How Online Fundraising Connects Your Community of Support
From peer-to-peer fundraisers to virtual events to crowdfunding campaigns, online fundraisers secure valuable revenue and make giving to your organization more accessible.
While in-person fundraisers and face-to-face gatherings help forge connections, these types of events aren’t always practical for all of your supporters. Taking your fundraisers online enables supporters to participate from anywhere.
With these benefits, online fundraisers are the perfect addition to fundraising calendars for schools, nonprofits, churches, sports teams, and other charitable organizations. To help you decide if online fundraising is right for your organization, this guide will explore the top benefits and how to implement the needed tools to run a virtual campaign.
Online Fundraising Benefits
Boosted Accessibility
Not everyone has the ability to travel to a designated fundraising venue. Whether they live far away, are too busy, or have medical concerns that limit travel, these supporters can still get involved with your organization’s virtual fundraisers.
Both donors and participants can support your organization from the comfort of their own homes. For instance, 99Pledges provides an example of a Read-a-thon. Compare the low-tech and online versions of this popular fundraiser for schools:
- Held traditionally: Students receive a written reading log and pledge log they bring to friends and family to earn donations. In this scenario, students are responsible for manually tracking and updating both of these pieces of paper for the entire duration of your fundraiser. If they get damaged or lost, students will need to request a new one and start over.
- Held online: Students are given accounts on your Read-a-thon software to record their reading progress and collect pledge donations from friends and family. With this system, all necessary documents are stored in one place and can be accessed as long as the student has a computer. Plus, by holding the donation pledge form online, students will be incentivized to expand their fundraising efforts by using online means to reach out to even more donors.
Essentially, an online Read-a-thon is more convenient and accessible than a traditional one. This concept applies to a range of other fundraisers by helping increase participation and reduce supply costs.
Improved Communication
Your organization can only host so many in-person gatherings per year, and it’s easy to lose touch with your community between events. For schools, this tends to hit them especially hard during the summer months when fundraisers might not be top of mind.
By hosting online fundraisers, you can get in touch with supporters at any time and keep communication going strong. For instance, you might host a crowdfunding campaign and send supporters continual updates on how much you’ve raised to keep them up-to-date and excited about your fundraiser.
Plus, technology also helps your fundraising participants stay in touch. For instance, teams often host campaigns where each member fundraisers individually, like a product sale or peer-to-peer fundraiser. When their progress is recorded online on a shared platform, team members can check in with and motivate each other.
Increased Audience
Online fundraisers have essentially infinite geographic reach, and they can be hosted over longer periods of time, allowing as wide an audience as possible to participate.
Here are a few fundraisers and how they can reach a wider audience by being held virtually:
- Merchandise sales. A merchandise booth at an in-person event will only reach the people who attend and, when it comes to apparel, people whose sizes you have available. In contrast, an online store can accommodate all visitors and continually bring in revenue year-round. Plus, you can sell online-only items like charity eCards.
- Auctions. By adding an online component to your auction, supporters can place bids from their phones. This means you can host your auctions over the course of multiple days, driving up bidding and providing more opportunities for new supporters to jump in and place their bids.
- Challenges. Challenge your supporter community to complete specific tasks or host a-thon events where they try to complete an activity for as long as possible. When hosted virtually, participants can plan their approach and get started when they feel ready.
By expanding your reach, you can forge valuable community connections. These donors will continuously support your online and may also show up to your in-person activities when they can.
Implementing Your New Fundraising Software
To run an online fundraiser, you need software. The first step in implementing a new fundraising platform is to assess your needs. There’s a wide variety of online fundraisers to choose from, so consider what types will work best for your organization and what software facilitates those fundraisers.
To help you get a handle on the range of solutions available, Double the Donation’s fundraising software guide walks through several types of platforms:
- Online donation forms
- Peer-to-peer fundraising pages
- Matching gift software
- Payment processors
- Donor management systems
- Nonprofit event tools
- Donor acknowledgment software
This list doesn’t even include specialized software, like Read-a-thon or auction tools! Be aware that there are all-in-one platforms, but these solutions may not have the same robust features that a dedicated platform would.
Once you know what fundraisers you want to host, you can research vendors. Assess vendors based on their tool’s features and your budget, as well as other considerations, like the level of technical support provided and if a platform will integrate with the rest of your technology. Narrow down your list of top choices to three or four top providers before requesting demos to see each solution in action.
Online fundraisers are a core part of modern fundraising. They earn your organization essential revenue and allow your entire community to support you. Get started with your first online fundraiser by assessing your needs and researching the tools you’ll need.
