Excerpts Series: Planning Your Next Fundraiser

At CDP we have some basic principles of resource development. We won’t run through all of those in this session as we have other trainings on resource development. But for fundraising, one of the basic principles is that every organization, every nonprofit, should undertake at least one fundraising event each year. We are big proponents of making sure that everything that we do is done with excellence and that everything that you’re doing in terms of fundraising is very well thought out and very well planned.

As a nonprofits we have to get away from shooting from the hip on fundraisers. Sometimes we’ll try to throw a fundraiser together in two or three weeks. Maybe that could have some success, but the idea behind any kind of fundraising or any kind of resource development is to be much more thoughtful, much more planning-oriented and much more intentional about how we do fundraising. What we suggest to organizations is — if you can do one excellent fundraising event every year, that is fabulous. If you can do two, that is even better, but you don’t want to do one every month. You don’t want to inundate the organization and all of your supporters with fundraising events. One stellar fundraising event is where you want to start.

The Purpose of Fundraising Event

It may seem silly to talk about the purpose of a fundraising event, but I can tell you there is a lot of confusion around why we do them. When we do fundraisers sometimes we’ll say, “Well that was a really fun event.”

Okay, but was it a good fundraising event?

The purpose of a fundraising event is, number one, to raise money. If you are doing a fundraising event and it is NOT raising money, it is NOT a fundraising event. It might be a fabulous marketing event. If increasing engagement, that is, telling others about your organization (we’ll  talk a little bit more about engagement in a moment) is also happening, great. We want the word about your organization to get out. Fantastic! — but that is not a fundraising event.

Our goal for nonprofits is to have one or two FUNDraising events every year. Remember, if the fundraising event is not raising money, it is not fundraising event. You either need to do something different or couch it as something different. Change your expectations and the metrics for the success of the event. The purpose of fundraising is — #1— to raise money.

I will give a nonprofit one year to break even or lose a little bit, but by the second year if the fundraising event is not yielding at least $10,000 in revenue for the organization, they need to find a different event. Again, the purpose of a fundraising event to raise money.

The secondary purpose, after raising money (not instead of raising money) is to engage people that have not been super familiar with your organization. Fundraising events are an absolutely wonderful way to introduce the organization to potential donors or potential investors. We want to try to and accomplish both of these things through our fundraising event, but remember, the number one purpose of a FUNDraising event is to raise money.

Fundraising Factoids

• Fundraising events will generate money from emotional givers.

• Emotional Givers are not the same as engaged investors. (We talk more about these fundraising facts in our training Donor Development. In that training you will hear these terms over and over and over again.)

  • Donors are your life blood of the organization. Nonprofits will want to raise the majority of their funding through donors.

  • Donors are investors.

  • Donors know about your organization. They understand what you do. They are behind your purpose. They are investing in your organization.

  • Donors are not just one time givers — donors are in this with you. There is a difference between an engaged investor or a donor, and someone who gives out of an emotional appeal inside your fundraising event —those are not the same people. Fundraising events provide opportunities for a nonprofit to tug on the heartstrings, to pull people into the popular opinion of the organization at this event, which is — we are joining together to champion the organization and their cause. Emotional givers get swept up in that and give out of that compelling story, out of that emotional response to what they’re hearing and seeing.

Fundraising events are way to appeal to people who, maybe tomorrow, aren’t going to necessarily want to become donors or make ongoing investments to the organization, but tonight they are very moved by what they heard. Emotional givers are one of the primary audiences we’re shooting for at fundraising events.

Another goal of fundraising events is to increase the number of engaged investors. Nonprofits will have two types of attendees at fundraising events. One — emotional givers and two — people who will become donors for you. They are now at that tipping point from being engaged to investing. This could be the opportunity that they make that turn from being just interested in what you’re doing to becoming really invested in your work.