario as well as in a collaboration scenario. I just think that sometimes those relationships look a little bit different. So it’s not like one is better than the other. I certainly don’t feel like having a sponsor means you’re a sellout.
Yeah. So it’s not like that’s bad. Yeah. I think in a lot of cases without the sponsor, the show that you love, Mada, can’t exist. Yeah, exactly. So advertising funds, it’s it’s quite necessary. Yeah. What’s the relationship like with a collaborator collab. What’s that? What’s that situation? What’s the relationship between you and the collaborator?
I think it’s very different. Yeah, it is totally different. Um, and you’re going to get value more than monetary value out of a collab. It’s, I think, really focused on building audiences. Yes. I was going to say, I think the difference, the main difference for me anyway, is the way that a colab feels. It’s less about, I need you to pay me so that this can survive.
Yeah. So a colab is more like, what can we do together? Because I think your customer looks a little bit like my customer, and I think my customer looks a little bit like yours. And together, utilizing each other’s audiences, we can both grow. So it’s about the mutual benefit of us coming together. And I think it typically looks very different to the sponsorship scenario, where in a colab we’re talking about the content together, what are we creating together?
Um, and that doesn’t necessarily mean have to be 50 over 50 split exactly. Like, okay, I’m going to do this and you’re going to do that. Um, it’s it’s more about the fact that everyone knows you’ve collaborated, and it is a thing that’s built together. So how much involvement does the host of a podcast have with a collaborator?
09:48.960 — 11:10.399
More than a sponsor, I’d say. Yeah a lot. Yeah. You mentioned like almost none of the sponsor, but this is a well, I suppose it’s in the name. It’s a collaboration. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I think like sponsorship agreements, collab agreements also will look different for, for everyone. Um, I think there when you are finding another brand or another content creator to work with in a colab manner, and it really comes across like quite exciting for the viewer, and it feels like something that everyone’s in and getting energized about together.
Yeah, so it feels even different when you are watching that content versus when a content creator does a read or pauses in the in the episode for an ad break, you know, the feel for the listener is listeners, very different. I know that in that little break, that’s an advertisement happening and that is the sponsor of this episode or of this show.
Whereas with the Colab, it feels like the whole thing is gelled together and it doesn’t feel like, oh, those guys have paid for these guys. Yeah. To do those content, when you collaborate, you essentially can grow your audience, which can lead to monetization, which is a way to make money with your videos.
So
11:11.480 — 11:46.350
even though a sponsorship is a financial transaction, the collaboration does, if done well, eventually end in some kind of financial benefit. Yeah. How do you present? Yeah, there’s definitely a benefit down the line. Yeah. That’s why we have podcasts and things. You want to monetize it at some point and you want to have a career in it then.
Then you want those things to happen. Yeah. Um, and collaborations can only do good. Um, unless you do a bad collab for some unknown reason and you don’t.
11:47.910 — 12:34.310
Yeah, I’d like a collab with Bill Cosby or something. Yeah, it doesn’t make sense. Which, by the way, it wouldn’t be very sexy. It’s a really good point for sponsorships. They may not be able to tell you what to do in your content, but if you do something wrong in your content, you will lose your sponsorship.
Yes. So that is one effect on your your content. We probably didn’t mention. Well, that would probably be part of what is in an agreement with the sponsor. Um, but, you know, typically a sponsor is more risk averse than a collaborator. You know, they are probably going to come to you with certain specifications or not come to you at all as a potential sponsor if they don’t like the content of your show, if it doesn’t match their their customer in their business.
So they’ll probably have some moral clauses in there, like if you, um,
12:35.430 — 17:27.969
if you’re in bad press or something, they can pull the sponsorship and things like that, but they can’t tell you how to play your game. Yeah. Um, but they can definitely pull this sponsorship if you, if you get into nasty stuff. And I think just going back to the question about collaboration and what that looks like for the host and revenue and all of that.
I think that, you know, the the definition of a sponsor is that they are paying with rands. Um, for you to do a certain thing or for their ad slot to happen in a certain way. Whereas with the collaboration, I think it’s more about a mutual discussion and decision for there to be value in kind or a revenue split as a result of the co-creation of that content.
So, you know, I think both, um, have a room for you as a content creator to develop an agreement that matches what you need and your, um, and the needs of the other party. Um, but typically they look kind of different in their the sponsorship side of things is more transactional and the collaboration is more about that, that co-creation.
And it’s, uh, it’s more of a partnership. Yeah. Okay. And obviously getting sponsors is quite cool. Sure. How do we get them? How do we approach a sponsor? Do you do you approach them? Do they approach you? How does it solely work? It happens both ways. Yeah, there’s no rules. But the key to to getting a sponsor is to create value.
Mhm. So if you’re creating a valuable audience you will get sponsors. Um and I think that’s what we must be focused on is, is creating a valuable audience and not being too worried about it being quite niche. Yeah. You know because a lot of the sizable is good. Absolutely. Nice niche. Nice niche and sizable is the ideal, but the sizable element takes a lot longer.
Yeah. You know, being niche and sticking to that is is what I would recommend to any content creator starting out, whether it’s a podcast or something else. But that also means you’ll have niche sponsors. Sure. But I don’t think that’s necessarily less valuable. No. That’s right. You know, I don’t think a niche sponsor necessarily means less rounds.
Yeah. No, no, I totally agree. And so so once you’ve created value you then need to package that value. Mhm. Because if you don’t package value to a sponsor how do they know what the value is. Yes. Yeah. So that’s when you start creating um I mean sales propositions media kits whatever you want to call it. Yeah.
And packages. Yeah. You know, we’ve always found if you just go to a sponsor, say, please sponsor me 200,000 rand and I go, okay, but what do I get? Oh, well, we’ve got all this viewership. Yeah, but how are we going? If you’re in that point in the meeting, you’re done. Yeah. Where if you walk into a sponsorship meeting and you go, hey guys, we’ve got X audience, this is how you’re going to reach them on our podcast and you’re going to get three stings.
One call out a bug, a graphic this, a this or that mention on our website, a Patreon special. Download three Instagram posts. Sure, they’re getting a lot closer. Yeah. And all you have to do is give me 50 bucks. Salt. Yeah. That’s too much for 50 bucks. Okay. But, but but you get my point. Yeah. So you got a package.
Package your value into something that obviously you’re capable of doing and easily executing. And it’s not. You don’t have to hire another person to manage, but within reach and within reason. And always remember the brand wants ROI. They want to return on their investments and it’s not a 1 to 1 return.
They want more than 1 to 1 return. They want to 1 to 3 or 1 to 5 return on their investment. So if they’re going to give you 100,000 rands, they want 200 to 500,000 rands with of value back whatever. However, they’re going to measure their ROI. Um, and be very clear on how you’re going to measure that. It’s probably something I would tell everybody agree at the outset what success looks like, agree what success looks like for that sponsorship, so that when you go for the renewal meeting you can say, guys, look at this.
This was super Uber successful because we reached your determined goal. Um, the worst thing to go into that meeting with is his guys was super Uber
17:29.050 — 17:50.489
successful because we reached a thousand people and then they went. They go, but we didn’t sell any product to that thousand people. And then you’re dead in the water. So so ROI incredibly important as part of that package that you know what you are selling. So I think going back to your question, Rich, the
17:51.770 — 18:35.010
there’s no right or wrong, you know. Should I approach a sponsor or should I wait for them to approach me? Obviously, if they do approach you, that’s marvelous. Um, and then it’s up to you to decide whether or not that feels like a good fit. And can you negotiate something that works well for both parties?
But seeking sponsorship is something that I think a lot of people, um, avoid or don’t think they’re allowed to do for whatever reason. And like you’ve just said, Carl, if you go prepared with a lovely media kit that explains the demographic of your listenership explains the benefit of them being a sponsor on your show and give them very easy to understand package offerings.
Um,
18:36.490 — 20:00.880
you know, it could be quite, quite surprising that you might pick up a sponsor more easily than you think. So, Cole, why would a brand want to sponsor a podcast and not put an ad on TV or whatever the case? So this is right up my alley. Obviously, being the TV guy, TV is the best way to advertise. Just call us boy.
But to all seriousness, what’s what’s happened is the media landscape has completely changed. We all know that the internet has changed things. Um, so traditionally we used to have 3 or 4 channels on TV, and that’s where all the advertising money went, because all the eyeballs were watching the same three channels every night.
Now we’ve got audiences that are split between platforms, Between, um, content. Content types. It’s fractured into a million different pieces. So as a brand trying to reach a specific audience, you can’t just throw your ad on TV anymore and expect to reach that audience. You’re probably going to have to do TV.
You’re going to have to do radio. You’re going to have to do digital. You’re going to have to do podcasts. You’re going to have to do YouTube. You’re going to you have to split that budget up. And that’s the massive opportunity to say, this is this is honestly the best thing ever. I’m sorry about you TV guys.
20:02.240 — 26:48.930
But for the rest of us, you know, I think the the opportunity exists now for, um, brands that have always been struggling with what happens above the line is that you take your ad spend and you put it out in front of a million eyeballs, hoping that there is a good enough portion of those eyeballs that are going to be the right customer for you.
Okay. Now we have like, I love the way you describe that, this fractured landscape. There’s millions of different places for everyone to put their their attention. And so now as a brand, you have to go and seek out those little tiny little groups of people that are in these small little communities. And if you can advertise in those spaces, you are getting what we’ve always wanted as marketers, and that is precise audience targeting.
So that is why a brand will seek out a niche audience that a podcaster has. Okay, because now I can. And you know, you’ve brought this up in a previous episode, Rich, your, um, obsession with building, um, a trailer and a caravan and the kind of advertising that you get watching that channel is very specific to the kinds of people watching their channel.
So those advertisers aren’t stupid. They know that people watching this channel are going to be probably the kinds of people that will buy their trailer components. Yeah. And so as a podcast, you should be thinking very carefully about, um, is your topic niche? Have you got that audience there? Are they engaged?
And then you approaching the right kind of sponsor, um, will in all likelihood really yield great results and be great for both parties. It’s not like the podcaster wins and the sponsor doesn’t. It’s really a it’s a it’s a good win win scenario for both. Okay. And then we also talked about types of sponsorship.
What types of collaborators are they. Yeah. So as varied as sponsorships really and as as wide as you can be creative. But even an expert guest can be a collaborator or a collaborator. In the podcast context, yeah. Collaborations would be appearing on each other’s podcasts. Exactly. So that would be like us three going to someone else’s podcast and doing a series with them.
Mhm. Um, and it could be a podcast about maybe technical gear or something, you know, something related to us, but not, not what we deal with. Yeah. But then we could appear on theirs and then we would invite that other podcast onto our show and talk to them about what we talk about. And that could also, you know, I think with a sponsor, you typically are looking at a period that is agreed to that is sort of fixed, whereas with a collaboration it can be a colab for literally one episode, or it could be a series.
So you could say, right. For the next five episodes we are unpacking topic X and we’re bringing this wonderful expert and they will collaborate with us for those far VIPs. Yeah. So yeah, it doesn’t necessarily have to be the be all and end all for your podcast. It can be a short period. It can be a single episode.
Um, I mean, I’ve even thought about, like, let’s collaborate with an illustrator or an artist and they do our thumbnails for the next season. You know, so it can be a great idea. It was a great idea. I think we will. Illustrator. Yeah. Hook us up. You know, so I think the collaboration thing is more about, um, how can you tap into, um, another content creators audience, but in such a way that it’s mutually beneficial and, um, and exciting and and energetic.
Okay. Yeah. And I think we’ve just got to be creative with these things. We’re trying to define things now, which I think we’ve done pretty well. Job. But at the end of the day, you can be really creative with sponsorships and and collabs. Yeah, and a collab doesn’t have to be another podcaster or whatever.
It could be a collab with a brand where, um, where you’re interacting with their product in a certain way for something for some reason, whatever it is. But we can be really creative. Really? What? What’s that favorite word we like to use as marketers? Tactical can be tactical in our executions. Um, and it’s a really exciting space to be in because every brand, every brand is looking for better traction with their audience.
And I actually think the collaboration way of doing things is the trend at the moment. It’s the thing that I see having the most traction. Um, it makes the most sense. Yeah, because I’m seeing it more and more and more and more to grow across all industries. And. Yeah, and I suppose you could get a sponsored collaboration.
Oh my God, now you really are marrying the waters. Should we go to the end of the video? You started confusing me again with. But I mean sponsors as collaborators and collaborative sponsors. Yeah. So you get a financial incentive to collaborate with a big brand. It’s it’s something that big brands do. Um, but it’s, it’s more of a collaboration because you’re working together on the content.
They’re not just blanket sponsoring. Put a tag on here and they’re they’re integrated throughout the episode. There’s a mutual benefit for both of you, but they’re also incentivizing you financially. Yeah. So there is also combinations of these things. There’s no hard and fast rules. And I think what marketing managers are looking for today is those clever integrations.
Um they’re tired of sponsorship packages. Mhm. Um, although I did say go with a sponsorship package to your brand. Uh, be smart about your package. Be clever. Be innovative. Be surprising. Um. For someone that sold a lot of television sponsorship stuff. Every packaged, every brand is exactly the same.
Yeah. Um, we stop even talking about the details because you go. It’s the on air package. You know, everybody knows what that means. Um, and then they want to know the value, and then they make a decision where if you can get a brand excited about their brand being seen by an audience in a cool way or an exciting way or a whatever way, then, um, yeah.
Then I think you’re winning as a as a marketer. Mhm. Um,
26:50.010 — 27:04.410
yeah. So good luck podcasters. You also need to be marketers. Yeah. Um, if anyone is keen to collaborate with us, we are keen to have a chat. Let us know in the comments below and we’ll see you on the next episode. Cheers!
