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Action Required: Your Click Decides if Sponsorships Are Worth it

Participate in This Live Experiment

Hello and welcome to the 124th edition of Fresh Salmon.

I am pleased to have you here, and if you would like to read past issues of the newsletter, please click here.

Partnerships > Sponsorships

I have been screaming this on top of my lungs for the past several months, especially for brands that are looking to partner with B2B Creators.

I have a hate-hate relationship with the typical cost-per-click ad sponsorships because the majority of the time it doesn’t align with the audience on the other end.

Clearly, newsletter sponsored ads are no different from old school Google display ads. 

The display advertisements are self-serving to Google so that they can generate clicks and make money from the advertisers. In my humble opinion, these represent a total waste of advertising dollars!  

So, if you're reading this newsletter, you'll be a part of the experiment with me today, proving that traditional newsletter sponsorships are out of sync with audiences' demands and expectations and are no different from display ads on Google.

Are you with me?

For this experiment, I have actually accepted 2 sponsorship opportunities for the very first time for this newsletter and put both the ads today.

The two ads are from CloudDevs and Vanta (see below). 

I want you to click both the ads and check out their offerings.

If you are one of those who end up taking any action based on that brand’s offer for you, I want you to reply to this email, and let me know. Please 🙏 .

The CloudDevs ad is going to pay $3.20 per unique click and the Vanta ad is going to pay $2.80 per unique click.

Now go ahead and click these ads below →

Grow your Engineering Team with LatAm

🌎 CloudDevs is your gateway to 10,000+ vetted LatAm engineers, hand-selected for your project in just 24 hours.

✏️ Our talent is rigorously tested for IQ, tech stack and communication, with 7+ years of experience.

Join the live session: automate compliance & streamline security reviews

Whether you’re starting or scaling your company’s security program, demonstrating top-notch security practices and establishing trust is more important than ever.

Vanta automates compliance for SOC 2, ISO 27001, and more, saving you time and money — while helping you build customer trust.

And, you can streamline security reviews by automating questionnaires and demonstrating your security posture with a customer-facing Trust Center, all powered by Vanta AI.

I plan to report how much of the money you help me make with these ads next week, and how many people actually took a meaningful and real action.

The whole idea is to share these numbers publicly and really see who is gaining what out of these type of CPC based sponsorships.

And then, of course, further assess my thesis of “Partnerships > Sponsorships”.

Whatever comes out of this, I plan to report it everywhere including my social media handles.

Let’s see what happens, until then hold tight!

Now Partnerships: What Do They Entail?

Partnerships are a deeper engagement, not just a click.

The whole idea is when an engagement is deeper, there is value creation for all parties involved, and not just follower/subscriber abuse.

For example, when I think of monetizing this newsletter, I am thinking of creating value and leverage first for my audience i.e. You.

And there are many ways of doing so, but one that I really believe in is - Offering 1-on-1 Sessions.

[Side Note: I’m seriously contemplating starting this pretty soon, if you are interested, please reply to this email - I’m still working on refining the details and the pricing, but happy to reserve a spot for you in advance.]

If you are either an individual or a business owner in B2B world, there is viability of providing value to you through personal coaching or business consulting on marketing and Go-to-Market strategies.

I’m planning to do several hours of time blocks dedicated to these 1-on-1 sessions on a recurring basis per month.

But it won’t be limited to just that…

I’m at almost 17,000 followers on LinkedIn, over 1500 on Twitter/X, and over 500 on TikTok. And of course, over 4000 subscribers on this newsletter.

Now obviously my combined reach across all platforms is meaningful. Therefore, one of the things while I do these 1-on-1 Sessions is to create content out of these interactions.

Having that content will help me leverage my reach across multiple platforms to shine the limelight on “You” as an individual or on your “business” if you are a business owner.

And by doing so, I would be able to multiply the value of my offerings to you.

This is the true essence of partnerships. Value Creation.

Sponsorships are too limited and too much surface level to create a win-win for everyone involved.

Interesting Thing That I Read This Week 

Jill Rowley 🔥 🔥 🔥 

“She who is closest to the customer wins, she who stays closest to the customer continues to win”.

Tweet That I Noticed This Week

What Do You Think?

This concludes this edition of Fresh Salmon.

I would like to hear what you thought of today's newsletter.

Also, let’s connect on Twitter, LinkedIn, or TikTok.

Cheers,

Vivek

PS. Do what is good for your soul ❤️