Last updated April 12, 2023
Writing a sponsor appreciation letter is an important way to thank those individuals and organizations who have supported your cause or project. It’s also an effective way to build relationships with a sponsor for future collaborations.
The process of writing a sponsorship appreciation letter can be daunting, but it doesn’t have to be! In this blog, we’ll provide tips on how to craft the perfect sponsor appreciation letter, as well as seven easily customizable, thank you letter templates that you can use as starting points. With these tools in hand, you’ll be able to easily create heartfelt messages of thanks that will make those who offer you a sponsorship feel appreciated and valued.
What is a sponsor appreciation letter?
A sponsor appreciation letter is exactly what it sounds like – it is a letter that you, as a non-profit organization, send to a sponsor or donor. A thanking letter to a sponsor can be sent for a litany of reasons – gratitude for a large donation, thanking them for being a long-term, recurring donor, or other reasons.
Many non-profits struggle to understand the benefits of consistently reaching out to donors and thanking them for their investment of time and money. Similarly, many also struggle to craft well-written, concise letters.
So, let’s break down these points one by one, starting with the importance of thanking your sponsors for their donations.
Why it’s important to thank sponsors
As a nonprofit, odds are high that you rely on the financial resources and support of donors in order to move your organization forward and to have the impact on the world that you hope and strive to. Due to this, having good relationships with all of your sponsors is crucial.
By leaving a positive impression on those who you interact with, whether it’s thanking them for a generous monetary donation, or just expressing that you are grateful for them investing their time and money into you, they will be extremely thankful for the fact that you took the time to reach out to them and thank them.
Not only will this build a bit of comradery between you and your sponsors, but it will also make them more likely to be a sponsor in the future. If you can build long-term relationships with those who are supporting your cause, you lower overall costs incurred within your business.
More specifically, it’s a well-known fact that retention is significantly cheaper than garnering a new customer or donor. When you try to acquire a new donor, there is a litany of costs incurred that you do not have to deal with when you retain donors.
Brand loyalty
Imagine you are choosing between two brands of toilet paper. Brand A is the brand you’ve historically chosen. It’s plush, absorbent, and feels nice. You know a bit about the backstory of the brand, and they’re a humanitarian organization that donates part of its profits to homeless children.
Brand B, on the other hand, is a cheaper toilet paper that you’ve never used, and know nothing about.
Most of you reading would pick Brand A to keep purchasing – you know the product, the brand, and you feel comfortable in sticking with the company and their product, even though it is a more expensive option. The same fundamental rules apply to the non-profit industry.
If you, for example, as a non-profit, have done your due diligence and have spread your brand’s message far and wide, and have simultaneously taken good care of your current donors, you can be sure that the same result will happen in your favor.
More resources
This one should be a bit simpler to understand.
When you’ve already acquired a sponsor, there are minimal things that you need to do to retain them. If you keep the sponsor informed about where their donations are going, thank them for their generous support, and ask them for feedback, most people will tend to stay with your organization.
But to get a new donor? First, you have to build out lead-finding campaigns, whether that’s through Google Ads, hiring a specialist, or creating posts on social media. Then, you have to contact those leads through a variety of various contact methods – email, social media, direct mail marketing – and hope that one of those methods will grab their attention. Once you have their attention, you need a person with sales experience to convince the potential sponsor that your project and your brand is the one they should be donating to. Even still, there are tons of different types of people who may donate to your cause, and trying to market to all of them is a very difficult task.
At the end of the day, it should be quite intuitive to understand that getting a new person to sign up to provide a donation is a lot more difficult than having someone who has already donated do so again.
Marketing and advertising
This slightly ties into our last point, but any sort of marketing or advertising that you conduct has zero effect on those who have already donated to your brand. The point of setting up a social media campaign is to reach a wider audience, to get new customers and sponsors, not to re-engage with old ones.
If you invest a bit of time and effort into creating a better customer experience for people who have already donated, you can worry less about setting up perfect marketing and advertising campaigns since there is a higher return on investment for returning donors.
How to write an effective thanking letter to sponsor
Writing a thanking letter to sponsors in the non-profit industry is a key element in building a strong foundation of support.
An effective letter should be personalized and include details to show that their donation is greatly appreciated. Expressing gratitude immediately by addressing the donor’s name helps create an emotional connection with the reader.
In addition, provide specific examples of how the sponsor’s contributions have resulted in positive outcomes for your organization’s mission. In these situations, directly establishing what their donation was used for and how it aided your organization’s mission is crucial. Remember, people do not donate to a non-profit organization for the fun of it – they typically do so because it is a mission that they can stand behind.
Lastly, it is important to extend an invitation for future involvement, such as volunteering or providing additional donations. The idea here is to baby-step those donors you reach out to through the process of feeling appreciated, being told where their donation is going or has already gone, and following up by saying “Here are some actionable next steps to take that can help us even more”.
Following these steps will help create a successful thank you letter that will cultivate loyalty and appreciation from sponsors in the non-profit industry.
7 sample thank you letter templates
1. Generic sponsor thank you letter
Dear ___________,
On behalf of the team at the ____________ organization, I would like to extend our deepest gratitude for your generous sponsorship. Your contribution to date has enabled us to __________ and we are extremely thankful.
Your support is greatly appreciated and we can only hope that you continue to be part of our cause in the future.
With gratitude and appreciation,
___________
2. Event sponsor thank you letter template for continued support
Dear ___________,
We are so thankful for your ongoing support and sponsorship of our organization’s events. Your generous sponsorship has made a tremendous impact on our cause and we would like to express our sincere appreciation for your dedication.
Your kindness and support has enabled us to provide education for ____________ and it means the world to us. We hope you will continue to be part of our journey and we look forward to seeing you at future events.
Thank you again for your loyal and generous support everyone!
Best regards,
___________
3. Large financial contribution sponsor thank you letter template
Dear ___________,
We are beyond words with gratitude for your generous contribution of ____________. Your donation is an incredible show of support and we are so thankful for your generosity.
Your financial support has enabled us to ____________ and it is making a huge impact on our mission. We can’t thank you enough for believing in us, supporting us and investing in our cause.
Best regards,
___________
4. Sponsor thank you letter for meaningful relationships/having sponsor’s company
Dear ___________,
We are incredibly thankful for your generous contribution and the opportunity to collaborate with you. Your generosity has enabled us to ____________, allowing us to realize our mission of education and creating a better world together for future us.
Beyond donating money, we appreciate that you’ve trusted in our organization and invested in what we stand for. We can never fully express how much your assistance means to our team- thank you from the bottom of our hearts!
Sincerely,
___________
5. Sponsor thank you letter template for corporate partnerships
Dear ___________,
From the bottom of our hearts, we are so appreciative of your generous sponsorship and your ongoing devotion to our mission! Your benevolent gift has enabled us to make a lasting impact on those around us, and it is absolutely invaluable. We could not express enough gratitude for your generosity!
Your corporate sponsorship and partnership has been an incredible benefit to our team and organization and we are so grateful for your kindness. Our appreciation is immeasurable for your trust in us and contribution to our mission.
Thank you again for sponsoring us,
___________
6. Sponsor thank you letter for special donations
Dear ___________,
We are overwhelmed with gratitude for your remarkable and generous donation! Your thoughtfulness has enabled us to ____________ and it truly means so much to us. We could not be more inspired by your generosity, hard work and dedication to our cause, and we cannot thank you enough for having faith in what we do and investing in our mission.
Sincerely,
___________
7. Thank you letter for event sponsor
Dear ___________,
We are immensely and sincerely appreciative for your contribution to our event! Your generous support really has enabled us to ____________, and it means the absolute world to us. We feel genuinely encouraged by your commitment and cannot express enough gratitude for trusting in our mission. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts!
Sincerely,
___________
Ways to show gratitude beyond the written word, such as gifts or special events
Gratitude doesn’t always have to be expressed through generic thank you cards or notes.
There are many other creative ways to show appreciation and demonstrate how much someone means to you. You can arrange a special event, such as treating your friends or family to a night out at the movies or planning an unforgettable picnic in the park. If you want something more permanent, there’s nothing wrong with buying a small present that not only has traction but also serves as a reminder of your appreciation long after the event itself.
This is where Handwrytten can come in to help. While we specialize in creating hundreds of handwritten notes much more quickly than would be possible by the human hand, we can also include various mail inserts with the handwritten cards we write and send out. Things like single-serve coffee packets, business cards, and more are all available through our easy-to-use service.
Key points and additional resources
To sum things up, there are a few key takeaways about writing your own thank you letter template.
- Start off with mentioning your company name and thank them for their donation
- Be a bit more specific than you’d expect; for example, if you’re thanking somebody for funds for a scholarship, mention that directly
- Mention how their donation has enabled you to either accomplish a specific goal, or say that it is going to be used in a specific way
- Offer them some next steps moving forward – encourage them to attend an event, for example
At the end of the day, we hope we can make this process even easier. If you simply pick one of the above letter templates, copy and paste it into our easy-to-use letter editor, and hit send, we can do all of the heavy lifting for you.
