I put out a request for availability today to wrap up a fundraising campaign that took the better part of the last year. I’ve also spent several days assembling a hard copy of all the documentation for the next team – as well as creating a digital backup. It’s a good and necessary way to see where we have been and start to evaluate the results.
Past lives have meant working my way through several such campaigns. Because I know and understand the process, that has worked well for me but also created problems.
These things were good about it:
- We started well in advance with a schedule and assigned dates
- We kept to the schedule
- The materials were prepared well in advance, carefully reviewed and they went out on time
- We approached team leaders to follow up and got good acceptance from our invitation
- Many responded quickly and and contributed well.
- Personal messages by commited members of the organization were well received and reached a wider audience through social media
- Our campaign ran concurrently with one for refugee support; the same people responded to both with generosity
- Several new people came aboard.
These things could be improved going forward:
- By working in pairs with team members, I limited the involvement of the whole group. Doing the work is the best motivator and builds commitment of the fundraising team.
- The kick off event was too tame. It needs to be exciting. The closing event was better but also too cautious. These things need to be fun.
- While not holding too many meetings at the beginning was an advantage, we should have met regularly during the campaign itself to keep the energy level higher.
- Keeping a firm check on follow up might have produced better results.
- There was much “preaching to the choir”. It’s more demanding to make the case for what the money does in terms of changed lives. We need more and better stories.
These are just my own observations. I look forward to hearing from the others.
Dynamic Thinker 