Go Back to Basics to Maximize Your Fundraising

Fundraising can feel like the most intimidating part of putting on your event. It’s the big goal, the mountain to climb, the point of it all! So meeting your fundraising goals is key to communicating the success of the event to your stakeholders and attendees (even though we know things like awareness are important, too).

Thankfully, partners like Get Fully Funded and Auctria are here to demystify and destress the fundraising process. Get Fully Funded knows how to break down your big goals into small steps, making it easier to scale your fundraising successfully. Auctria provides a platform designed with fundraising events in mind, so each of our tools is built to support you every step of the way. With their coaching and our tools, you’re sure to pull off a successful event without the stressing and guess work.

• Let’s break down a few basics to help you get started on the right foot:
• Make your website easy to find
• Leverage social media
• Give attendees all the information they need
• Keep the event running smoothly

Nailing down these basics with partners like Get Fully Funded and Auctria will help you maximize your fundraising and meet your goals!

Your auction website should link directly from the known, established organization website. Having a separate website for the auction keeps your information more streamlined, but by connecting the two websites, it lends authority to the auction website so attendees know that it’s a trusted source of information.

• Use Auctria to create an event website with a custom URL using your own org and event name so it’s clearly tied to your organization.
• Direct attendees and supporters to your event website so they consistently know where to find event and donation information.
• Link to that website in emails from your organization, social media posts, and any other place you communicate about the event.

Build trust with your supporters by sharing clear, easy to find information. The more trust you build with your supporters through consistency and clarity, the more likely you are to encourage repeat donors, attendees, and supporters. Keep in mind that trust is even more important if you plan on soliciting donations or bids through the website – your attendees want to feel confident in your security and organization before sharing their payment information!

Investing in social media is a great way to target younger demographics, which is useful for encouraging the next generation of repeat supporters for your cause. A multi-channel strategy puts your event and cause in front of a wider audience; here’s two tips to keep in mind:

• Different social media platforms have different generational audiences. While users of all ages are present on every platform, Facebook tends to have an older audience. Instagram, on the other hand, tends to have a younger audience.
• Posting on a variety of social media accounts will get your cause in front of a large audience, but knowing where your primary and secondary audiences are most likely to be can help you get more specific in your communication. For instance, if Gen Z is your secondary audience, you could post more educational content on Instagram to help pull in new audience members.

If you haven’t already invested time into building a social media following, it’s never too late to start! Social media will help the long term growth of your organization, so investing the time sooner rather than later will help you pull in more attendees, educate more people about your cause, and increase your fundraising revenue.

Once you direct attendees to your website, make sure that it’s worth their time. That means that it should be easy to navigate, nicely designed, and all the information should be clear and easy to find. Making sure your auction website matches the branding of your organization, including logo, colors, and font, assures your attendees and partners that they’re in the right place! Plus, transparency around how your donations are collected and where the funds go is essential to retain trust – and it’s easy to communicate that information clearly on your website.

Make sure to choose a template that allows you to customize all of the above options. It should also allow you to post:

• Videos
• Images
• Impact stories
• Infographics

and any other information you think your attendees and partners should know related to the event like where the event is being held – maybe include a Google Map!

Just like having an easy to find website, making sure your website has all the information your attendees need will build trust and emphasize transparency.

Want to see more examples of the websites you can build with Auctria? Check out Auctria’s Current Events page for inspiration!

Once the event rolls around, encourage your supporters to donate by running a smooth, successful event! A happy attendee is an attendee more likely to pull out their wallet – or be a little looser with the purse strings than they originally planned. On the other hand, an unhappy attendee might lose trust in your organization, potentially causing you to lose a supporter.

Here’s a few ways to keep things running smoothly:

• As the date for your event approaches, sell tickets through your website. As with sponsorships, this allows you to easily track inventory and alert potential attendees when tickets are running low.
• Once your auction arrives, direct attendees to your website when bidding opens. This provides a one stop shop for them to bid, receive alerts about the items they bid for, save their payment method for faster, easier bidding, and more.
• Easily add a raffle or other additional benefits! There’s a lot of ways to add extra excitement to an auction event – raffles are one of our favorites because of how successful they typically are.

The road to a successful fundraiser might feel long, but Auctria and Get Fully Funded are here to support you every step of the way. The tips in this article should help you get started with the right mindset to tackle the planning that leads to success. If you’re looking for more support, check out the Get Fully Funded Fundraising Coaching and Free Strategy Sessions! Once you’ve gotten the ball rolling, reach out to Auctria to begin building your website and more.

Special thanks to Laurie Hochman from Auctria for the expert advice.

Auctria is a powerful engine to organize and run your event and auction fundraiser. From in person events to online and from the first donation to the final collection, Auctria helps you stay on top of the details so you can focus on maximizing your fundraising. Over 45,000 event fundraisers have used Auctria to raise over $500M.