Mar 09, 2013

Sponsorship Plan

Welcome!

We appreciate you taking time to consider sponsoring SQLSaturday Exeter #194 and we’ve put together some information that will tell you about our plans for the event and show you how your company will benefit from sponsoring our event.

Event Overview

SQL Saturday Exeter is a 2-day event running on 8th and 9th March 2013. The Friday pre-con sessions are covered by an alternate sponsorship plan. The Saturday will have 4 tracks providing 28 sessions to attendees covering all areas of SQL Server. Sessions are being submitted from SQL Server experts from all over the world and are attracting a lot of interest from potential attendees - we have over 60 delegates already registered. Sessions have been submitted by almost 25 different speakers who range all the way from SQL Server MCAs, MVPs and recognised SQL Server experts to people who are going to take their first step at becoming a SQL Server community speaker in our Lightning Talks session.

We are working hard to make our event a great experience for everyone, especially the sponsors that enable us to cover the working costs of this event. We’re expecting 120+ attendees at SQLSaturday Exeter which will make it the largest and best SQL Server conference to ever be held in the South West.

How Much Does It Cost To Be a Sponsor?

Sponsorship ranges from £50 to £2000 depending on the package you select, and we’re always willing to discuss custom options to meet your needs.

Item	Community Supporter	Bronze	Silver	Gold	Premium
Maximum available	No limit	No limit	3	3	1
Cost	£50	£150	£400	£750	£2000
Name to be listed in official event guide sponsor directory1	X	X	X	X	X
May donate prizes for end of day raffle2	X	X	X	X	X
Sponsor logo on the event guide sponsor page	X	X	X	X	X
Provide a leaflet in the swag bag		X	X	X	X
Logo placement on the Sposor page on the SQL Saturday website		X	X	X	X
Company contact information in the Event Guide		X	X	X	X
Logo on the SQL South West website3		X	X	X	X
Provide an item in the swag bag			X	X	X
Space in the exhibitor area for a table and two chairs.			X	X
Electronic copy of the registrants details for marketing purposes4			X	X	X
2 seats provided at the Friday night speakers and sponsors meal			X	X	X
Company name on all emails and materials sent to delegates				X	X
May include marketing item(e.g. flash drive, DVD etc) in swag bag				X	X
Whole page advert in event guide				X	X
Option to have 30 minute lunch time sponsor session				X	X
Dedicated content in email from SQL Saturday to all registered attendees after the event.				X	X
Small pop-up stand with sponsors logo and chosen message beside hot drinks facilities				X	X
Sponsor logo on SQL Saturday helper shirts					X
Sponsor logo on SQL Saturday speaker shirts					X
Use of space in event registration area outside exhibitor hall5					X
Dedicated full sponsor-provided content on SQL South West website6					X
Acknowledgement as sponsors of lunchtime refreshments.					X
Sponsors logo on swag bag					X

Additional sponsorship opportunities	Cost	Description
Speaker and Sponsors Meal	TBC	On Friday evening, as a thank you for their support we are having a Speaker and Sponsor meal in the centre of Exeter and at the end of the event there will be an option for all attendees to have a pint of local beer and a Cornish Pasty. If any sponsors would like to take up any contribution to either of these items then we would be pleased to discuss terms where their support is clearly promoted.
After event refreshments	TBC

1. Listing will be on a single page with sponsors in descending package order.
2. Prize value to minimum of £30.
3. Logos go on the site from within 7 days of date that sponsorship payment is received and will remain there until 16th September 2013
4. Those registrants that have agreed to share their details with sponsors.
5. Space is approx 5m long against a wall with the optional use of a wall mounted LCD screen with rotating powerpoint presentation. Prime Sponsor will have this space on Saturday, pre-con sponsor will have this space on Friday
6. Premium sponsor acknowledged as sponsoring lunch on Saturday, Pre-con sponsor acknowledged as sponsoring lunch and all other refreshments on Friday

We would appreciate payment as soon as possible so that we can make the necessary arrangements with printers and other suppliers. To register as a sponsor please just visit www.sqlsaturday.com/194/sponsorsignup.aspx and fill out our sponsorship registration form. We’ll email you an invoice that can be paid via cheque or bank transfer.

The Raffle – Your Key to Success!

The biggest challenge facing sponsors at community events is capturing contact information for follow-ups. Few attendees will have business cards, and having them hand write their info often leads to a 30% or higher loss due to inability to read what they wrote! We provide attendees with a set of pre-printed raffle tickets (see example below) that will contain their name and email address; they are then able to put these tickets into the raffle box at each sponsor table to try to win a prize. This gives you 100% readability and 0% loss! It is also more effective than any other technique we’ve seen for trying to capture contact information and that includes scanning their name badge.

 

Because we want you to be successful all of our sponsorship levels include the requirement that you provide a prize of at least £30 in value, and that you provide full color A4 or A5 flyers that highlight the prize(s) you are providing for the raffle.

We can provide raffle boxes for sponsors that don't have a preferred option. We will have one table for all absentee sponsors placed in the same areas with our onsite sponsors. Raffle ticket collection will proceed through to the end of the day. If someone from your team is present we’ll ask them to draw the winning ticket at the end of the day, otherwise we’ll draw the ticket. Attendees must be present to win. If there is a physical prize we’ll give it to them, otherwise we’ll forward you their contact information for you to follow up (for license keys, etc).

We will mail you all the raffle tickets from your box within 30 days following the event.

Event Logistics

We’ll open the doors to sponsors at 6:30 am on the Saturday. If you would like to set-up on the Friday evening please contact us to arrange access to the conference suite. Sponsors will be provided with a table and two chairs, and access to 13A power (NOTE - please let us know what you need in advance as cables will need to be put in place before sponsors stands are set up). Tables will be located in the exhibitors area to make it easy for attendees to find all sponsors. We encourage sponsors to remain on-site throughout the day and hope that you will have a representative available to present your prize at the end of day raffle.

Lunch will be provided to sponsors that have registered. Please have everyone from your team that will be attending register at www.sqlsaturday.com so that we can have enough food available.

Contact Us

We hope you’ll support this event! Please contact us at sqlsaturday194@sqlsaturday.com if you have any questions.