A very interesting thing happened at the latest New York Chapter’s NAMD Marketing Mondays event. The subject was Part 2 Sponsorship: Closing the Deal and the moderator was Stephen Jackson, General Manager, Roaddoggz Productions and the panelists were Andrew Morrison, President, Small Business Camp, Camille Evans, Senior Acct Director, Noise Marketing - Bombay Sapphire and Kristian Buchanan, Senior Vice President, Primetime Onmimedia, Ltd. The information learned at this event was indeed valuable and necessary for anyone who is trying to obtain sponsorship and the ones in attendance were lucky to get the kind of information not readily available, especially hearing it from the people who are the actually decision makers or are key in getting those decisions made.

During the panel discussion, Andrew Morrison made a statement that resonated so much in my head that it affected me in a way that made sense. Although he wasn’t speaking specifically to me (Hello, Erika Kennedy!), in theory, he was. To keep it simple, he basically stated that as Erika is used to being a giver, she has to be comfortable being a receiver as well. That sounds just like me! As many times as I have helped people, I don’t look for anything in return (usually… I also have to be a little realistic at times) yet when legitimate people offer their help in whatever I am doing, I usually turn them down, not because I can’t use their help or don’t want their help, it’s just that I am so used to doing things on my own that it’s just the way I truly operate and from experience, I have always done better when doing things by myself.

So from this point on, I will listen to all reasonable offers and I stress REASONABLE offers to do business with and/or collaborate as I am also building a team to basically do what I’ve been destined to do from the start and that’s take over! Understand this, I am looking for like-minded people who have their own vision and can get there with or without my existence but will feel comfortable getting there jointly for mutual benefits. For the majority who think I am foolish and are trying to connect with me in hopes of not having to do anything but latch on to me, don’t approach or if you do, have a LOT of money or resources that I can utilize!

I do want to apologize to the legitimate people that have approached me in the past and recently for being skeptical and not willing to pull the trigger but I am also used to working with people who talk a lot but don’t do shit and I end up doing all the work myself so this is why I feel comfortable doing things myself because then I know that the only person I can blame is myself if things don’t go as planned and to take pride in my successful ventures because I did it on my own! If you have something to offer or have a talent that needs to be showcased and you don’t have the means or the connections to make it happen, let’s talk!

This is not the time to say you are going to do something this is the time to DO something!