106 seconds with Jackie Fast, Entrepreneur, Author of Pinpoint, Sponsorship Trailblazer…
Jackie Fast is the Founder of Slingshot Sponsorship – an innovative strategic sponsorship sales agency based in Central London with offices worldwide. Launched with the belief that sponsorship has evolved and now has the ability to truly transform businesses, Slingshot has successfully taken their strategic commercial framework and applied it to the world’s leading brands who want to take their investment beyond eyeballs and awareness.
She recently sold her sponsorship agency Slingshot Sponsorship and has exited the business. As founder, she grew the bootstrapped agency to the global powerhouse it became through its success in innovation with brands, which transpired into significant sponsorship sales deals with FTSE 100 companies.
Jackie is now a regular keynote speaker within Europe and has spoken at global marketing conventions in Australasia, the Middle East, and throughout North America. Jackie is also a Non-Executive Board Director of the European Sponsorship Association, one of the youngest Board Directors in the association’s history.
In your book, Pinpoint, you say that you’ve ‘made every mistake in the book’. What made you get up and keep going again?
I don’t like failing and am very competitive so I would argue it’s just my make up that I just keep going despite all odds.
How did you create the right culture and create a sense of belonging at Slingshot?
It was very important that we had a culture of inclusion and support as we were always punching well above our weight. However, more important than ensuring everyone was happy, was ensuring everyone was aiming to be the best at what we were doing. That innate curiosity is what we hired for and the combination of that with enthusiasm made Slingshot so successful.
What was the best thing about building your business?
Picking your people – who you work with and who you work for.
After Slingshot, now what’s next for you?
I’m in the process of starting a wine business – something completely different, but still uses a lot of the marketing and sales skills I developed with Slingshot.
Taking a look across the media world, there’s still a distinct lack of diversity; what needs to change to change this?
More people making change and voicing their opinions of it. It’s not about belief, it’s a proven fact that organisations that have more diverse employees have a greater profitability. The issue is that it’s too easy to hire people that are like you – so it’s self-fulfilling.
Finally, what’s your guilty pleasure?
Haribo.