Roast my idea! Productized Sponsor Outreach service
What if newsletter creators could have sponsors come right to them?
A few years ago, I created a few Facebook groups and newsletters.
I loved operating them.
They grew in size and over time, I was approached by companies who wanted to PAY ME to reach the community members.
I graciously accepted a few small deals...
I was a n00b at all of this.
but wouldn't it be great if I could scale up?
I worked to create a super-simple process to reach-out cold to sponsors and sell them.
I had a designer friend make an awesome Rate Sheet with:
- Info about our community's demographics
- Stats on # of members, open rates, click-through
- Ad spots available
- Testimonials from previous sponsors
I found companies already advertising to my target audience and pitched them, met over zoom and closed a bunch.
A few months back, I even closed a billion-dollar Enterprise company. I was stoked. (and still am).
Now I want to create a "productized service" from my process.
The TL;DR is a service that works with online creators to create awesome marketing materials, then go execute on them and sell.
We'd take a cut of each intro that leads to a deal.
additional opportunities could be selling a database of both creators and sponsors, courses on creating ad packages, sales, and more.
so now, Indie Hackers, I ask for YOUR feedback on this idea.
Please feel free to poke holes and give me your honest criticism.
What could work right? What could go wrong?
I've got a basic landing page up at https://demandscout.co
I'm clearly in the validation stage at the moment :-)
Thanks!
I'm interested in learning more about how the process will work with matching creators to advertisers.
For the first few users, I'll have to reach out to newsletter creators manually. From there, there are a few tactics anyone can use to find sponsors. Depending on your niche, you can look at competing newsletters or communities your audience hangs out in. What brands are already advertising there? That's a good first step. What about their competitors?
Next -- finding contact details for the advertiser/sponsor isn't too hard. Google "<x company> marketing manager linkedin".
This is the manual, high-ticket offer -- but I think there could also be value in compiling a list of both advertisers and newsletter creators and offering paid access on an on-going basis. Getting that info can be done manually or automated through web scraping or VA's. You'd get similar value of connecting both sides, Demand Scout just isn't doing the work for you.
Nice idea. How do you filter/ screen the online creators?
Looks like your product is what offer a regular web agency. I contact a web agency, give him where I want to advertise, I set up a budget, and they do the job.