How to get and leverage endorsement deals
In today’s influencer world, there seem to be more endorsement deals than ever before. But endorsement deals go beyond sponsored posts by a celebrity or a company using top athletes as brand ambassadors. Endorsements can come from businesses that provide services or products that compliment yours, creating benefits for clients of both parties. In other words, endorsements are a way to leverage your marketing dollars and build your perceived value, both key components to gaining preeminence in your market.
What are endorsement deals?
When you get an endorsement, you get approval; a basic endorsement is a statement of support from one person or company for another. Endorsements work because we rely on people we trust to learn about new things; endorsement deals leverage this trust to gain new leads and clients that you might not otherwise access.
As Jay Abraham explains, an endorsement cuts through all the steps of trust development that otherwise requires time to build in a marketplace. The new prospective client transfers their trust from the endorser to what they endorse, making for an immediate and cost-effective way of accessing new leads. This is why celebrity endorsement is so popular; people who want to emulate the celebrity feel they can do so by purchasing the item the celebrity endorses (from kitchen wares to sports equipment).
However, endorsement deals can also be business to business, such as a real estate recommending a particular staging or landscaping company to their clients. Along with other cooperative partnership opportunities, like joint ventures or strategic alliances, endorsements remain a tested way to grow your business, no matter the market conditions.
3 Best practices for endorsement deals
1. Know your clients
We usually hear about the biggest endorsement deals, like Nike paying millions of dollars to top athletes like Serena Williams and Kevin Durant. But you don’t have to pay that much to gain the credibility and increased sales that endorsements deliver. Part of what makes endorsements work is understanding who your clients really are and, as a result, what other things they might want to buy. For example, what endorsements would likely be attractive for clients at a yoga studio or investment bank? Even though we bet there is likely some client crossover, it’s more likely to see clothing or equipment endorsements connected to the studio, not the bank.
2. Find overlooked opportunities to establish your value
We know how powerful referrals are for lead generation; you can use endorsements in the same manner. Endorsing other businesses can show your clients that you genuinely care about their welfare, building out your expertise for your market niche and beyond.
Take this example from Jay about car dealers. He knew that dealers spent money to bring clients to their lots, but would likely only sell to 5% of them. However, in that other 95%, anywhere from a quarter to half were going to definitely buy a car, it would just be somewhere else. Instead of wishing them luck elsewhere, Jay’s solution was to leverage endorsements to make sure these clients would end up getting the car they wanted. So you want a Ford and the dealer only has Toyotas and VWs? The dealer would explain how they have a good relationship with a Ford dealer and guarantee the best possible price on what you want without you even having to leave, offering a savings of at least $1,000 in return.
Mutual endorsements like this mean no more watching potential clients walk away. Now the dealer would put them in the car they really wanted and get a share of the profit from the Ford dealer, who would the same arrangement there. Wouldn’t you rather make $500 selling someone else’s car than $0? Even better, now you will speak highly of both dealers to those you know because the experience was so seamless for you. They’ve created the kind of value that comes with being a market leader, not a follower.
3. Leverage endorsement deals for geometric growth
Endorsements offer three major benefits: A shortened selling cycle, reduced access costs and higher response rate. This means that you’ll sell more faster at a lower cost per client, even if you pay back some of your revenue to the endorser. Endorsement deals leverage understanding the lifetime value of your clients, allowing you to potentially pay endorsers quite generously for the initial sale while you accrue the profit on all subsequent ones.
Whenever possible, pay your endorsers only for the specific, actual sales they generate instead of for the ever-nebulous “influence.” You can track these through referral codes, specialized links or other means that track their impact on your sales. Performance based endorsement deals incentivize the endorser to evangelize your business without any upfront costs for you.
About Jay:
Jay Abraham is a proven business leader and top executive coach in the United States, and a close friend of Tony Robbins. Jay has spent his entire career solving complex problems and fixing underperforming businesses. He has significantly increased the bottom lines of over 10,000 clients in more than 1,000 industries, and over 7,200 sub industries, worldwide. Jay has dealt with virtually every type of business scenario and issue. He has studied, and solved, almost every type of business question, challenge and opportunity. His principles can be the difference between mediocrity and a business that generates millions of dollars in additional revenue.
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