backwoodsbowhunter Posted May 18, 2011 Report Share Posted May 18, 2011 Im 17 years old and dream of being sponsored for shooting my bow whether it be in the field or in competetions. I was wondering if anyone has tips on how to get companys such as hoyt (my brand of choice) to notice me. do i send them a letter or something along those lines? all feed back is greatly appreciated. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cray8705 Posted May 18, 2011 Report Share Posted May 18, 2011 I'm 24, not really that much older than you, but i've been trying for the same thing since I was about your age. I got the chance a few months back to talk to Skyler Wirsig of Heartland Bowhunter (hes my age). He has a full time job, not the HB hunting show. The show is just a hobby for him, he makes no money at it. Just keep that in mind. Contact as many people in the industry and make as many friends as possible. Expect a lot of turndowns and failures, because you have to be extremely lucky and you have to just keep trying. Michael Waddell of Bone Collector got noticed because he was extremely good at turkey calling and got noticed. You have to convince the companies like Hoyt that they can make money off of you. Good Luck and if you truly want to do it dont give up and dont expect to get rich. Hope this helps Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChrisSeb53 Posted May 18, 2011 Report Share Posted May 18, 2011 I'm 24, not really that much older than you, but i've been trying for the same thing since I was about your age. I got the chance a few months back to talk to Skyler Wirsig of Heartland Bowhunter (hes my age). He has a full time job, not the HB hunting show. The show is just a hobby for him, he makes no money at it. Just keep that in mind. Contact as many people in the industry and make as many friends as possible. Expect a lot of turndowns and failures, because you have to be extremely lucky and you have to just keep trying. Michael Waddell of Bone Collector got noticed because he was extremely good at turkey calling and got noticed. You have to convince the companies like Hoyt that they can make money off of you. Good Luck and if you truly want to do it dont give up and dont expect to get rich. Hope this helps good advice! just remember.. even though you may not get rich, you will have never worked a day in your life if you do what you love for a living. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cray8705 Posted May 18, 2011 Report Share Posted May 18, 2011 good advice! just remember.. even though you may not get rich, you will have never worked a day in your life if you do what you love for a living. couldnt agree more Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dbHunterNY Posted May 18, 2011 Report Share Posted May 18, 2011 start with your local archery pro shops. get to know them and just promote their business if you think it's a great place. eventually if you're skills and personality are good enough, they may have you shoot at outdoor or indoor shoots and represent their shop. then you build relationships with people involved in the industry by being at different events and just around. some day, if you're lucky, it's possible someone will approach you about promoting their stuff and sponsorship. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The_Kat Posted May 18, 2011 Report Share Posted May 18, 2011 Practice, practice, practice..... To get sponsored you will have to place high in some national contests. ASA, IBO, NFAA.....get to shooting in those organizations. Otherwise you can forget getting an archery sponsorship. Getting your name out there or talking to so in so will do nothing for you. Results in competitions is whats gonna get you a sponsorship from the archery companies. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stinger-Hunter Posted May 25, 2011 Report Share Posted May 25, 2011 (edited) If I can provide some marketing and public relations advice.... since that is my expertise. A company sponsors people that provides that company with publicity for their product. That is the main reason they provide money for sponsors. Being good at something doesn't qualify someone to be a good sponsor. Exposure qualifies someone to be a good sponsor. Without exposure and marketing, a company can't make money, which means that can't pay you. So the logical thing to do is to get as much exposure as possible. First of all, if you have a preference for a product or a company, then make it your die-hard preference and give that brand or particular product a bunch of exposure, such that they increase sales because of your marketing effort. That's right, make THEM money first, then turn around and get a sponsorship. Example 1: The George Foreman Grill was not an invention by George Foreman, people with a product came to him and said, "will you market this for us? We'll name it after you." They did exactly that, and he marketed the heck out of it. He gave them exposure. Wherever he went, he talked about the George Foreman Grill. Example 2 MIchael Waddell talked about what he loved to do after a hunt or a successful hunt, do you know what it is? That's right, taking a ride into town and going to the IHOP. Executives soon noticed they were getting free advertising and began a collaboration between Realtree and themselves (IHOP) and began cross advertising companies. It came to fruition because of Michael's natural preference toward a particular "brand" of breakfast restaurant. He gave them exposure and soon ad money and sponsorship money was soon made. So there are a lot of things you can do to begin the process of giving a company exposure. 1. Get a video camera and begin making videos about "Hoyt" or whatever product or company you want an endorsement for - and when you are making videos, include information about the product, name the video title something like "Practicing with my Hoyt for XYZ competition" Etc. Make 100 videos of little things, big things, related to shooting. Tournaments, local shops, new shooting programs in your area. Neighborhood fun tournaments, town against town tournaments. Have all your friends have a competition between One Brand and another Brand. Make a video and upload it to YouTube. Have you noticed all those hunting shows aren't really hunting shows, they are product placement advertisement built around a scenario called "hunting." But it is all advertising. So get to advertising the product. Give them exposure. Make them money first, provide VALUE to them first and then it will be a boat load easier to get some sponsorship. 2. Be passionate about your product or company support. If company owners think that you will promote anything as long as they pay you, good luck! I wouldn't want to give money to someone that was not a total advocate for my product (not someone without name recognition). In other words, if you owned a company, wouldn't you give someone money that was totally OUT There! promoting your product because they loved it? Absolutely you would. So do that. Provide Hoyt with 50 videos, a website with all Hoyt ads, etc. Wear Hoyt clothing while hunting or making the videos, create a facebook fan page called "I Love Hoyt" and work it, make 50 How-To Videos and promote Hoyt or whatever company you think is high-quality. 3. Even if someone decides to sponsor you and you have not been an advocate for THEIR product, you can point to all the promotions you have done for XYZ product and say, "hey, I can do this for your product too." I've got the means and ability to do that. A great idea, actually is to do a bunch of how-to videos and then shop the sponsorships around and say, hey, i'll do a 5 second or 10 second sponsorship intro to all 50 videos on YouTube for $15,000 or highest bidder. You'd have a check before you left the office (if the videos were done well). 4. Go to tournaments with a camera and a microphone and interview people. Do some funny stuff, be creative - get the human story behind the event, become a mini-reporters, all in an attempt to... promote the company or product you want. 5. Build a website and do al this stuff while promote your website - have advertisements on your site and get whatever company you want to advertise with banner ads, ask them to pay for the site, embed those videos on the site. 6. If you want money, you have to convince a company that they will MAKE money by associating themselves with YOU. Sell yourself, be an advocate for THEM and you won't have to go looking for $$, the $$ will find you. But you have to be authentic, honest and true about what you are willing to promote and support. In this industry (hobby) authenticity is everything. Last thing: If you don't know how to do many of the things that I've mentioned.... learn them. Not only is it fun, but if you truly are passionate about hunting and shooting- it is a small sacrifice to learn some technology in order to be 1, 2, 10 steps ahead of all the other people that "hope" and "dream" of getting a sponsorship, but are sitting on their rear ends doing nothing about it. Have fun, measure your progress by years, not days or months. You'll get there in direct proportion to the time, effort and strategy that you spend in the attempt. Edited May 25, 2011 by Stinger-Hunter Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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