Unlock your club’s untapped sponsorship potential with SNAP Sponsorship

"How can my Cricket Club generate more income, fund projects like new kits, equipment and nets while ensuring financial sustainability for future generations?"

These are just some of the questions being asked by club volunteers across the UK.

With traditional funding methods, like donations, crowdfunding and governing body grants in decline, a spotlight has been cast on sponsorship, often overlooked and underutilised by many.

Mark Covington, SNAP CEO, said: "In every club there are thousands of pounds in undersold and untapped sponsorship potential. We've supported clubs for over 10 years developing strategies to help make sponsorship work for them. Our digital platform, SNAPSponsorship.com now makes this accessible to every club to replicate."

SNAP Sponsorship was founded on the simple principle of helping grassroots sports clubs to become more financially sustainable, enabling more people to participate for longer.

The company’s mission is to help club volunteers "Learn, Secure, Manage and Retain" more sponsors by using its technology combined with the shared knowledge from others in the #TeamSNAP network, which spans the UK, across all sports.

So, with that "Learn, Secure, Manage and Retain" ethos in mind, let’s take a look at how SNAP is helping cricket clubs across the country right now.

LEARN - Hatherley & Reddings Cricket Club

Hatherley & Reddings Cricket Club only went live on SNAP a few weeks ago.

However, that's not stopped the club taking advantage of SNAP's library section, which provides grassroots sports volunteers with sponsorship strategies and industry-lead case studies.

Taking these learnings HRCC approached a local estate agent, Elliot Oliver, and successfully secured them as the club's new shirt sponsor. Sam Coote, director of cricket at HRCC, praised SNAP's educational tools.

"The offline resources are super useful", said Sam. "Through my chats with my dedicated account manager we were given the ability to see other ways to set up sponsorship deals. We're already approaching our first year target of £10,000!"

Alongside an up-front payment, the club also negotiated a 10% commission from the estate agent's fee, should any business be referred to the organisation.

Elliot Oliver said: "We have a lot of clients in the Hatherley area and as a business we wanted to hand something back to the local community.

"Sponsoring the shirts of a grassroots cricket club is a perfect fit for us. We can't wait to support the club as it challenges for promotion come the 2024 season."

#TeamSNAP know that club members, players and followers are potential customers to the products, services and experiences that businesses have to offer. Done correctly, sponsorship can be a great way of generating return for businesses and adding value to members.

Could your club benefit from learning new sponsorship methods?

SECURE - Woodbridge Cricket Club

Woodbridge Cricket Club came to hear about SNAP after visiting the 2023 Suffolk Cricket Expo. (Suffolk are one of 16 county cricket boards in partnership with SNAP).

Scott Button, secretary of Woodbridge CC had this to say on their journey so far: "We’ve secured just under £1,500 in four weeks of being live. I always thought sponsorship was someone helping us out, whereas SNAP has taught me that it’s actually us helping them out. It’s a two-way street."

Having a digital platform like SNAP to showcase their sponsorship opportunities has been key to the club's success, making it easier for them to share information and connect with potential sponsors. With 12 sponsors now secured the club’s commercial portfolio only continues to grow.

#TeamSNAP help clubs secure sponsors by offering a system and support services to make the sponsorship process simpler from start to finish. Sign up, build a profile, promote the opportunities and enable your club to move the needle forward with securing additional funding.

Could your club benefit from securing more sponsorship revenue?

MANAGE – Cam Cricket Club

As a club with a healthy membership base Cam Cricket Club were always reasonably comfortable.

Yet, to support their members with the ongoing cost of living crisis, the club began to look for alternative funding routes to provide a financially viable place to play Cricket. Although sponsorship had been spoken about it had never been utilised with any structure.

Simon Lane, Vice-Chairman at CCC spoke about how SNAP has helped manage their sponsors.

"Before SNAP we were struggling to see where our sponsorship was coming from," said Simon. "Since joining, SNAP has given us both branding and identity. As a club volunteer with a full-time job, it can be challenging to manage everything so having a platform like SNAP that can track deals, provide advice and promote sponsors has been such a useful tool!"

Since joining SNAP, Cam Cricket Club have successfully registered 39 separate deals, having everything sponsored from shirts to players and awards to youth sections, helping them to exceed their original target of £5,000. 

The SNAP team is made up of club volunteers, working for club volunteers. With over a decade of experience and understanding on the challenges within the grassroots sponsorship sector, SNAP have developed a platform to remove barriers and provide frameworks to maximise sponsorship revenue.

Could your club benefit from managing sponsors more effectively?

RETAIN – Woodham Mortimer Cricket Club

Woodham Mortimer Cricket Club never had any form of sponsorship before joining SNAP.

The club had always struggled for members, playing in a rural location on private land that prevented the display of physical branding. However, after three years on SNAP the club had secured 50 sponsors.

Nigel Costin, chairman of WMCC, said: "As a club we’ve been able to secure a high quantity of small-value businesses purely through social media promotion.

"Having a platform like SNAP to support that has been fundamental for us to secure revenue, especially in the way it helps us now monitor this network, communicate with partners and retain the various income streams, season after season."

SNAP has been at the heart of WMCC’s development, helping them to provide income through sponsorship which has funded a variety of projects such as coloured kits, electronic scoreboards and covers. These enhancements have raised the club’s profile within the community, helping to attract new members, something which only adds further value to their conversations with current and potential sponsors.

#TeamSNAP make it simpler to retain sponsors, providing tools to access funding records, communicate with partners and notify users when deals are nearing renewal. Done efficiently, retaining sponsors can enable partnerships to strengthen, whilst enabling consistent revenue for clubs to improve their membership experiences and strive towards sustainable futures.

Could your club benefit from retaining more sponsorship revenue?

SNAP CEO, Mark Covington, had this to say on the organisation’s work:

"At SNAP we’re transforming how clubs think about sponsorship whilst providing them with a system to make volunteer life simpler. Sponsorship doesn't need to be complicated. It just needs a structure. That's where #TeamSNAP come in.

My offer to you is get in touch with no obligation if you’re wondering if one, or all, of the Learn, Secure, Manage, Retain pillars would benefit your club. I welcome any opportunity discuss the challenges you face as volunteers to see how we at #TeamSNAP could help!”

For more on SNAP Sponsorship, click here.

Your club can also win a FrogBox live streaming kit thanks to SNAP. Click here to enter.