Supporter Love Is All You Need
This morning I came across the very thoughtful piece “Don’t Think About Your Fundraising” by Jen Love from the Agents of Love Good blog.
Oddly enough, it’s all about how you should NOT think about your fundraiser AT ALL this Fall.
“This fall, don’t think about your revenue target. Don’t think about your organization’s pressing needs. For God’s sake, don’t think for a second about your half hour staff meeting with your team to dig out last fall’s fundraising packages and “strategize” about how to update by changing a few words and resend.” This fall, think about your donors.
It all comes down to people in the end. Be passionate, use the tools available and communicate with your Supporters.
Challenge yourself to really focus on your donors. Work toward creating fundraising campaigns that will make your donor stand up (or even better SHOUT) and say “YES! I am with you!”
Jen’s great advice on how to start off!
- Set a clear objective.
- Create an irresistible call to action.
- Build a compelling – and honest – case for support.
- Think about your creative approach and how you will draw people in.
Last week Katya Andresen of Katya’s Non-Profit Marketing Blog “Getting to the point” blogged about the older generation being more generous than its younger counterpart and by quite a bit more.
Katya argues that donor expectation plays a huge part and that no one strategy should be given exclusivity right now and that “fundraising expenditures must be weighted according to a strategy that maximizes those who are giving now.”
This is where I believe she makes a great point:
So should you write off anyone remotely youthful? Forget the Internet for the next two decades? Errr…. no.
Agreed Katya!
I see as a two part strategy:
- Keep the currently successful offline strategies of fundraising – because they work for some now.
- Take advantage and innovate in the online realm – because it works for some now and will work for more in the future.
At FundScrip, we struggle with these same dilemmas. Many of our groups (approximately 30%) use a paper order form type of campaign while other groups insist on an online supporter-based campaign. Both types of campaigns can be tremendously successful but they are aimed at very different audiences.
I believe we are in a cultural (age-related) transition of fundraising – social fundraising. Some online strategies work but some don’t. Some traditional strategies work but some don’t.
So what’s in between all these traditional models and future trends? Well, in the case of FundScrip it’s our MemberCare department.
FundScrip’s MemberCare department tries to guide these two very different group types and help them reach their fundraising goals all the while addressing and balancing the differences and the demands of an online campaign and a paper order form campaign.
It’s a challenge but we strive to satisfy everyone when it comes to established ways, web technology and social fundraising trends.
Our online and traditional game plans have come a long way since FundScrip was founded in 2004 and for that very reason we remain a relevant fundraising tool to both our online and offline audiences and we plan to hold on that place for many years to come.
What do you think about all this? Chime in here!
FundScrip – A donor-based fundraiser too!
I came across this post on the “Get Fully Funded Blog” today and it got me thinking about donor-based fundraising and how it relates to the FundScrip gift card fundraising program.
What is donor-based fundraising?
Well, isn’t that what our program is all about?
For a FundScrip campaign to be successful, it requires honest and open communication between its principle pillars; the FundScrip Coach, the Group Administrator and its Supporters. This coordinated effort of free-flowing information can lead a FundScrip campaign to be more sustainable (and successful) in the long run.
Note: It’s also important that the dialogue between the Supporter and the Group Administrator remain in tune with the fundraising goals of the group. So, it’s crucial that a Group Administrator be available for any questions from a Supporter.
In return, the Coach, the Administrator and most importantly, the Supporter (donor) are rewarded by an increased sense of satisfaction and achievement which leads to a rise in supporter motivation – and of course, which then leads to a profitable fundraising campaign!
Sandy Rees, CFRE, explains that there are 4 simple steps to raising all the money your organization needs. They are definitely worth remembering:
- Tell your story. Keep it short and simple, and tell people why they should care about your organization.
- Ask for a gift*. Ask multiple times during the year and use a variety of techniques.
- Thank the donor. Be warm, sincere, and prompt in your gratitude.
- Build relationships. Get to know your donors and what peaks their interest in your organization.
* in the case of a FundScrip program, this could be Ask Supporter to participate on a regular basis.
The internet is all about the sharing of information, openness and expressing unique experiences and now more than ever, organizations with fundraising needs are also among those vying for everyone’s attention – and specifically everyone’s wallets. For this reason, standing out from the crowd has never been more important. Building a strong relationship with your Supporters should be a priority. If you really care – so will they!
If you are a Group Administrator organizing and preparing your Fall FundScrip Campaign right now, what are you doing differently (if anything) this time? Do you have a new approach? Feel free to share!
Everyone can make a difference – even you!
Although this video is aimed specifically at teachers, you can easily make a case for it with regard to fundraising.
Everyone can make a difference – even you!
Preparing For Your Fall FundScrip Fundraiser
Well, it’s that time of the year again! Fall – yes, FALL – is around the corner which for many, means fundraisers! With this in mind, we thought it would be a good idea to go through a few of the basics when preparing your FundScrip Campaign.
As you all know by now, proper planning is the key to success in the long-term for any fundraiser and whether your fundraising efforts are benefiting a school, a church, a non-profit or a sports team, the basics are similar.
In the past several months, many Fundrazr posts have addressed the various ways to help your FundScrip Campaign reach its goal.
Here are a few “best of” Fundrazr posts we thought were worth re-reading:
- The Importance of Planning for Success
- Choosing Between an Online or Paper Order FundScrip Campaign
- The Little Banner That Could
- Incorporating Social Media Tactics with Your FundScrip Campaign
- EFT vs Credit Card – Does it really make a difference for my FundScrip Campaign?
- Put an End to Ineffective Fundraising Letters
- 10 Ways to Increase Participation in Your FundScrip Campaign
- I’m Busy! Why Should I Support Your Campaign?
- Dress Up Your FundScrip Gift Card Fundraiser
Finding a good reason to give
“People don’t buy what you do. They buy why you do it.”
I hope this video inspires you (as it did me) to spread the “why” of your FundScrip fundraising message.
The Little Banner That Could
FundScrip has recently made numerous and significant upgrades to its Supporter website and we’d like to thank all our Group Administrators and Supporters for hanging on for the ride. Everyone was awesome during this important transition!
Besides the overhaul to the entire ordering site, one of the most noteworthy changes has been the need for an Invitation Code. Every FundScrip group/cause/sport team/non-profit/church/school is now assigned a unique 6 digit alpha-numeric code. This invitation code is the only way for a potential supporter to find and join your group or cause on FundScrip.
Where can a Group Administrator find this Invitation Code?
First begin by going to the FundScrip Login Page and login as a Group Administrator by selecting your group under the Administration heading from the Selector Panel.
NOTE: You’ve probably all noticed by now that the Administrator Dashboard has not yet been upgraded to the new look. Well, we are working on it and should be ready to go in 2011!
At the top of the page, you will notice 1) a url link and; 2) a 6 digit alpha-numeric code. This is the unique Invitation Code and link which have been specifically assigned to your FundScrip Group.
Why do we provide you with a URL?
This URL sends your potential supporters directly to the FundScrip Login/Sign Up page and automatically fills in your group’s Invitation Code in the appropriate field. All they have to do is to fill in the remaining required information. That’s it! Your supporter is ready to start buying gift cards for your fundraiser and best of all, they can help make it an even bigger success!
How do I communicate my Invitation Code?
There are several ways you can forward this Invitation Code to your potential supporters and the most obvious way is to copy either the URL or the 6 digit code and paste it in an email message (along with a few introductory words about your FundScrip campaign).
These days you don’t have to be a genius to realize that being creative will get your group or cause noticed. That’s why it’s worth including our newly created FundScrip Sign Up Banner on your school’s, team’s, church’s or non-profit organization’s website. Remember to link the image to your group’s unique URL as provided in FundScrip Group Administator Dashboard.
We created this banner especially for our Group Administrators. To download your own version right now, simply right on this image and save it to your computer. Now all your website administrator or webmaster has to do is upload it to your website and assign it your group’s unique URL to the image. That’s it! It’s a hassle-free sign up process for your new supporters!
We’d love to know if you placed our banner on your website or blog and don’t be shy – send us the link.
As usual, if you have any questions I’m always available for you!
Establishing a Niche for Your FundScrip Group
You’ve set-up a Twitter account and you have created your group’s Facebook page for your school, church, sports team or non-profit organization. Excellent!
Now, you are probably wondering: “How do I attract people to these pages? What do I post? How do I persuade people to care about our FundScrip campaign?” All great questions!
Expecting people to automatically “Follow” or “Like” your group isn’t very realistic but there are ways of attracting people to your FundScrip cause in the Social Media space.
Here are few things to keep in mind:
Be the friendly “go-to” person
Remember that the entire reason you joined these Social Media channels is because you want to promote awareness of your group or cause and you want to increase the number of supporters. That means that you should expect that prior to people “following” or “liking” your FundScrip Group, you’ll likely need to answer some questions. That’s why a good idea to have the Who, What, Where, Why and How’s answered before they are even asked. Anticipating questions and being a friendly ambassador for your group is how you turn “followers” into active FundScrip “supporters”.
Remember to share
Social media is exactly what its name implies – social. The chances are very high that your followers will be very interested in every facet of your campaign progress so, it’s important to keep them updated and on a regular basis (i.e., a few times a week).
You can share news, images or anything else you feel is relevant to your fundraising campaign. This sharing culture will create an environment where your supporters feel as though they are truly part of the process and this will likely encourage them to spread the word (i.e., more supporters) and it might even help them stick around as a supporter through a few fundraising campaigns.
Be yourself – nobody does it better
Everyone has stage fright once in a while right? Well, just remember that people want to communicate and share with people. When you are yourself, you convey confidence in your exchanges and in turn, you can be an effective ambassador for your group or cause.
Find your voice & stick to it
This might be the most tricky of all the ways when establishing your group in the Social Media landscape. The secret is to know who your audience is. Are they women? Men? Parents with small children? Business people? Baby-Boomers?
When you know who you are speaking to, it’s much easier to connect, communicate and focus your message. A clear message leaves no doubt in your fundraising intentions which will allow your group to find its niche more quickly – not to mention that it will enable you to find more devoted and enthusiastic supporters.
Remember these tips before you start typing and you’ll do just fine.
If you have any others to add, please leave a comment below and we’ll certainly add it to the post.
If you have been reading my posts over the last several weeks, you know that I’m an advocate for adding a Social Media edge to your FundScrip campaign. It can bring additional attention to your cause or group and significantly increase your supporter-base. Although it requires some time to get the hang of it, when it clicks, it can make a huge difference.
I found this terrific Slideshare presentation called “50 Social Media Tactics for Non-profits“. The presentation is targeted towards “non-profits” but if your aim is (as it should be) to complement your existing FundScrip campaign with the potential of Social Media, each tactic mentioned can be applied to any FundScrip fundraising campaign.
If you have created a Twitter account or Facebook page for your campaign, these are just of few of the tactics which stood out to me as key implementing strategies:
- Build real relationships by replying, retweeting and joining discussions
- Promote an event, campaign or movement with Twitter hashtags*
- Use Twitpic to share photos
*Hashtags are a community-driven convention for adding additional context and metadata to your tweets. You create a hashtag simply by prefixing a word with a hash symbol: #hashtag. (via Twitter Fan Wiki)
- Reflect your brand (FundScrip Group) on your Facebook Page
- Add events (news & updates) to your Facebook Page
- Ask Facebook fans to upload videos that support your mission (fundraising goal)
The presentation also mentions tactics for Youtube, Flickr, Widgets, and blogs. These are other Social Media channels I intend to blog about in the near future so stay tuned.
As a primer to that, I encourage you to take a look at the presentation for yourself.
Let’s begin with
a definition:
Twitter is a social networking and microblogging service that enables its users to send and read messages known as tweets. Tweets are text-based posts of up to 140 characters displayed on the author’s profile page and delivered to the author’s subscribers who are known as followers. Senders can restrict delivery to those in their circle of friends or, by default, allow open access. (via Wikipedia)
Why is FundScrip on Twitter?
FundScrip decided to open its own Twitter account back in September 2009. Since the FundScrip fundraising program is so closely tied to its participating retailers, we believe that Twitter is the best way to keep in touch with our fundraising partners in real-time. As well, we want to connect with FundScrip Groups and broaden our program’s reach and awareness. Last but not least, we want to communicate and connect with charities (@kids_now), non-profit organizations (@sickkids), schools (@TDSB_Official) and junior sports teams across Canada. As an example, we enjoy following an active FundScrip group called Champion Cheer Athletics All-Star Cheerleading (@ccapanthers).
We’ve even put together a list that incorporates FundScrip’s own Participating Retailers (80+ and growing). We’ve done the work for you! All you have to do is join Twitter and find us @fundscrip then follow our FundScrip Groups List as well as our Participating Retailers List and you’ll get the news you want from the retailers your group cares about the most.
What do brands get out of being on Twitter?
An obvious answer is because brands can reach more people; but it’s not that simple. These savvy brands realize that there tremendous value in making themselves accessible to their consumers. They aren’t only interested in people buying their products, they also want to know what kind of person buys their products.
Basically that means that anyone with a Twitter account following @IndigoDeals can ask a question or make a comment regarding a product, a sale or a contest – and receive an answer!
They want to build a relationship with their customers and best of all, they want their them to talk back. This feedback is the foundation of increased loyalty and positive word of mouth.
According to eMarketer:
Coupons remain a leading driver of brand interactions in social networks. Learning about sales and new products is also a strong motivator for people to interact with companies in social media. Beyond the tangibles, such as coupons, consumers do gain positive feelings about a brand as a result of their interactions.
As a result, Twitter has quickly become an indispensable marketing tool for many popular Canadian brands such as Indigo/Chapters, Presidents’ Choice, Sears, Starbucks, Future Shop, La Senza and Home Depot Canada just to name a few.
These popular retailers often Tweet (and most several times a day) about their special coupons, previews, exclusive contests, deals, sales and limited offers. As a FundScrip Group Administrator, this can be an invaluable source of information and it can be easily used to increase your groups gift card orders from week to week.
Here are a few examples of these Tweets:
Why your FundScrip Group should consider joining Twitter
Twitter is not only great for keeping people in touch with each other but it’s also a fantastic resource for charities, non-profit organizations, school boards & sports teams as it’s a fantastic way to keep supporters in touch with all the latest developments and news that can be posted globally with a touch of a button.
Don’t worry if you aren’t able to convince your FundScrip supporters to join Twitter and follow your account. As a FundScrip Group Administrator, you can still find it useful as a complementary resource in your fundraiser’s marketing arsenal. When you learn of a deal, a special offer or a contest you feel is relevant to your group’s particular field of interest, communicate it to your supporters! It’s a great way to boost your FundScrip orders and incite more buzz about your fundraising goal.
If you have any questions about Twitter or anything related to social media, please feel free to ask me by leaving your question in the comment box below. 
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Some useful Twitter links:
“Twitter 101 for Non-profits” created by Blackbaud:
“Complete Guide to Twitter”, a collection of useful blog posts by Mashable:
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Ray Richards
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