Putting the People first - Rewarding sponsorship and member loyalty

Loyalty is a wonderful thing in the world of sports, and you often see players and coaches who spend their entire careers at one club get labelled as club legends. While this is all happening, there are often many club sponsors and members behind the scenes that have backed their respective clubs for long periods of time and received little to no recognition in the process. Today, we will talk about rewarding your club's sponsors and members for their many years of great service, to ensure that these partnerships last for years to come.

This can apply to both sponsors and members, but offering a loyalty package when a sponsor or member hits a milestone (e.g. 10 years of sponsorship/membership) is a great incentive to initiate. What you put in this package is completely up to you, but 10 years of service to a club often leads to life membership, so that is one thing to keep in mind for the members. Offering life membership after 10 years is an excellent motivator for sponsors and members to stay on board, throughout the highs and lows at the club.

At the conclusion of the season, clubs have their awards night which is where the hard work of everybody involved in operating the club is recognised. This provides the perfect opportunity for you as a club to ensure to your members and sponsors that their hard work and dedication does not go unnoticed, and even a simple shoutout at your awards night can go a long way. People love being recognised for their efforts, whether they want to admit it or not, and it’s only fair considering without these people, you don’t have a fully operative club.

Another way to reward membership and sponsorship loyalty over a prolonged period of time, is to reduce their costs every ongoing year by a percentage (e.g. make their costs 10% cheaper every year after 3-4 years at the club). This offers another great incentive for people to get involved at your club, and also goes to show that your club is about the people working behind the scenes just as much, if not more than being profitable. While money is always a priority for clubs, looking after people and doing everything in your power to keep them around will do more for your club's reputation, and gives you a higher chance of gaining more members and sponsors in the future.

These are only a few of the ways you can reward loyalty from your clubs' members and sponsors, but I cannot stress enough that these are the people that keep your club running, which means that keeping them satisfied should be a key priority and will sustain your club's success in future years to come!

Would incentives like these further inspire you to join a club as either a member or sponsor?

• Yes
• No