Tips to Improve Your Fundraising in the New Year!

We saw many blog posts wishing people "Happy Holidays" and "Happy New Year" come out over the last few weeks. Right when you were shutting your laptop, heading into vacation and not interested in reading yet another blog post!

Instead, we wanted to wait until things got ramped up again, after all most of you are in the beginning throws of a new set of resolutions and setting goals for 2016.  To help you get started, here are our 3 ideas for you to consider for your 2016 Fundraising!

Improving your fundraising this year

TIP 1:  BUILD ON YOUR PREVIOUS YEAR'S ACCOMPLISHMENTS

An easy way to do that is to compile the data from your 2015 efforts and use that information to make decisions on how to best grow in 2016.   Did you run a series of peer-to-peer fundraising campaigns across several cities? Consider pulling a list of pages for each city and the donations per page.  

With this information, you can get a sense of areas where you can improve your fundraising by looking at how each city and fundraiser performed.  

Did you run an auction in 2015?  

• Which categories performed well?
• Which ones did not?
• What were the average bids per item?
• What were the average bids per bidder?  

While it may seem a bit technical, there are many valuable metrics you can use to evaluate and predict how future auctions could perform.  With the number of auctions we run and the data we collect, we have done extensive research around auction performance metrics and what you should aim for with respect to your starting prices, bid increments, etc.   Click on the button below to learn more about our findings.

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TIP 2:  INVEST IN YOUR FUNDRAISING

We often tell our clients that they need to treat their non-profit like a business when it comes to fundraising.  Businesses know that it requires investment to make money and that it is highly unlikely that any business will increase its revenue at zero cost.  The same goes for fundraising.  Whether you are contemplating hiring a Development staff person or investing in fundraising technology, you must understand that it will cost you money.  The important thing to consider is not simply the cost but the overall return that this investment can make.  For Handbid, we consistently show our customers how their investment results in a positive return. In other words, Handbid pays for itself.  Can you say the same for your current fundraising tools?

TIP 3:  TRY SOMETHING NEW

Albert Einstein is famous for a lot of things, including the quote "Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results."  Not happy with your fundraising results in 2015?  Want to improve and expand this year?  Try something new! 

Implement a new fundraising campaign, leverage technology and venture out and place some safe bets on technologies like Handbid.  It may just be what you in need in 2016 to exceed your goals and impress your Board.

GOOD LUCK! 

Regardless of what you do, we wish you all the best in 2016 and hope you raise a lot of money for your cause. We are here to help whether be providing advice through our blog, talking with you on the phone or via email, or even helping you get starting using our awesome mobile bidding technology.  

Reach out to us to learn more about Handbid and how we can help you in 2016!