Clarification of Answer by
guillermo-ga
on
15 Oct 2005 23:26 PDT
Hello Supermagicbk-ga,
Well, my news are not great, but I hope you'll have some help from them though.
Please let me address each part of your request for clarification:
>> "Have you contacted these companies to see if they would recruit
sponsors for the HOOPS camp?"
No, I hadn't (at the time you asked), because I thought it wouldn't be
appropriate and/or useful, as I confirmed later, since they would only
provide that information directly to the interested parties.
Also, and in a wider sense, by contacting other companies and
associations, I confirmed that no one would discuss the terms of
payment by telephone, at least with someone who doesn't belong to the
interested organization.
>> "The second question is: if these companies will recruit
sponsorship- most of these companies ONLY help recruit donations. The
difference being donations are requested based on charity whereas
sponsorship is a business deal where the company receives something in
return (usually exposure) and is not charitable. The companies you
listed only recruit donations; this is also the reason they don?t work
on commission, as it is unethical."
At least three of the companies I listed explicitly state in their
websites that they work on sponsorship funding, as most fundraisers
do. (Have in account that I found those companies by googling the
terms "sponsorship agencies"). Please let me elaborate a bit on this.
There are several fundraising strategies, one of them being
sponsorship, which differs from donation precisely in the aspect you
pointed out --the sponsor receives something in return, typically
exposure. When fundraising by this and other strategies --e.g.
merchandising, brand alliances, etc.-- the deal between a nonprofit
and a for-profit company works similarly to regular commercial deals
between two businesses. However, there are particularities mainly
related with the ethical aspects --such as transparency, destination
of the benefits, etc.-- which derive from the nonprofit condition of
one party. So, while not being strictly charitable the method, the
purpose is still so, because it is a nonprofit cause, and that would
still fall into the principle of not engaging in a commission-based
agreement. Then my guess is that it wont be the likeliest to find a
serious company who would accept such an agreement with a nonprofit,
regardless of the method.
That said, however, I didn't take that for granted, so continued my
search with a different focus, trying to avoid the typical fundraising
approach. So I tried different search strategies:
"marketing agencies" site:.ca
(://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&newwindow=1&safe=off&rls=GGLG%2CGGLG%3A2005-38%2CGGLG%3Aen&q=%22marketing+agencies%22+site%3A.ca&btnG=Search
)
"marketing agencies" sports site:.ca
(://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&newwindow=1&safe=off&rls=GGLG%2CGGLG%3A2005-38%2CGGLG%3Aen&q=%22marketing+agencies%22+sports+site%3A.ca
)
"marketing agencies" toronto sponsorship sports site:.ca
(://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&newwindow=1&safe=off&rls=GGLG%2CGGLG%3A2005-38%2CGGLG%3Aen&q=%22marketing+agencies%22+toronto+sponsorship+sports+site%3A.ca
)
"marketing agencies" toronto sports
(://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&newwindow=1&safe=off&rls=GGLG%2CGGLG%3A2005-38%2CGGLG%3Aen&q=%22marketing+agencies%22+toronto+sports
)
"marketing agencies" toronto sports site:.ca
(://www.google.com/search?num=100&hl=en&lr=&newwindow=1&safe=off&rls=GGLG%2CGGLG%3A2005-38%2CGGLG%3Aen&q=%22marketing+agencies%22+toronto+sports+site%3A.ca
)
Now, what did I take out from these searches?
The result that I figured would be of most help was the CMA website --
Canadian Marketing Association (http://www.the-cma.org/ ), specially
their very complete Online Membership Directory
(http://cma.naylornetwork.com/wbs/cont_edit.asp ). Now, only in
Ontario, it counts about 500 entries. However, you can search by four
different criteria: Products and Services, Geographical Region,
Company and Contact. Only the first and second were useful for our
purpose. The geographical region had the disadvantage of a too large
number, and that it wouldn't include a category for a city level but
only a province level, thus quite unapproachable. So I tried the
products and services criterion, but here the difficulty was to find
the category that would fit --there wasn't a "sponsorship agencies"
one. I figured that the closest would be "marketing/communications
agency/consultant". By checking their services I picked up a few that
seemed they might be in the lines of work we needed, as a sample to
probe. But the results were not satisfactory --either they wouldn't
work in sponsorship search, or wouldn't provide the information unless
a member of the organization made direct contact. Particularly the
critical question -the commission based deal- was always politely
declined. In some cases, I couldn't get further than a voice mailbox.
These were the companies I made (or tried to make) direct contact to:
>>Arnold Brand Response
(http://cma.naylornetwork.com/dol/member_results_info.asp?byg=903&ad=4&key=Marketing/Communications%20Agency/Consultant
)
1920 Yonge Street, 6th Floor
Toronto, ON M4S 3E4
Phone: (416) 487-9393
Fax: (416) 487-4668
Website: www.arnoldbrandresponse.com
>> Beakbane
(http://cma.naylornetwork.com/dol/member_results_info.asp?byg=42348&ad=4&key=Marketing/Communications%20Agency/Consultant
)
130 Bridgeland Avenue, Suite 101
Toronto, ON M6A 1Z4
Phone: (416) 787-4900
Fax: (416) 787-9665
Website: www.beakbane.com
>> Barefoot Creative Inc.
(http://cma.naylornetwork.com/dol/member_results_info.asp?byg=46680&ad=4&key=Marketing/Communications%20Agency/Consultant
)
236 Victoria Street North, Unit 3A
Kitchener, ON N2H 5C8
Phone: (519) 571-5058
Fax: (519) 571-5059
Toll Free: (877) 571-5058
Website: www.barefootcreative.com
>> Youthography
(http://cma.naylornetwork.com/dol/member_results_info.asp?byg=481237&ad=4&key=Marketing/Communications%20Agency/Consultant
)
205 Richmond Street West, Suite 500
Toronto, ON M5V 1V3
Phone: (416) 204-1256
Fax: (416) 204-1257
Website: www.youthography.com
>> Base Consulting and Management Inc.
(http://cma.naylornetwork.com/dol/member_results_info.asp?byg=40107&ad=86&key=Other
)
250 Consumers Road, Suite 301
Toronto, ON M2J 4V6
Phone: (416) 494-1440
Fax: (416) 495-8723
Website: www.baseconsulting.ca
This sample probe made me realize that hitting the nail in this way
would be a matter of odds, and not very favorable. So I thought of
contacting the CMA itself. There I received two valuable informations:
first, that they couldn't tell whether the kind of agreement I was
looking for (commission-based sponsorship recruitment for a Raptorball
Hoops Camp) is an existing practice or not --that was a subject to be
discussed by the interested parties directly-- but it didn't close the
possibility "a priori". Second, they told me that the type of
organization I wanted to find was a "sports management company". The
contact information for the CMA is:
Canadian Marketing Association
1 Concorde Gate, Suite 607
Don Mills, ON M3C 3N6
Tel: 416-391-2362
Fax: 416-441-4062
E-mail: info@the-cma.org
Mon: Fri: 8:30 a.m.: 5:00 p.m.
Unfortunately, they have not such a category in their database, so I
googled the phrases such as "sports management agencies", "sports
management companies", "sports management", and eventually came across
with two very promising links, which wouldn't provide the information
in an immediate way, but that you might consider as a possibility to
search further. I'm talking about two directories for the industry
which are fee-based --within a reasonable range:
The "All-Sports-Agents-Directory.Com"
(http://www.all-sports-agents-directory.com/join.asp ), for $59.95,
and the "AllSportsDirectory.net"
(http://www.allsportsdirectory.net/join.asp ) for $49.95.
It seems apparent at this point that the information we've been
searching for was elusive because it is not available for free. To be
honest, I can't guarantee that what you're looking for will be in
those directories, but I do believe that it is worth the try. Also,
for what I said in the beginning of this clarification, you should
consider the possibility that what you're looking for may not exist.
I don't think I can help you any further. While your question could
not be answered in its original terms, I hope you find the information
provided as a useful orientation for your search. Please let me know
your thoughts.
Sincerely,
Guillermo
