#GivingTuesday fundraising ideas that work.

#GivingTuesday is a global movement for nonprofit fundraising. It promotes solidarity among people, organizations and companies. #GivingTuesday is a day to share, to think about others and act and as we like to put it, together we add more! In our last posts around fundraising for nonprofits, we looked at how to set up a GivingTuesday campaign, marketing it and then using the online giving data to analyze the campaign results. In this post let’s look at some #GivingTuesday fundraising ideas that you could use to kickstarts the year-end fundraising.

 Silent auction

A classic … this always works well! Collect gifts you want to place at the auction, like items you might have received from overnight stay in a hotel, restaurant package, cruise package, food baskets – food, cosmetics, autographed sports article, etc. At silent auctions simply arrange the prices on a table where guests enter the amounts they are willing to pay for these items, with an addition of $ x to each bet.

Matching Gifts

In its Fighting Poverty campaign, back in 2010, Oxfam had tied up with Pizza Express as its corporate partner for the campaign. A £5 Pizza Express voucher was given out by Oxfam for every £5 donated to them or spent on their promotion merchandise/products. Pizza Express marked their pledge by giving out £1 to the charity for every main course meal bought there. You could learn from this example and put forth your own Matching Gifts concept.

Tag your friends for good

Create an event on social media where one of your volunteers donates $10 to your cause and then tags 10 friends to accept the challenge of giving. If this idea could be marketed well, it could well turn into a movement. $10 is not much to an individual who wants to create a difference and mutual tagging would spread the word like wildfire.

Selling handmade art, homemade products, pastries

Another classic, selling handmade items you get for free and you sell to your guests. These kind of events can be arranged by your volunteers also and need only a point of sale device like GiveCentral Go to collect donations at events. The key here is the quality of the products offered. A bonus: add recipes or instructions so that they can reproduce these products at home.

Launch a Peer-to-Peer Campaign

#GivingTuesday starts off the year end fundraising season. This is the time when people are full of gratitude and are looking to get involved in some charitable work and give back to society. You could ask your supporters and volunteers to start a campaign or to make a personal fundraising page on #GivingTuesday so that they can help spread your word among their friends and family while contributing to your cause and bringing about a difference. Make sure you give them specific fundraising goals and follow up on their campaign every few days.

Announcing Rewards on reaching specific milestones

You could set up specific goals and then try setting up a reward if that goal is met. Like you could get a video made by a local celebrity to thank your donors or you could send personal goodies to each one who donated. Come up with something innovative and set targets. This could add motivation to your cause.

#Unselfie Movement

The #Unselfie Movement gained popularity following Typhoon Haiyan. You could learn from this movement and ask your supporters to upload a picture on social media that shows how and why they are giving back. You can start off with your own staff and asking their friends and families to do it. You could ask your supporters to include a link in your donation page.

These were a few examples and ideas for you to look at and learn from. You could take cues from all our previous above blog posts on #GivingTuesday and make the perfect start to your year end fundraising.

Mega outdoor musical workout

These events are gaining such popularity with fundraising. You invite people to a large municipal park. Registration $ 2 or $ 3. A professional volunteer instructor provides a workout lesson. You provide music and Hop! In advance group training.

 Sale of books

Collect used books from your volunteers, donors and sell them at a low price.

Canine grooming

A local grooming salon becomes your partner for a Saturday afternoon grooming small dogs, and it becomes at the same time an opportunity for exchange and networking between friends of small animal

Hosting a fundraising event in your neighborhood is a great way to involve them. Sadly, there are quite a few events that do not see as much success and are barely able to raise enough to cover costs of hosting events. The only way to avoid this possibility is proper planning and setting smart goals. Keep in mind the people in your community and what type of event they are most likely to support.

– Pick a theme wisely. It should be exciting and yet though provoking because you want your donors to remember you and the cause – so choose wisely!

– Think about the ‘ask’ and how to present your cause. It is often the beginning of a relationship with your donors.  To talk about an issue effortlessly and drive people to action, you need more than passion! You need to be well researched and be prepared to address any queries your prospect donors might have. Don’t forget to offer them something for their contribution.

-Keep it simple and short. Don’t make your donors wait. Keep your fundraising event short and your speech to-the-point. Give them enough time to process the new information if they don’t immediately want to contribute. It is okay to leave them wanting more!

-Most importantly! Don’t forget to thank your donors.

The basics of planning and targeting for an audience learnt from these #GivingTuesday fundraising ideas are also relevant for other seasonal community events. If you need more resources on how to grow digitally your GivingTuesday and Year-End Fundraising events, check out these resources.