Your school undoubtedly enjoys supporting the programs and activities that your students love, and you should be able to continue to do so. But as an educator or member of the PTA, your time is limited. You have many tasks vying for your attention and it can be difficult to balance everything and still perform each task well.
School fundraising should not be another source of stress in your life. Fundraising for all of your kids and teens’ favorite programs can be fun and engaging for you, your students, and your community. However, to avoid becoming overwhelmed with stress as you organize the fundraiser, utilize an effective event fundraising software.
To cultivate a fundraiser that kids will want to participate in and promote, you should:
- Plan a fun event.
- Stay organized.
- Encourage personalization.
- Allow healthy competition.
- Offer incentives.
- Make it shareable.
If you follow these 6 best tips for school fundraising, you will be blasting through your fundraising goals in no time—and getting your kids involved in the fundraising process. So, without further ado, let’s start learning how to create the best and most engaging fundraiser your school has ever seen!
1. Plan a fun event.
The best way to guarantee your students actually want to get involved in your fundraiser is to make it fun and simple. It is entirely possible that the goal of raising money is not enough to get the students to engage with the fundraiser.
Depending on the age of the kids, they may not quite grasp the importance of money in making sure the programs you provide can still be offered year after year.
To ensure the students value the fundraiser, try planning your fundraiser around a fun event. To get some inspiration for fundraising ideas, click here.
A Fun Run or Jog-a-thon is an excellent example of a fun and easy event that’s well-suited for school-aged children.
The concept of a Fun Run or Jog-a-thon is simple. The student should recruit friends, adults, and family to pledge money for each unit of distance that they run or donate a lump sum for the entire distance. This could look like:
- Uncle Joe pledges $3 for every lap ran by Timmy S.
- Janet pledges $2 for every half mile ran by Ellie H.
- Charlie donates $50 to Louis’ Fun Run fund.
An effective walk-a-thon allows for the kids to hang out with their friends and stay active while supporting their school.
2. Stay organized.
One of the hardest parts of organizing and promoting a large-scale school fundraiser is making sure all of your data stays organized. You may be unfamiliar with fundraising techniques and strategies—and that’s completely normal!
To stay organized and properly manage the information you gather from your Fun Run or Jog-a-thon you should employ a Fun Run/Jog-a-thon fundraising software, like 99Pledges.
The best software will track and manage the pledges made to your Fun Run or Jog-a-thon so that you don’t have to! Yes, you heard that correctly. You will never have to sit with a calculator adding up the money that each pledgor owes to your child’s fundraising page.
This technology will allow you to load each child’s information into the program and create a custom-made, individualized fundraising page for supporters to donate or pledge money to.
If you want to get kids and teens involved invested in your fundraising efforts, you need to have an organized system that can easily integrate students into its process.
3. Encourage personalization.
While you are all fundraising for the same end result, your fundraiser participants may have many reasons for becoming involved. Some people might participate because they are passionate about the cause or the program that your event benefits. Meanwhile, others may want to compete for incentives or simply participate in your fun event.
Whatever the reason for their participation, you should encourage students to personalize their fundraising page to entice more supporters.
With the right software tool, each student will be able to fundraise separately for a common goal. While some fields on their unique page may be consistent throughout all the supporters, such as the:
- School name or program
- Description of the fundraiser
- Per participant goal
- Date of the fundraiser
The students or their parents should still have the option to write a fundraising letter that offers an impassioned appeal for donations and pledges that will be more likely to draw in friends and family supporters.
This fundraising letter should:
- Describe the fundraising event in their own words.
- Explain what the fundraiser benefits.
- Convey the student’s reason for participating.
- Provide donation information.
- Thank the supporter in advance.
It is not likely that friends and family members will donate or pledge money simply because it is a good cause. They want the emotional appeal—they want to donate and pledge money because it is something the student is passionate about.
Feel free to encourage your students to make this fundraiser their own. This will not only cause the students to become more invested in the outcome of the fundraiser, but it will also boost your fundraising revenue!
4. Allow healthy competition.
One of the benefits of your PTA hosting a participant-based fundraising event is that the work is divided up among a wide range of people. While we know it can be difficult to motivate such a wide group of kids, make sure you don’t underestimate the power of healthy competition.
Friendly competition among friends has the potential to greatly enhance your fundraising revenue and encourage students to work hard to gain supporters.
The students should be able to have some sort of visual that represents how much each student is fundraising. A good software tool will display top donations that can serve as motivation for students to seek out additional support for their pages.
If you choose to do a walk-a-thon, or any variation of the event-a-thon, it is easy for the students to see how hard their peers are working. The student may be more inclined to walk further or read more or hit more baseballs if they can see how well other participants are doing.
While good, old-fashioned competition is one of the best motivators in fundraising among kids and teens, you must remember to provide some incentives that will further encourage the students to put effort into the campaign.
5. Offer incentives.
If you want to modify your fundraising strategy to maximize the number of students who are meaningfully engaging with your fundraiser, you should offer incentives to participants. Kids and teens love free stuff and added perks— but then again, who doesn’t?
To make competition a sustainable motivator and to help students stay excited about your fundraiser, you must give them a light at the end of the tunnel. They need something to look forward to and something to latch onto as they fundraise.
Don’t worry. The incentives don’t need to be elaborate or expensive, just something that will appeal to the kids and teens participating in your fundraising event.
Potential incentives you may want to offer include:
- A pizza party for the classes with the highest participation rates.
- Giving a percentage of the total earnings to the class who raises the most money.
- Allowing the class to allocate the money they earn above their goal to a project of their own.
Depending on the age of your students, they may respond better to different incentives. Make sure you offer incentives that you know your students will love and want to achieve.
An easy way to incentivize all of your students at once is to provide fundraising team t-shirts. These can be custom made based on class, grade, or school depending on the size of your fundraiser. The kids will love the free merch and be excited to wear it, which will, in turn, promote the fundraiser.
To see how you can increase excitement in your fundraiser with a tangible incentive, check out Bonfire’s custom school shirts.
6. Make it shareable.
The best tactic to include in your fundraising plan when hosting a school fundraiser that kids and teens will want to be a part of is to make it shareable on social media. Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and so many more social media platforms have taken over how people communicate with one another and share news that is important to them.
Depending on the age of your students they may have their own social media accounts or, at the very least, it is likely their parents have accounts. Enabling students to share the fundraiser with remote friends and family members and to engage with the fundraiser on their own terms will make it more likely that the students actually want to participate.
You will be able to reach more people and encourage the students to promote their own fundraising page if the event-a-thon software that you use allows mobile sharing of personalized pages, your students and their parents are sure to want to spread the word about the school fundraiser.
Your school fundraiser should be easy and fun for everyone involved—student, teachers, parents, and supporters alike! With the right software, your walk-a-thon or other exciting fundraising events can engage your students and increase your fundraising revenue.
This post was contributed by Brad Dowhaniuk.
Brad Dowhaniuk is the co-founder of 99Pledges, which provides schools and teams with an easy-to-use, web-based fundraising solution to manage and drive success in Fun Runs, jog-a-thons, baseball hit-a-thons, and much more.
GiveGab Chooses Double the Donation for Matching Gifts Integration
/in Learning Center, Company Updates /by Adam WeingerIn an exciting move, Double the Donation is proud to announce that GiveGab has released a new integration with Double the Donation, the leading provider of matching gifts and volunteer grant software to nonprofits and educational institutions.
The integration connects Double the Donation to GiveGab Enterprise, GiveGab’s year-round giving solution. GiveGab users can easily integrate Double the Donation’s automated matching gift identification and follow-up tools into their GiveGab Enterprise online donation forms.
As donors progress through a GiveGab Enterprise online donation form integrated with Double the Donation, the system goes to work matching donors with the corporate matching gift and volunteer grant programs they’re eligible for.
“Nonprofits are leaving $4-7 million in matching gift revenue on the table every year,” said Adam Weinger, President of Double the Donation. “Double the Donation and GiveGab Enterprise are able to help nonprofits close that gap by addressing donor awareness surrounding these matching gift programs.”
Setup takes minutes, and once the integration is established, nonprofits will immediately begin automatically identifying more matching gift-eligible donors who give. Double the Donation and GiveGab also guide donors through the matching gift submission process.
Activate in Seconds and Start Raising More from Matching Gifts!
When you open a Double the Donation account, the Double the Donation support team will help you through the process of activating and embedding the Double the Donation tool into your GiveGab Enterprise landing pages. With friendly and timely step-by-step support, you’ll be up and running and ready for gift matching in no time!
Once the Double the Donation tool is set up, donors will be able to use the autocomplete search function to find their employer and begin the gift-matching process.
When donors find that they are eligible for a match from their company and are led straight to the company matching gift site from your confirmation page, they are likely to take action and get their gift doubled or even tripled!
Looking to learn more? Check out our in-depth integration guide to get started!
Drive More Matches to Completion with Double the Donation!
With Double the Donation now integrated with GiveGab, helping donors double or triple their contribution to your cause has never been easier. The integration gives you the tools you need to identify match-eligible donors, empower them to pursue a match from their company, drive those matches to completion, and increase your fundraising revenue.
The GiveGab and Double the Donation integration has several features that go beyond just boosting nonprofits’ matching gift revenue. The joint solution also features the following:
Ready to learn more about the Give Gab and Double the Donation integration? Request a demo today to get started and revolutionize the way you do fundraising with gift matching.
About GiveGab: GiveGab is the #1 digital solution for Giving Days and year-round fundraising tailored to cause-based organizations, community foundations, education institutions, hospital foundations, and public media outlets. GiveGab offers a complete suite of products and services that make online fundraising easy, enjoyable, and effective.
About Double the Donation: Automate your matching gift fundraising with the industry-leading solution from Double the Donation. The Double the Donation platform provides nonprofits with tools to identify match-eligible donors, drive matches to completion, and gain actionable insights. Double the Donation integrates directly into donation forms, CRMs, social fundraising software, and other nonprofit technology solutions to capture employment information and follow up appropriately with donors about matching gifts. To learn more about Double the Donation, visit https://doublethedonation.com and request a demo at https://Double the Donation.com/demo-request/.
RaiseDonors Selects Double the Donation as Exclusive Matching Gifts Provider
/in Learning Center, Company Updates /by Adam WeingerDouble the Donation is excited to share the news of a new matching gifts integration with RaiseDonors and Double the Donation’s leading matching gift and volunteer grant software.
Double the Donation offers the industry-leading matching gift automation tool for nonprofits ready to take their matching gift revenue to the next level. When integrated with RaiseDonors online fundraising forms, Double the Donation automatically identifies and follows up with matching gift-eligible donors without requiring any additional action from nonprofits stretched for time.
Adding the Double the Donation streamlined company name search field to RaiseDonors online fundraising forms allows nonprofits to capture donor matching gift eligibility, then automatically present matching gift next steps on the confirmation page and in follow-up email messaging.
“The key to increasing matching gift revenue is to address the lack of donor awareness about matching gift and volunteer grant programs,” said Adam Weinger, President of Double the Donation. “The Double the Donation integration with RaiseDonors online fundraising forms automatically identifies matching gift opportunities even donors had no idea they were eligible for, then guides them through their company’s specific process to get their gift matched.”
Each company with a matching gift program has different program requirements and processes for employees to take to get their gift matched. And with 65% of Fortune 500 companies and many others offering these programs, there are a lot of forms and guidelines to keep track of. Double the Donation’s database of matching gift companies takes the guesswork and time out of the matching gift process, leaving nonprofits time to focus on top opportunities.
Nonprofits can take advantage of this vast database of matching gift programs automatically in the donation process with the integration between RaiseDonors and Double the Donation.
Activate in Seconds and Start Raising More from Matching Gifts!
Double the Donation can easily be accessed through the RaiseDonors platform. This integration only takes seconds, providing a hassle-free method to fuel your fundraising efforts. To activate the integration, first log in to your RaiseDonors account. Then, navigate to the “Integrations” option to access the “Double the Donation” tab.
If you already have a Double the Donation account, then you can simply enter your public and private credentials to integrate the systems. If you need an account set up, then you can fill out the contact form that appears on that page. This will allow the Double the Donation team to provide you with a Double the Donation account and credentials.
If you do not have a Double the Donation account, simply fill out the form on this page.
Double the Donation gives you the option to activate the software across all of your donation forms with the press of a button. If you would like to add Double the Donation functionality to individual donation forms, then you can configure this in settings. These two options give you the freedom to choose which of your donation pages are equipped with the power of Double the Donation and to customize what donors see on those donation pages! Nonprofits are able to change the text that appears around the Double the Donation tool. Now your organization can configure messaging to tell donors if they are eligible for a matching gift along with how to proceed based on the information they entered in the search bar.
After the setup is complete, donors will see an option to list their employer on donation forms. This feature includes a streamlined search tool that suggests company names. This allows donors to select their employer quickly and easily, keeping them on task during the donation process.
You can also equip your confirmation pages with the power of Double the Donation. This tool auto-populates with the company entered during the donation process. Don’t worry if the donor skipped this step during the initial donation. The streamlined search tool can be placed on the confirmation page too! Then, the confirmation page will display relevant matching gift information alongside a direct link to the donor’s specific matching gift submission page. That means that your donors could submit a matching gift request immediately after the donation process, leading to increased revenue for your organization.
Once your donor selects their employer whether it be on the donation form or the confirmation page, Double the Donation will scan a detailed database to check for gift matching eligibility. The donor will then be contacted via Double the Donation’s automated email outreach and supplied with some guidance on the matching gifts process! The email provides simple and specific steps to complete a gift matching contribution, making it quick and easy for the donor to drive their matches to completion.
Looking to learn more? Check out our in-depth integration guide to get started!
Drive More Matching Gifts to Completion with Double the Donation Matching!
Double the Donation provides specialized tools to ensure that users enjoy an easy yet valuable gift matching experience.
This means that you can:
The Double the Donation integration is a great way to drive donations while utilizing the valuable tools from RaiseDonors. Check out the demo page to schedule a personalized session and see this integration in action.
About RaiseDonors: RaiseDonors uses high-converting donation pages, numerous integrations, and valuable analytics reports to make online fundraising easy for growing nonprofits. Founded in 2014, RaiseDonors helps upgrade your giving experience with high-converting donation pages so that you can fundraise more while spending less. To learn more about RaiseDonors, check out their website at https://raisedonors.com/
About Double the Donation: Automate your matching gift fundraising with the industry-leading solution from Double the Donation. The Double the Donation platform provides nonprofits with tools to identify match-eligible donors, drive matches to completion, and gain actionable insights. Double the Donation integrates directly into donation forms, CRMs, social fundraising software, and other nonprofit technology solutions to capture employment information and follow up appropriately with donors about matching gifts. To learn more visit https://doublethedonation.com/get-a-demo/
Double the Donation Joins the Ellucian Partner Community with Ethos Connectivity
/in Learning Center, Company Updates /by Adam WeingerDouble the Donation is proud to join Ellucian, the leading provider of software and services built to power higher education, in partnership to offer a new technical integration. Double the Donation maintains the industry-leading matching gift automation tool for nonprofits and educational institutions. Through this integration, university clients are able to access valuable matching gift and employer information directly from their CRM Advance account.
When connected to CRM Advance, Double the Donation Matching automatically scans gift records for matching gift eligibility. The system then delivers the correct employer matching gift forms and instructions to each donor, following up appropriately to drive matches to completion. Donors’ employer matching gift data then flows from those follow ups back into CRM Advance, allowing university clients to monitor their matching gifts strategy from a single platform.
“Time-saving automation is the key to the value of this joint solution,” said Adam Weinger, President of Double the Donation. “Double the Donation Matching shoulders the burden of research, outreach, and reporting that our clients were doing manually. That leaves time for advanced reporting and targeting manual communications to top matching gift opportunities.”
The integration connects Ellucian CRM Advance and Double the Donation in a 2-way data sync. This seamless integration consolidates donor data and makes increasing fundraising revenue a quick and painless process for higher education institutions.
Activate in Seconds and Start Raising More from Matching Gifts!
Thanks to Ellucian Ethos integration, this powerful automation can be activated in minutes. Just enter your Ellucian API key in the Double the Donation Matching dashboard, map your 2-way sync to the appropriate fields, and start matching gifts!
Once institutions are set up and ready to go, they can track match-eligible donors’ data and drive matches to completion as well as keep an eye out for trends—and they don’t ever have to leave their CRM Advance platform to see matching gift insights. If organizations use customer experience webpages with CRM Advance, the Double the Donation search field and plugin can easily be placed in those pages as well.
Since Double the Donation handles the matching gift identification and follow-up automatically, gift officers and advancement offices can dedicate their valuable time to top opportunities instead of manual outreach.
Drive More Matching Gifts to Completion with Double the Donation!
Corporate matching gifts are an underutilized source of fundraising for institutions of higher education. Although 15-19 million individuals in the United States are eligible for matching gift programs, $4-7 billion in matching gift revenue goes unclaimed each year. The joint solution of Double the Donation and CRM Advance addresses this gap in client potential to turn match eligibility into matched donations.
Learn more about Double the Donation at https://doublethedonation.com/ or schedule a private demo of Double the Donation Matching at https://doublethedonation.com/get-a-demo/.
About Ellucian: Ellucian is one of the world’s leading provider of software and services that power the essential work of colleges and universities. More than 2,500 institutions in nearly 50 countries rely on Ellucian to enhance operations and enrich the student experience for over 18 million students. Learn more at www.ellucian.com.
About Double the Donation: Automate your matching gift fundraising with the industry-leading solution from Double the Donation. The Double the Donation platform provides nonprofits with tools to identify match-eligible donors, drive matches to completion, and gain actionable insights. Double the Donation Matching integrates directly into donation forms, CRMs, social fundraising software, and other nonprofit technology solutions to capture employment information and follow up appropriately with donors about matching gifts. To learn more about Double the Donation, visit https://doublethedonation.com and request a demo at https://doublethedonation.com/get-a-demo/.
OneCause Announces Double the Donation Matching Gifts Integration with Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Platform
/in Learning Center, Company Updates /by Adam WeingerDouble the Donation is proud to bring OneCause, a leader in mobile and social fundraising, into the Double the Donation partnership ecosystem with an integration into the OneCause Peer-to-Peer Fundraising solution.
With the combined power of the integration, nonprofits can activate and manage their matching gift efforts with ease without even leaving the OneCause Peer-to-Peer Fundraising platform.
“An essential feature of the new OneCause integration is the match forecast,” said Adam Weinger, President of Double the Donation. “With this integration, donors see the highlights of their match expectancy before they donate, which encourages them to take advantage of the matching gift process. Then, Double the Donation delivers their forms and instructions right to their inbox.”
The OneCause and Double the Donation integration already has traction with users of both Double the Donation and OneCause’s services. Susan G. Komen Greater New York City has implemented the Double the Donation integration for Komen Greater NYC Race for the Cure, which launched in early 2019.
The Double the Donation and OneCause integration tackles the most substantial obstacle standing between nonprofits and their potential matching gift revenue: donor awareness. Even though 15-19 million individuals in the United States are eligible for employee matching gifts, $4-7 billion in matching gift revenue goes unclaimed annually.
Activate in Seconds and Start Raising More from Matching Gifts!
The activation process is quick and easy thanks to the native integration of Double the Donation into the OneCause platform. All a nonprofit organization has to do after acquiring a Double the Donation account is to plug in their API keys into the designated field of the OneCause platform and they are ready to go!
Activation is easy with a simple API key plugin.
After this step, donors will be able to easily find if they are match-eligible through the autocomplete search field powered by Double the Donation. A match-eligible donor making a contribution through the integrated Double the Donation-OneCause Peer-to-Peer Fundraising form will know before they even check out whether their gift is eligible to be matched.
Lead donors to their employer’s matching gift program.
Double the Donation’s signature streamlined employer search field prompts the donor to search for their company’s name, then automatically calculates and presents their match expectancy. The Double the Donation tool makes gift matching a one-stop-shop for the donor, streamlining the matching gift process and raising the nonprofit’s probability of receiving a match!
Looking to learn more? Check out our in-depth integration guide to get started!
Drive More Matching Gifts to Completion with Double the Donation!
OneCause is dedicated to helping nonprofits explore creative ways to raise funds through peer-to-peer events, auctioning initiatives, and more! The Double the Donation integration now expands the OneCause digital fundraising mission to include corporate gift matching, with features including:
Interested in increasing your fundraising revenue in exciting, creative ways that engage your donors without asking them to reach back into their own wallets? Request a demo today to get started with corporate gift matching through OneCause and Double the Donation.
About OneCause: OneCause is a powerful fundraising solution that delivers innovative, easy-to-use software for auctions, peer-to-peer, text2give, events, payments, and more. Learn more at www.onecause.com.
About Double the Donation: Automate your matching gift fundraising with the industry-leading solution from Double the Donation. The Double the Donation platform provides nonprofits with tools to identify match-eligible donors, drive matches to completion, and gain actionable insights. Double the Donation integrates directly into donation forms, CRMs, social fundraising software, and other nonprofit technology solutions to capture employment information and follow up appropriately with donors about matching gifts. To learn more about Double the Donation, visit https://doublethedonation.com and request a demo at https://doublethedonation.com/get-a-demo/
Arreva Chooses Double the Donation for Integrated Matching Gifts Provider
/in Company Updates, Learning Center, Press Releases /by Adam WeingerDouble the Donation is proud to announce a new strategic partnership with Arreva, trusted leader in fully integrated online fundraising and donor relationship management software.
Arreva clients may now activate matching gift functionality directly from Arreva’s fundraising software and include a streamlined matching gift search tool with the click of a button through Double the Donation, a robust, fully-automated matching gifts platform.
Susan Packard Orr, chairman of Arreva adds “Arreva is dedicated to our clients’ success by helping them optimize their fundraising through best-in-class technology and fundraising best practices. With Double the Donation, Arreva clients now have a powerful new tool to increase average donation size and volume without asking more from donors. The streamlined integrated donor experience helps nonprofit organizations run successful matching gift programs with much less effort and greater results.”
Donors giving through the Arreva online fundraising form, integrated with Double the Donation, will be automatically screened for matching gift eligibility and their transaction and employer information will be recorded in the Arreva platform.
“Lack of donor awareness is the number one reason for the $4-7 billion in matching gift revenue left on the table every year,” said Adam Weinger, President of Double the Donation. “We are delighted to be working with Arreva and their many clients. Our strategic partnership with Arreva and integration of Double the Donation with their fundraising platform closes the donor awareness gap for organizations, allowing them to significantly increase their matching gift revenue using Arreva’s robust software.”
The streamlined, frictionless integration between Arreva and Double the Donation ensures that donors take advantage of the matching gift programs for which they’re eligible, helping nonprofit organizations maximize their fundraising opportunities.
Activate in Seconds and Start Raising More in Matching Gifts!
Activating your Double the Donation account within your organization’s Arreva platform is quick and easy. With the new native integration, all you have to do is enter in your public and private API keys to activate and get started.
Once the Double the Donation tool is active on your donation and confirmation pages, donors can easily search their employer’s name using the Double the Donation autocomplete search function. Encouraged by the possibility of a match, donors are likely to increase their donation amount!
The easy search function prompt on both the donation page and confirmation page allows donors to go straight from your organization’s confirmation page to their company matching gift application form, streamlining the donor’s journey to doubling their donation!
Looking to learn more? Check out our in-depth integration guide to get started!
Drive Matches to Completion with Double the Donation!
Arreva and Double the Donation are now able to help nonprofits further their mission by making the gift matching process an easy and streamlined experience for both the donor and the nonprofits they support. The Double the Donation tool helps organizations identify match-eligible donors, lead donors to their employer’s donation pages, and drive matches to completion to help donors double or even triple their contribution.
Arreva aims to help their clients optimize their fundraising efforts in creative ways that allow the nonprofit to focus helping their communities instead of worrying about finding the funds to do so. The Double the Donation integration helps Arreva accomplish that mission with features like the following:
Request a demo today to get started with improving the giving experience for you and your donors.
About Arreva: Arreva is a trusted advisor and market leader of fundraising and donor relationship management software. ExceedFurther, Arreva’s All-in-One, Cloud-based, Integrated Solution, is helping thousands of nonprofits worldwide further their mission, transform fundraising, and cultivate relationships with donors and constituents. Visit www.arreva.com for more.
About Double the Donation: Automate your matching gift fundraising with the industry-leading solution from Double the Donation. The Double the Donation platform provides nonprofits with tools to identify match-eligible donors, drive matches to completion, and gain actionable insights. Double the Donation integrates directly into donation forms, CRMs, social fundraising software, and other nonprofit technology solutions to capture employment information and follow up appropriately with donors about matching gifts. To learn more about Double the Donation, visit https://doublethedonation.com and request a demo at https://doublethedonation.com/get-a-demo/.
8 Ways to Make Your Nonprofit Website More Accessible
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerThis post was contributed by Elevation and written by Lauren Uhl.
Today in the United States, all those with disabilities are entitled to equal access in public facilities. This means building ramps and elevators, accommodating bathrooms with handicapped stalls, sectioning off one/two parking spots in the front, and more. Think of the internet and your website this same way: you have to intentionally consider those with disabilities when creating and maintaining your website. Such actions should not be considered laborious favor: they are, in fact, legally required. Those who proactively consider accessibility measures on their website will allow all types of users to partake in their online experience, whilst avoiding potential lawsuits. Check out these 8 ways to make your website more accessible.
Download this information in a handy infographic here!
What is Website Accessibility?
Let’s backup a little bit: what is website accessibility all about? Similar to accessibility in the real world, website accessibility is designed to accommodate diverse users on the internet. This includes those with auditory, visual, neurological, physical, and speech special needs, as well as those with old age and slow internet. Nonprofit website designers must consider ways their color layouts, text content, and overall structure can reach these diverse populations.
Accompany color indicated text with additional indicating text/images
We use color indications in many places around the world: with stoplights, warning signs, and more. While it may feel natural to change content colors based on connotations (i.e. red means stop/important, green means good/safe…) those maintaining and designing websites should keep colorblind, visually impaired, and epileptic populations in mind. Of course, you can change the text color for meaning, but that should not be the only indication of meaning. This means (for example) marking important content in red AND accompanying it with additional text that reinforces the text’s importance.
Use appropriate contrast on text and images
It’s also important to color contrast on your website. According to Web Accessibility In Mind, texts and images should maintain a contrast ratio of 4:5. While larger text requires a contrast of at least 3:1, smaller text, images, and logotypes, in general, are exempt from such requirement. You can check your color contrast here for more information.
Use a minimum font size of 16
The bread and butter of your nonprofit website is (most likely) the text content. Therefore, it’s absolutely essential that the text is accessible.
The first and probably easiest fix is making all text a minimum size of 16. Of course, you can make the text bigger, but any smaller may result in a legal issue.
Add closed captions and/or transcripts for videos
Next, ensure that all videos have closed captions and a manuscript to accompany it. That way, those with hearing impairments/faulty computers can still access information shared in the video.
Use Alt-text on all images
Check that images have a descriptive blurb, or alt-text. While every content management system is slightly different, they all should have a way to add alt-text to your images.
Allow flexible navigation time-limits
While seamless navigation is already a strong priority for user experience, it also helps those in underdeveloped areas and those with faulty service access the website contents.
Website designers should allow users flexible time limits. Some websites force users to log back into the website after a given time period: such improves security, but it also can hurt those with slow internet. Be sure to add flexibility into time-sensitive areas in your website so you can maintain some level of security while also accommodating users with slower service. Whether you add warning messages on time limits or some other indicating method, this will improve both user experience and accessibility in developing areas.
Allow full website navigation via keyboard actions
The website should be completed navigable through keyboard actions. That way, users without a computer mouse can still be able to jump around the website. Elevation Web uses the wordpress plugin from userway.org.
Add concise text for error messages
Finally, when coding error messages, be sure to make them concise. Simply displaying an icon (i.e. red exclamation point) may mean “warning” to someone from western cultures, however, such may confuse other demographics. If you want to include some image/icon with a warning message, be sure to accompany it with a concise explanation for the error.
Software Help in Accessibility
To be safe, website maintenance staff should assess the website’s accessibility bimonthly or more. Below are some helpful resources for accessibility assessments:
This post was contributed by Lauren Uhl at Elevation.
Lauren Uhl is a copywriter at Elevation, a full-service nonprofit web design agency. Lauren earned her B.A. in English Literature, Secondary Education, and Philosophy from Gonzaga University and is currently studying for her M.Ed. at the University of Portland. Lauren believes writing can change the world: that’s why she teaches middle-schoolers Language Arts and History through a social justice lens. More than anything, she hopes that she can find the right words when people need it the most.
4 Reasons Why Your Nonprofit Should Emphasize Retention
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerWhen it comes to a nonprofit’s donor base, some may typically think that acquiring new donors should be the most important goal they have. The reasons for this make sense on the surface level: nonprofits want to obtain more donors in order to raise more money.
But it’s actually not that simple. While obtaining new donors is, of course, a goal that every nonprofit should have, it shouldn’t always be the emphasis. In fact, retaining donors can bring about much more profitable fundraising campaigns and success. If you’re looking for fundraising tips, especially about donor retention, you’ve come to the right place.
So, what are the reasons that donor retention should be emphasized? We’ll cover the following topics:
Focusing on donor retention can help your nonprofit reach its fundraising goals and fuel its mission. Without having this focus, your rate of return on outreach can actually be much lower.
Are you ready to take a closer look at the reasons you should focus on donor retention? Let’s get started!
1. Donor acquisition is more costly than retention.
Believe it or not, but it’s actually more difficult and costly to acquire new donors than it is to keep the ones you already have. Think about all the money you’ve put into outreach and prospect research, and what your return on investment ends up being after you’re finished. Now think about how that time could be better spent on cultivating the donors you already have relationships with.
For these reasons, focusing on donor retention can save your organization money and effort over time. Let’s look at this more closely:
As a result of the above, investing the same amount of money spent on new donors with existing donors instead can bring in a higher rate of return, as it will cost less to work toward retaining existing donors. Building on your connections with these donors will help build stronger relationships with them as well.
If you’re looking for the right CRM solution that can help you steward your existing donors, check out this list.
2. Higher retention rates lead to better fundraising totals.
It’s clear that retaining donors should be high on your nonprofit’s priority list. But it might not be as evident that higher retention rates can also lead to better fundraising.
How does this happen?
If you’re not sure where to start with building these donor relationships, you may consider hiring a fundraising consultant. Aly Sterling offers some great tips on hiring a consultant who can help you build stronger donor relationships and create strategies to raise more as a result.
3. Fundraisers will have access to the necessary data.
As we mentioned earlier, you already have your existing donors’ information in your nonprofit CRM. This is a great launching point to build relationships with your current donor pool. If you have their information in your CRM, your fundraisers will have access to what they need to raise even more.
For example, donor information can help your nonprofit:
On the topic of matching gifts, nonprofits can actually use these to improve their donor retention. From sending a matching gift appeal immediately after a donation is made, to letting donors know when the matching gift is made, all of this serves to improve your relationship with your donors and increase the chances of them supporting you in the future.
Having the necessary donor information at your nonprofit’s fingertips can help build your fundraising potential. Personalized outreach and having the right focus on the right people will ensure that you work toward achieving your mission.
4. You can build awareness and engagement around your nonprofit.
One of the most impactful reasons to emphasize donor retention is the awareness and engagement you can build around your nonprofit by doing so. Both awareness and engagement are important because they help spread the word about your nonprofit and its mission, and also give you a chance to listen to your constituents.
Here are some key ways you can build on awareness and engagement:
When you actively include your existing supporters in your plans to fundraise, listen to them, and give them a great experience, you’ll be able to bring more attention to your cause. This is especially effective during campaigns, when you can incorporate peer-to-peer fundraising, and in times when you need feedback or advice.
Your nonprofit should emphasize retention because the payout, in the end, can be much more valuable than if you focus that same energy on acquiring new donors. That’s not to say acquiring new donors isn’t important. It certainly is and should be a focus of your organization to some extent. However, having an even stronger focus on retention can bring in more donors as a result of word-of-mouth promotion and other methods.
By including your current donors in your nonprofit’s fundraising efforts and cultivating your relationships with them over time, this can lead to major gifts and even stronger ties between you and them. Redirect your time and energy to donor retention, and you’ll be on your way to fundraising even more!
This guest post was contributed by CharityEngine.
Author: Leigh Kessler – VP, Marketing & Communications
Leigh Kessler is VP of Marketing and Communications at donor management software platform CharityEngine and a frequent speaker on branding, fundraising, data and technology. He is a former nationally touring headline comedian and has appeared on numerous TV shows including VH1’s “Best Week Ever”, CNN’s “Showbiz Tonight”, Discovery Channel & Sirius Radio. He has overseen and informed research and branding strategies for some of the most well known brands in America.
Double the Donation is Salsa Labs’ Choice for Matching Gift Solution
/in Learning Center /by Adam WeingerDouble the Donation is thrilled to have been chosen as the matching gift software provider for Salsa Labs, a technology company that provides powerful fundraising, advocacy, and marketing engagement software to nonprofit organizations all over the world.
This integration will allow Salsa customers to activate matching gift functionality with the click of a button. Double the Donation offers is a fully-automated matching gifts platform.
Salsa Engage users are now able to include Double the Donation’s streamlined matching gift search tool as a field on their donation forms. As donors search for their company name in that field, their transaction record is updated in Double the Donation.
“We have built these tools to help nonprofits increase matching gift revenue while simultaneously relieving the organization of the effort it takes to run a matching gift program,” said Adam Weinger, President of Double the Donation. “We are so excited to have the opportunity to work with Salsa’s many clients to do just that.”
Double the Donation easily integrates into the Salsa Engage platform and allows nonprofits to begin their gift matching journey in a matter of minutes, doubling or even tripling their fundraising revenue with corporate gift matching.
Activate in Seconds and Start Raising More from Matching Gifts!
The Salsa and Double the Donation integration makes it easy to activate the Double the Donation tool into your donation forms. You can activate in seconds and be on your way to matching gifts in just a few steps!
Easily activate your integration using API key plugin.
Enter your API keys from your Double the Donation account into the Salsa Labs platform to get activated. And voila! Your Double the Donation integration should be complete. Go to your donation pages and verify Double the Donation’s matching gift plugin is activated.
Donors will now be able to type in their company name and determine if their employer offers a matching gift program. The Double the Donation autocomplete search function allows donors to find their employers quickly and get the gift matching process going to maximize the possibility of driving matches to completion.
Map donors to their company with the autocomplete search tool.
Double the Donation does everything from collecting employment information from donors, reaching out to those donors about matching gifts, and following up with the donor afterward to ensure that not a single matching donation falls through the cracks.
Looking to learn more? Check out our in-depth integration guide to get started!
Drive More Matching Gifts to Completion with Double the Donation!
Salsa marries nonprofit CRM capabilities with rich constituent profiles, leading marketing automation, and online fundraising platforms to give you the tools you need for effective supporter engagement.
The Double the Donation integration takes things one step further by providing your nonprofit organization with features designed to help you stay focused on driving donations and increasing your revenue. Some of these features are listed below:
Salsa and Double the Donation work together to identify match eligible donors and assist them in doubling their donation to your organization with corporate gift matching. That means you’ll see a drastic increase in revenue without having to put in drastic effort! Your organization can focus on carrying out your mission with the confidence that Salsa and Double the Donation are focused on optimizing donor relationships and boosting your fundraising efforts. Want to see the integration in action? Request a demo today.
About Salsa Labs: Salsa is the world’s first supporter engagement platform. By unifying online supporter engagement and constituent relationship management software in one integrated toolkit, nonprofits have all the online and offline tools they need to engage communities, raise funds, rally supporters, and change the world. To learn more about the Salsa Engage platform, visit www.salsalabs.com.
About Double the Donation: Automate your matching gift fundraising with the industry-leading solution from Double the Donation. The Double the Donation platform provides nonprofits with tools to identify match-eligible donors, drive matches to completion, and gain actionable insights. Double the Donation integrates directly into donation forms, CRMs, social fundraising software, and other nonprofit technology solutions to capture employment information and follow up appropriately with donors about matching gifts. To learn more about Double the Donation, visit https://doublethedonation.com and request a demo at https://doublethedonation.com/get-a-demo/.
Plan a Fundraiser that Engages Kids: 6 Top Tips for Schools
/in Fundraising Ideas /by Adam WeingerYour school undoubtedly enjoys supporting the programs and activities that your students love, and you should be able to continue to do so. But as an educator or member of the PTA, your time is limited. You have many tasks vying for your attention and it can be difficult to balance everything and still perform each task well.
School fundraising should not be another source of stress in your life. Fundraising for all of your kids and teens’ favorite programs can be fun and engaging for you, your students, and your community. However, to avoid becoming overwhelmed with stress as you organize the fundraiser, utilize an effective event fundraising software.
To cultivate a fundraiser that kids will want to participate in and promote, you should:
If you follow these 6 best tips for school fundraising, you will be blasting through your fundraising goals in no time—and getting your kids involved in the fundraising process. So, without further ado, let’s start learning how to create the best and most engaging fundraiser your school has ever seen!
1. Plan a fun event.
The best way to guarantee your students actually want to get involved in your fundraiser is to make it fun and simple. It is entirely possible that the goal of raising money is not enough to get the students to engage with the fundraiser.
Depending on the age of the kids, they may not quite grasp the importance of money in making sure the programs you provide can still be offered year after year.
To ensure the students value the fundraiser, try planning your fundraiser around a fun event. To get some inspiration for fundraising ideas, click here.
A Fun Run or Jog-a-thon is an excellent example of a fun and easy event that’s well-suited for school-aged children.
The concept of a Fun Run or Jog-a-thon is simple. The student should recruit friends, adults, and family to pledge money for each unit of distance that they run or donate a lump sum for the entire distance. This could look like:
An effective walk-a-thon allows for the kids to hang out with their friends and stay active while supporting their school.
2. Stay organized.
One of the hardest parts of organizing and promoting a large-scale school fundraiser is making sure all of your data stays organized. You may be unfamiliar with fundraising techniques and strategies—and that’s completely normal!
To stay organized and properly manage the information you gather from your Fun Run or Jog-a-thon you should employ a Fun Run/Jog-a-thon fundraising software, like 99Pledges.
The best software will track and manage the pledges made to your Fun Run or Jog-a-thon so that you don’t have to! Yes, you heard that correctly. You will never have to sit with a calculator adding up the money that each pledgor owes to your child’s fundraising page.
This technology will allow you to load each child’s information into the program and create a custom-made, individualized fundraising page for supporters to donate or pledge money to.
If you want to get kids and teens involved invested in your fundraising efforts, you need to have an organized system that can easily integrate students into its process.
3. Encourage personalization.
While you are all fundraising for the same end result, your fundraiser participants may have many reasons for becoming involved. Some people might participate because they are passionate about the cause or the program that your event benefits. Meanwhile, others may want to compete for incentives or simply participate in your fun event.
Whatever the reason for their participation, you should encourage students to personalize their fundraising page to entice more supporters.
With the right software tool, each student will be able to fundraise separately for a common goal. While some fields on their unique page may be consistent throughout all the supporters, such as the:
The students or their parents should still have the option to write a fundraising letter that offers an impassioned appeal for donations and pledges that will be more likely to draw in friends and family supporters.
This fundraising letter should:
It is not likely that friends and family members will donate or pledge money simply because it is a good cause. They want the emotional appeal—they want to donate and pledge money because it is something the student is passionate about.
Feel free to encourage your students to make this fundraiser their own. This will not only cause the students to become more invested in the outcome of the fundraiser, but it will also boost your fundraising revenue!
4. Allow healthy competition.
One of the benefits of your PTA hosting a participant-based fundraising event is that the work is divided up among a wide range of people. While we know it can be difficult to motivate such a wide group of kids, make sure you don’t underestimate the power of healthy competition.
Friendly competition among friends has the potential to greatly enhance your fundraising revenue and encourage students to work hard to gain supporters.
The students should be able to have some sort of visual that represents how much each student is fundraising. A good software tool will display top donations that can serve as motivation for students to seek out additional support for their pages.
If you choose to do a walk-a-thon, or any variation of the event-a-thon, it is easy for the students to see how hard their peers are working. The student may be more inclined to walk further or read more or hit more baseballs if they can see how well other participants are doing.
While good, old-fashioned competition is one of the best motivators in fundraising among kids and teens, you must remember to provide some incentives that will further encourage the students to put effort into the campaign.
5. Offer incentives.
If you want to modify your fundraising strategy to maximize the number of students who are meaningfully engaging with your fundraiser, you should offer incentives to participants. Kids and teens love free stuff and added perks— but then again, who doesn’t?
To make competition a sustainable motivator and to help students stay excited about your fundraiser, you must give them a light at the end of the tunnel. They need something to look forward to and something to latch onto as they fundraise.
Don’t worry. The incentives don’t need to be elaborate or expensive, just something that will appeal to the kids and teens participating in your fundraising event.
Potential incentives you may want to offer include:
Depending on the age of your students, they may respond better to different incentives. Make sure you offer incentives that you know your students will love and want to achieve.
An easy way to incentivize all of your students at once is to provide fundraising team t-shirts. These can be custom made based on class, grade, or school depending on the size of your fundraiser. The kids will love the free merch and be excited to wear it, which will, in turn, promote the fundraiser.
To see how you can increase excitement in your fundraiser with a tangible incentive, check out Bonfire’s custom school shirts.
6. Make it shareable.
The best tactic to include in your fundraising plan when hosting a school fundraiser that kids and teens will want to be a part of is to make it shareable on social media. Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and so many more social media platforms have taken over how people communicate with one another and share news that is important to them.
Depending on the age of your students they may have their own social media accounts or, at the very least, it is likely their parents have accounts. Enabling students to share the fundraiser with remote friends and family members and to engage with the fundraiser on their own terms will make it more likely that the students actually want to participate.
You will be able to reach more people and encourage the students to promote their own fundraising page if the event-a-thon software that you use allows mobile sharing of personalized pages, your students and their parents are sure to want to spread the word about the school fundraiser.
Your school fundraiser should be easy and fun for everyone involved—student, teachers, parents, and supporters alike! With the right software, your walk-a-thon or other exciting fundraising events can engage your students and increase your fundraising revenue.
This post was contributed by Brad Dowhaniuk.
Brad Dowhaniuk is the co-founder of 99Pledges, which provides schools and teams with an easy-to-use, web-based fundraising solution to manage and drive success in Fun Runs, jog-a-thons, baseball hit-a-thons, and much more.
Double the Donation is Proud to Announce Matching Gift Integration with Funraise
/in Company Updates, News, Press Releases, Learning Center /by Adam WeingerDouble the Donation is proud to announce our latest integration with Funraise, a leading provider of innovative fundraising technology. Double the Donation is debuting on the Funraise platform as the preferred matching gifts solution for Funraise customers.
Double the Donation is readily available for all of Funraise’s current and future customers to provide easy-to-use, fully-automated corporate matching gift capabilities. Once a Funraise customer has a Double the Donation account, they are able to turn on the matching gift functionality directly within the Funraise platform, or they can create an account right then and there.
By allowing users to embed Double the Donation’s advanced search tool across their website pages and giving forms, as well as encouraging the use of automated email marketing, Double the Donation helps organizations to enlighten their donors about matching gift opportunities. The biggest hurdle to building matching gift revenue is the lack of awareness about these programs among donors.
“Funraise is such a great company to work with, and we are very happy to provide their customers with our advanced matching gift tools,” said Adam Weinger, President of Double the Donation. “With automated follow-up, these nonprofits are able to claim some of the $4-7 billion of matching gift revenue that goes unclaimed every year. We truly believe that, in addition to access to our thorough database of companies that offer matching gifts, automating the follow-up process revolutionizes existing matching gift programs.”
With Double the Donation and Funraise, nonprofit organizations are able to identify match-eligible donors, track the status of those donors’ match requests, and automate the follow-up emails that will drive these matches to completion. The platform also provides actionable insights to help nonprofits shape their matching gift programs moving forward.
Activate in Seconds and Start Raising More from Matching Gifts!
Double the Donation is a great way to increase gift-matching revenue. Now you can use it alongside the Funraise platform with just one click. Follow these steps to learn how to get started.
First, navigate to your Funraise dashboard. Then, select your initials in the top right corner to see the “Settings” option. Once you’re in settings, select the “integrations” option on the left-hand menu. Next, you will see several integration icons. Each of these options has three dots on the right side of their respective row. Select the three dots on the right side of the “Double the Donation” row. Select “Edit” and you will see the following menu.
Funraise customers with an existing Double the Donation account can enter their API Keys to activate the integration.
You can toggle the green switch off and on to activate the integration. If you already have a Double the Donation account, simply enter your Double the Donation credentials to get started. If you do not have an account, don’t sweat it. Select the “Create an Account ” option to automatically create a Double the Donation account. Then you can access your credentials and input your public and private API keys onto this page.
You have the power to add Double the Donation to your donation forms individually, giving you the ability to choose where this functionality will appear. Once you select your forms, you will see the streamlined search tool on your donation pages.
The Funraise gift matching form will now have a streamlined search tool for company gift matching.
This tool allows donors to search for their employer to see if they are eligible for a gift-matching program. The search bar gives company suggestions, making it quick and easy for the donor to enter this information.
Once the donor completes the form, the Double the Donation database will automatically check gift-matching eligibility. The system will send an email to the donor if they qualify for an increased donation. The email will explain the gift-matching guidelines and provide steps to drive the donation to completion. This email is customizable, so your organization can choose its appearance and messaging.
That’s all it takes to equip your forms with the donation-matching power of Double the Donation!
Looking to learn more? Check out our in-depth integration guide to get started!
Drive More Matching Gifts to Completion with Double the Donation!
Double the Donation contains valuable features for an efficient and effective fundraising experience.
Check out some of the Double the Donation features below:
Ready to see it in action? Check out the Double the Donation demo page to schedule a personalized demo.
About Funraise: Funraise provides exceptional, innovative, and friendly fundraising technology to save you time and resources. Funraise is the child of nonprofit experience and technological innovation: these two aspects of Funraise are behind all of its developments. Funraise believes in the donors, willing to stand with a movement to see a mission accomplished, and in the organizations, stewarding these gifts and creating impact around the world. To learn more, visit https://www.funraise.org/
About Double the Donation: Automate your matching gift fundraising with the industry-leading solution from Double the Donation. The Double the Donation platform provides nonprofits with tools to identify match-eligible donors, drive matches to completion, and gain actionable insights. Double the Donation integrates directly into donation forms, CRMs, social fundraising software, and other nonprofit technology solutions to capture employment information and follow up appropriately with donors about matching gifts. To learn more, visit https://doublethedonation.com/get-a-demo/