Posts tagged Events
Fundraising’s Elusive Silver Bullet
May 8th
Recently, my wife and I attended a friend’s fundraising event. An excellent cause; a fun time; a good use of our entertainment dollars. All is good, right?
Not necessarily.
We all know the level of effort that is required to successfully orchestrate any sort of fundraising event. In this case, it was coordinating the hall and the dinner, the silent auction items, the wine that was donated from it’s members for the raffle, the post card announcements, the Master of Ceremonies for the evening, the… well, you get the idea. Sure, money was raised, but at a significant level of invested effort by many of the group’s members.
My friend shared with me a sentiment from his group that is a common refrain coming from most non-profit organizations: “If we just had that one source of revenue that didn’t take all this effort by all these people.” Of course, there isn’t a “Silver Bullet” that will solve all the revenue issues for a non-profit, but there are ways to improve your position, or better yet, ability to earn revenue from other sources.
Look at diversifying the sources of revenue. More >
Do You Know Your Supporters?
Apr 25th
The key to successfully building valuable, long-term relationships with your supporters and as importantly, potential supporters, is in getting to know them. The better you can track their “characteristics” and use that valuable information to produce relevant and appropriate communications, the better you’ll connect with them. Showing them you have taken the time to get to know them will usually encourage them to do the same. When they do, you will of course benefit.
Here’s some introductory questions you should ask yourself:
Outdated Web Content Impacts Revenue
Apr 2nd
Fight the Calendar - Keep Your Web Site Current
If you do a Google search for “outdated websites” you will get over 1.8 million responses. No, not every hit pertains exactly to the negative impacts of pages that have not been updated for some time. However, there are very compelling reasons for keeping your content fresh and not allow any occurrences of “Last updated May 12, 2004″ to display. You know how you feel when you notice very dated content on a web site. Not tending to this important detail is likely to have financial consequences for your organization.
Companies with a web presence that use the web to sell products, do not instill confidence in their customers when information is shown that is obviously dated. Non-profit organizations usually aren’t selling products, but you all sell your message – a message of the good work that you do. The better you sell your message to your current and potential supporters, the more apt they be to help. If you don’t give them current, relevant and actionable information, they will likely look elsewhere.
There are strategies that you can employ to help you stay nimble with the ever-changing calendar, or better yet, prevent yourself from getting into a situation where the site can look old. Let’s look at five ways you can make sure you maintain an “up to date” presence at all times: More >
Continuous Improvement Not Just For Industry
Mar 18th
Continous Improvement For Everyone
There have been many books written about Continuous Improvement
Does business benefit from these disciplines? Absolutely. Does business have an exclusive hold on these benefits? No way!
Non-profit organizations can also benefit from paying attention to continuously improving operations. Nowhere is it more important to reduce costs and improve quality performance than in the resource-constrained non-profit world. It doesn’t take Kaizen Events, Process Mapping, 5S, or Seven Why analyses to benefit from Continuous Improvement attitudes. However, it does take a certain amount of discipline and a few tools to identify and apply creative solutions.
Let’s look at recurring fundraising events.
Board Member Participation Begins with Careful Selection
May 1st
Posted by Click. Buy. Help. in Resources
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Expect Full Participation
Understanding that the commentary posted on Click. Buy. Help. is intended for everyone at a non-profit organization, this topic may be somewhat “touchy.” A substantial difference in perspectives are brought to bear (rightfully so) between Board Members, Executive Directors, paid staff, volunteers, involved constituents, and loyal supporters. This is not meant to “pick on” Board Members. It is merely intended to bring to light an important and required element for success: Participation. So, for the duration of this post, I will be speaking directly to Executive Directors and Board Chairs.
In the past, I have been exposed to situations where participation and attendance at events by the leaders (sometimes Board Members) of non-profit organizations has been lacking. Other times, leaders from the group directly benefitting from the non-profit’s event have even been absent. While you may or may not be able to relate personally, believe me, those circumstances are awkward at best and divisive or worse at the other end of the spectrum.
More >