[Discussion] Gitcoin Sponsorship Guidelines

[CoachJonathan]

Intro

Purpose of this post: Advice-seeking to create guidelines that give a yes/no on potential sponsorship opportunities.

Context:

• Gitcoin has historically had a “no sponsorships” policy
• We are being offered more and more opportunities to get involved in various initiatives
• The idea of a “sponorship” is being blurred more and more often between all sorts of unique, novel opportunities
• We have no evaluation criteria for sussing these opportunities

Structure/Content of this post:

• What is/is not a sponsorship?
• Your opinion on some recent examples
• Who decides on sponsorships?

Note: the post below is meant to be a strawman so that we as a DAO may better discover the answer to these questions.

What is a sponsorship?

A sponsorship is a type of financial or in-kind support provided by a company, organization, or individual to another entity or individual for a specific purpose or event. Typically, a sponsor provides funds, resources, or other forms of assistance to help the sponsored entity achieve its goals or objectives.

Sponsorship is often used as a marketing tool to increase brand awareness, promote products or services, or reach new audiences. For example, a company might sponsor a sports team, music festival, or charity event to gain exposure and connect with potential customers.

In return for their support, sponsors may receive various benefits such as advertising or promotional opportunities, logo placement, or access to exclusive events or experiences. The terms and conditions of a sponsorship agreement are typically outlined in a contract or agreement between the sponsor and the sponsored entity.

Recent examples

Given the definition above, how would you approach the following situations?

• Gitcoin supporting Zuzalu by funding 3-4 support roles
• Gitcoin being asked by ETHBeijing to use our logo without us participating in the event at all
• Gitcoin being asked to put in funds for an upcoming hackathon
• Gitcoin being asked to put an ad on a popular web3 podcast
• Gitcoin hosting an IRL appearance at a large web3 event

Who decides?

Typically, the marketing team of an organization oversees sponsorship initiatives. This is because sponsorships tend to be used for the purposes of increasing brand awareness, promoting products/services or reaching new audiences, all of which tend to be the responsibility of the marketing team.

Additionally, in traditional organizations sponsorship budgets are allocated at the beginning of the year as part of the overall marketing budget. It is up to the marketing team to determine how it is spent.

Roles and responsibilities
How would we like to fill out the following roles?

Driver (who drives the sponsorships)
Approver (who has ultimate approval over the sponsorship)
Contributor (who can contribute to the sponsorship)
Informed (who needs to be informed about the sponsorship)

*Note: if there is a better way to approach this, please make suggestions accordingly!

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Below is a recommended structure for comments:

Definition of a “sponsorship”

• I conceptually agree with the definition in the post
  OR
• I conceptually disagree with the definition in the post and here are the changes I would make:

Examples of sponsorships:

• Zuzalu - I think this is/I don’t think this is a sponsorship because…
• ETHBeijing - I think this is/I don’t think this is a sponsorship because…
• Hackathon - I think this is/I don’t think this is a sponsorship because…
• Podcast - I think this is/I don’t think this is a sponsorship because…
• IRL activation - I think this is/I don’t think this is a sponsorship because…

Who decides

• I conceptually agree with the information in this section
  OR
• I conceptually disagree with the information in this section and here are the changes I would make:

Roles and responsibilities:
Driver: [who this should/could be]
Approver: [who this should/could be]
Contributor: [who this should/could be]
Informed: [who this should/could be]

[CoachJonathan]

Definition of a “sponsorship”

• I conceptually agree with the definition in the post

Examples of sponsorships:

• Zuzalu - I’m genuinely torn about this. On one side, I see the great points being made here about this being a new market opportunity. Additionally, the money we are spending is not specifically going toward any sort of brand awareness. I’m then torn because if it is not a sponsorship, what is this? Looking forward to reading other comments.

• ETHBeijing - I think this is a sponsorship since they are asking to use our logo (whether we are paying for this or not).

• Hackathon - If we are hoping to get a specific output from the hackathon and use the funds to award devs, then it is not a sponsorship. However, if we’re using our funds simply to appear on a roster without hopes of taking any meaningful code away, then this is a sponsorship.

• Podcast - I think this is a sponsorship because it meets the criteria for the definition in the post.

• IRL activation - I mostly don’t think this is a sponsorship, but rather a brand activation/serving some other business purpose.

Who decides

• I conceptually agree with the information in this section

Roles and responsibilities:
Driver: MMM or another contributor
Approver: MMM
Contributor: Anyone with an opportunity
Informed: CSDO

[krrisis]

Thanks so much for starting this conversation Jonathan!
I don’t think it addresses yet how much funding we allocate to sponsorships per year or what the criteria are but I think this is the next step once you have a clear view on the DACI. Hope these comments help.

Definition of a sponsorship
Generally agree

Examples:

• Gitcoin supporting Zuzalu by funding 3-4 support roles → To me this should have been a sponsorship opportunity and not a GCP (GCPs are strategic initiatives that help Gitcoin build Gitcoin and part of our pluralistic budgeting approach). As we don’t have a sponsorship strategy (yet) I voted yes on the GCP (the support roles, not the matching).
• Gitcoin being asked by ETHBeijing to use our logo without us participating in the event at all → sponsorship
• Gitcoin being asked to put in funds for an upcoming hackathon → sponsorship
• Gitcoin being asked to put an ad on a popular web3 podcast → sponsorship
• Gitcoin hosting an IRL appearance at a large web3 event → sponsorship
• EXTRA: Infinite Garden game → perfect example of a sponsorship. I’ll prob vote yes on a minimum budget here but ideally this would not be a GCP but a sponsorship

Who decides?

Agree with definition and budget allocation. If timing is too short to estimate here or make a decision you could ask for additional sponsorship budget through a GCP. (but hope it will be asked for the overall budget)

Roles and responsibilities:
Driver: External applicant for funding or Gitcoin contributor who’s deeply involved
Approver: MMM
Contributor: MMM Team
Informed: CSDO, Foundation

[alexalombardo]

Thanks for this @CoachJonathan

I think this is a really important conversation as we make further moves to decentralize our organization - and our brand(s)

I conceptually agree with this definition. My comments on types of sponsorships below:

• Gitcoin supporting Zuzalu by funding 3-4 support roles - in this case, feels to me like we sponsored the individuals, not Zuzalu, because we thought it was in the wider org’s interest to do so; if we want to incorporate this, id expand the definition of sponsorship to include individuals - or perhaps we actually deem these scholarships in the future
• Gitcoin being asked by ETHBeijing to use our logo without us participating in the event at all - would consider this a sponsorship that would necessitate an agreement of some kind; that said, in a world of headless brands (although we arent one, others are), how do we monitor/regulate this? if we were to say no and they did it anyway, what would we do?
• Gitcoin being asked to put in funds for an upcoming hackathon - would agree this is a sponsorship bc there is a clear exchange of funds in return for something and would necessitate a agreement stipulating what we “get” for funding
• Gitcoin being asked to put an ad on a popular web3 podcast - agree this is a sponsorship bc there is a clear exchange of funds in return for something and would necessitate a agreement stipulating what we “get” for funding
• Gitcoin hosting an IRL appearance at a large web3 event - agree this is a sponsorship if we are not the main host/if it is part of the event and not its own satellite event; e.g., a Gitcoin stage at FTC would be a sponsorship bc we are getting something in return for exchange of funds

In the case of all of the above, with the exception of the first, I believe what we would be getting in exchange for funds would be some kind of marketing benefit and therefore the decision making rights should rest with the marketing team (i.e. do we think the juice is worth the squeeze in terms of the marketing ROI we are responsible for driving)

Additionally, though, I also believe there are types of monetary exchanges that are not sponsorships. For example, the Infinite Card Game, in my opinion, would be a community funded initiative. If we are limiting GCP’'s to strategic initiatives, I’m not sure this fits with that - but I also dont necessarily think the funding of this aligns with our marketing priorities. So, is there something in between a GCP and a sponsorship that encompasses something voted on by the community? In this case, the decision making rights rest with the community, not MMM.

Additionally, I also think it’s important to clarify that when there is not a monetary exchange there can still be some kind of mutually beneficial agreement, and that this type of agreement is what I would deem a partnership, not a sponsorship.

With regard to GCP’s being sponsorships - I actually disagree
If we are lending our brand (logo, etc), I’d view this as more of an endorsement type of sponsorship, not a flat out

[shawn16400]

@CoachJonathan

Speaking on behalf of myself as a GTC token holder & Gitcoin Steward.

Thanks for this post and sorry I missed the original prompt. This is an important discussion to me given I tend to be fiscally conservative and as a steward, I believe we have to be clear on the value add behind every token we spend. For two reasons, 1) because it is the right thing to do and 2) every token from the treasury = downward pressure.

• Zuzalu - This is a sponsorship.
• ETHBeijing - This is a sponsorship.
• Hackathon - This is a sponsorship.
• Podcast - This is a sponsorship.
• IRL activation - This is a sponsorship.
• Community Gathering - This is a sponsorship.
• Trading cards - This is a sponsorship.

To clarify - I think the terminology is somewhat less important (is a trading card really a sponsorship - if one card has our logo), but what is important is looking at each such opportunity as a basket of opportunities and from which, we make the best choices for Gitcoin.

Please do not mistake my insistence on rigor as a dismissal of creating emergent spaces. If the objective outcome is innovation / improving networks connections, I am ok with that, but let’s weigh that in conjunction with other sponsorship opportunities.

I think it would be great if MMM built an annual calendar of known sponsorships (in conjunction with the protocol workstreams and GPC) and ensure there is plan to cover costs.

Roles and responsibilities:
Driver: MMM or delegate
Approver: MMM
Contributor: CSDO, Steward Council (they can amplify)
Informed: Community

MMM Budget Approver: GTC tokenholders/stewards

In short, I think this is MMM’s domain, and I trust MMM to build a plan that meets the need of Gitcoin and to make the most out of every GTC spent.

[kyle]

Thanks @CoachJonathan - Some thoughts below:

Definition of a “sponsorship”

• I conceptually agree with the definition in the post

Examples of sponsorships:

• Zuzalu - I think this is a form of community building and could be considered a sponsorship of our community.
• ETHBeijing - I don’t think this is a sponsorship, but more likely a partnership (sometimes, it is merely us extending our legitimacy to an organization which comes with great responsibility).
• Hackathon - I think this is a sponsorship because we are most likely paying for access to the outcome we desire (projects building on our protocol or with our products, or growing our community)
• Podcast - I think this is a sponsorship
• IRL activation - I don’t think this is a sponsorship because of the way community building falls out side the term “sponsorship” to me. Its not to say these should go without diligence, its simply different on how we define these outcomes. Specifically, running our own event doesn’t feel like a sponsorship as we own the experience, the messaging, and the desired outcomes. There are no other firms we are paying for that, and instead we are responsible for the outcomes in a way that other events normally own delivering outcomes as they own the event.

Who decides

• I conceptually disagree with the information in this section and here are the changes I would make:
  • We are a web3 organization with three developing org structures:
    • A Product Organization (Grants Stack, Passport)
    • A Protocol Organization (Allo, and to a lesser extent Passport)
    • A Community Organization (we are still developing this muscle, but our Grants program squarely fits in here - our future community of teams building on the protocols also fit in here)
  • A result of this, I don’t think the marketing team should be responsible for sponsorships across all three of these org areas.
  • This chart does a great job or showcasing some options on ownership areas:
    
    

Roles and responsibilities:
Driver: Proposer of said sponsorship or approver per below
Approver: Organization team (Marketing for Product, DevRel for Protocol, GCPs/combination of others for Community)
Consulted: (changed the verbiage here) CSDO, Token holders or some combination of both
Informed: DAO

For those who haven’t read, I have been really enjoying the article on Sequence of building in web3. I would highly encourage others to check it out.

[DisruptionJoe]

@kyle

Hackathon - I think this is a sponsorship because we are most likely paying for access to the outcome we desire (projects building on our protocol or with our products, or growing our community)

One quick thing, I think it is important for the devrel, engineering and product teams to have freedom to participate in these without too many guardrails. We routinely participate with small amounts in hackathons which get great results.

This can be seen with Passport hackathon, Open Data Community hackathon and others where we are either looking for a little crowdsourced inspiration or lower cost to build clear defined and tightly scoped components of a system. This is distinctly different than future DevRel hackathon expenses, but in a similar way devrel will need to reasonable measure of freedom in assessing and choosing hackathons.