Online fundraising is one of the most effective, low-cost ways to raise funds for your organization. Online fundraising tools can elevate your fundraising goals, since donors can give at anytime, anywhere, with a mobile device. On Razoo, more than 30% of donations for #GivingTuesday 2016 were made via a smartphone. Online fundraising also provides a slew of other benefits, including easy to share messaging, automated gift processing, automated data entry and more.
Now that you understand the importance of online fundraising, how can you amplify your fundraising efforts even more?
Team fundraising is an effective way to boost your fundraising campaigns. On Razoo, teams raise 80% more than solo fundraisers. Aside from more revenue, there are other benefits to having a team fundraiser, including more controlled messaging, increased engagement and more effective management.
Improve peer-to-peer fundraising efforts
Online fundraising provides the environment needed to help grow peer-to-peer campaigns (P2P). P2P fundraisers are those that are started on behalf of your nonprofit by supporters, or ambassadors, to help bring in new support in an easy, effective way. On average, P2P fundraisers have 15 donors on Razoo. That means each fundraiser has the potential to bring in 15 new individuals with whom you can share your organization’s message.
Team fundraising can help improve your organization’s P2P fundraising success online. Fundraisers feel like they are a part of something bigger when they join a team campaign and will engage more deeply in the team’s efforts. It’s in our DNA to be a “team player.”
Plus, features of a team fundraising page are specifically designed to trigger this competitive drive: The use of a display thermometer, which aggregates the donations for all fundraisers on the team, plays a role in helping P2P fundraisers feel they are part of something bigger and engages them more deeply in the team’s efforts.
Team fundraising is effective because it builds camaraderie, while also triggering our instincts to compete. Another prominent feature on team fundraising pages is the leaderboard. Seeing a leaderboard in a transparent way can boost the donations a fundraiser receives. It’s our natural instinct to want to win, regardless of what’s at stake. Wouldn’t seeing that you’re just $10 out of the top spot on your leaderboard motivate you to fundraise more?
Converting donors into ambassadors
Ambassadors proactively engage in efforts to support your organization by soliciting new support. Donors simply react to opportunities to support, without seeking out ways to proactively support the organization.
A key distinction between donors and ambassadors is the autonomy given to ambassadors—you trust this group to not only donate to your organization but to bring in new donors, attend events, communicate your key messages to others, help with social media promotion and participate in a variety of other activities that will deeply engage them in the work of your organization.
Looking to convert more donors into true ambassadors? Encourage them to join a team fundraising effort! This is a good opportunity to give them the autonomy to bring in new support, raise funds and share your organization’s messaging with others in a low-barrier, but meaningful way.
Online fundraising platforms like Razoo make it easy to set up a fundraiser as part of a team while using the organization’s messaging. Easy-to-share tools like Facebook auto-posting and numerous prompts to share on social media also make the transition easy for new ambassadors.
Easy to manage your organization’s online fundraising efforts
Every development professional knows that running a fundraising campaign for a walk/run or other team event is no easy feat—it takes an unmatched level of project management, cheerleading skills, organization and planning. But, we all know most items on your to-do list end up being a time suck – following up with team members throughout the campaign, tracking each group’s checks and cash donations, remembering to post those photos on social media, printing out fliers for that one group that needs more … the list goes on and on!
Wouldn’t it be great if there was a way to free up your time to engage in a meaningful way with team members?
Automate those things on your to-do list that are causing a time suck with an online fundraising tool. With team fundraising, you can track all the donation activity right on your team page and the leaderboard is updated in real-time. Some solutions, like Razoo’s team fundraising tool, will even allow you to automate your team member communications and track each member’s progress as an organizer.
With more free time, you can boost your fundraising potential by prospecting new team members, stewarding major donors and spending more time marketing your team’s efforts to garner media attention.
Plus, as an added bonus, team fundraising campaigns are scalable and easy to duplicate as an annual campaign in your nonprofit’s fundraising strategy. So, you don’t need to re-invent the wheel each year with a brand new campaign.
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Ashley Hieb is a crowdfunding specialist at Razoo, the leading online fundraising platform with a pioneering legacy in charitable giving. Over $550 million has been raised on the platform for causes that matter. Prior to her role at Razoo, Ashley worked at the region’s largest hunger relief organization in Washington, D.C., helping them build their corporate partnerships program. She graduated with a Journalism degree from the University of Georgia in 2011.
