With the big decisions made, it’s time to get the word out—and to arrange key partners who will help you deliver your event.
The best marketing approaches depend on your donor demographics. Traditional techniques like mail and telephone calls work best for older generations. If your audience is younger than, say, 50, you might also want to think about some of the following:
For ages 24-40: Instagram Share your mission, visually! Instagram is a great way to share project updates and the culture of your organization.
For ages 28-50: Facebook Join relevant groups, to share a variety of content types: links, images, and videos. You’ll also need to set aside some funds for paid advertisements if you want your event page to be seen.
For ages 18-mid-30s: Twitter Use tools like Hashtagify.me and Keyhole to find the best hashtags to get the attention of potential attendees. But don’t overdo it: engagement drops if you use more than two hashtags, or tweet more than three times a day.
For professional contacts: LinkedIn LinkedIn is a useful way to attract the attention of professionals and sponsors. Join groups relevant to your cause—but be sure to engage with other posts too, otherwise you will risk being marked as a link spammer.
Content marketing and SEO Lots of nonprofits are having success with a content marketing strategy—sharing powerful, shareable content to capture the imagination. It’s also important that your content can be found on search engines; our event marketing guide can help you with that. Related blog: 7 new ways to connect with donors to promote your event
Learn more about segmenting your donors.
Connect Your email campaign should tell a story. Introduce the reader to the problem you are trying to solve and explain how your fundraiser event is the solution to the issue. Speak personally. Our Fundraising Event Expectation Study shows that most donors respond best to personal emails when it comes to hearing about an upcoming event.
Educate Your email must include the where, when, why, and how of your event. Where will the event take place? When will it take place? Why are you hosting this event? And how will attending your event solve your problem? Give donors a way to write back to you, should they have any additional questions or want to inquire more about getting involved with your mission.
Offer In your email campaign, make early registration offers to potential guests, such as lower attendance fees or entry into a raffle of some kind. Give your email readers something special they wouldn’t get anywhere else.
If your price is too low, you might not attract top-dollar donors…or you might sell out too fast... …but set it too high and you could exclude attendees who’d donate more during an auction or appeal.
You can find your sweet spot by looking at data from previous events.
If people who bought more expensive tickets also donated strongly, the higher ticket price works for you. But if most of your auction and appeal revenue came from attendees with cheaper tickets, lowering your price could increase your income overall.
Know your donors.
Here are a few ways to collect extra data:
During ticket sales, you should plan to have a donation ask to capture early donations and allow donors that want to give on top of their ticket purchase or registration. This is a great way to set someone up for recurring giving, if that is something you offer.
Utilizing an event fundraising software to run your event will save your team stress...and quite a few trees.
The right software will make it easier to handle all your administration, run a smooth event on the night, and build year-round relationships with your donors. In short, they help you worry less, and raise more. That’s why we’ve written an unbiased guide to what you should be looking for in a supplier. You’ll find the link on the right.
And of course, we’d love for you to choose GiveSmart. But there are a lot of silent auction software companies out there today, and the most important thing is that you find the one that’s the best fit for your organization. It’s important because it becomes your hub for donor details, financial information, auction inventory, and more, so it really needs to work for you.
When looking at any fundraising software, identify components that can be used year-round, for instance, ticketing, text-to-donate, online auctions, and other fundraising components that wouldn't cost extra but can enhance a smaller micro-event.
9 questions to ask when purchasing silent auction software
