Establishing an ongoing, online giving page on your site will al- low you to solicit and collect donations year-round, not just at your fundraising event. If you solicit donations for a variety of causes, create pages for each cause. Make sure that you have a description of the cause and, if possible, descriptive images on the donation page to remind online donors of why they are there. And make sure that you offer a secure way to donate funds to protect your donors from possible fraud.
Including your sponsors on your online giving page will give them more marketing exposure and give them compelling reasons to continue being a sponsor. Include sponsor logos and messages on the page, and review the copy with your sponsors to make sure their message aligns with yours.
segments of your donor list on other issues pertinent to your organization. This ongoing dialog will create a stronger relationship between your organization and your donors - but be prepared to take action based on their input.
Website Promotion Online Surveys
Prepare your post-event survey before the event so you can field it while your attendees’ memories are fresh. Event attendees have a unique viewpoint that you and your team don’t have, and their comments can help you substantially improve next year’s event. Surveys help you to identify what went well (so you can repeat it) and what didn’t go well (so you can avoid it).
Start your survey by thanking attendees for their attendance.
Tell your guests that their feedback is valuable and will help you improve next year’s event. To maximize the number of responses, keep the survey short enough that a recipient can complete it in ten minutes or less. You’ll learn more - faster - if you conduct an online survey. Sur- vey tools like SurveyMonkey and Zoomerang are easy to use, allow you to deploy a survey quickly, and enable you to tabulate results fast.
Mix closed- and open-ended questions on your survey. For closed-ended questions like “Did we successfully communicate our mission at the event?” include a selection of possible answers, such as “Strongly Disagree, Disagree, Agree, Strongly Agree.” This will help you to pinpoint the degree of attendee satisfaction so you know how much emphasis needs to be placed on every issue at next year’s event.
Keep open-ended questions as specific as possible. Rather than simply asking, “How can we make next year’s event better?” you can segment that question into categories like entertainment, venue, food and beverage, sound and lighting, etc. You’ll get much more actionable answers.
Also, consider fielding online surveys to your donor list or
Promote your website with every form of communication, in- cluding direct mail, phone conversations, and email messages. Make your site the default location for the latest information about events, fundraising campaigns, and organization news. Create a standard email signature template for you, your col- leagues, and volunteers that includes general contact information, your site URL, and a follow-up teaser. For the teaser, you can say, “Click here to sign up for our email newsletter” or “Click here to register online for our annual dinner.” Make sure the email signa- ture is always up to date. Train staff and volunteers to conclude phone conversations by reminding people of the promotion mentioned in your current email signature and pointing them to your website for more infor- mation. Get others to spread the word for you. Ask partners, peers, colleagues, etc. to reach out to everyone in their core groups and plug your event, cause, and organization via their own email lists or bulletin board services. To do this effectively, you may want to write a short description including the usual who, what, when, where, and why. Remember to include your URL for further infor- mation.
Many nonprofit organizations are enjoying the benefits of using
the Web to supplement or replace traditional marketing efforts. When assessing the relative merits of these tools for your organiza- tion, remember that it’s okay to start small and build over time.
Nannette Vilushis has over 20 years of technology sales and mar- keting experience. Prior to joining Greater Giving (
www.greatergiving. com), she was senior product marketing manager at Sage Software. Previously, Nannette was a senior manager at Citrix Systems, where she managed a team that planned, promoted, and executed over 400 marketing and training events a year. Her background also includes marketing and program management positions at IBM and a Carnegie Mellon University spin-off, with responsibilities ranging from public re- lations and marketing programs to event strategy. She is a member of the Advisory Board of the Heartwood Institute, a non-profit organization providing literature-based ethics and character education programs for children.
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