January/February 2005

Leveraging Corporations Can Take Fundraising Events to a New Level
Convio’s company coordinator capabilities help nonprofits jump-start volunteer fundraising participation

Volunteers, donors and other supporters are the lifeblood of many organizations. That is why an increasing number of nonprofits are taking advantage of these valuable assets by empowering their constituents to raise money in support of their organization’s mission.

Y-ME National Breast Cancer Organization (Y-ME), for example, used this approach for its annual Y-ME RACE Against Breast Cancer fundraiser, enlisting the help of volunteers to raise money on behalf of the organization. Using Convio TeamRaiser™, the organization gave its volunteers online tools for setting up their own fundraising pages and sending email solicitations to their networks of friends and family. For its 2004 RACE, the organization exceeded its goal of $2.5 million to raise $2.8 million, with more than $1 million raised online. While this online approach has been the foundation for many organizations’ success, new capabilities from Convio help organizations extend their reach in volunteer fundraising events.

Increasing Donations by Leveraging Corporations
Organizations are learning that they can jump-start volunteer participation and raise more funds faster by leveraging corporations several months before the fundraising event. A large percentage of funds from Y-ME’s annual RACE, for example, come from company teams, in which volunteers create teams at their workplaces to help raise funds for the nonprofit.

In 2004, Y-ME RACE team fundraising efforts accounted for 43 percent of the event’s $2.8 million raised, and corporate team efforts represented one third of the overall team dollars raised, up from one quarter in 2003. Y-ME attributes part of that increase to piloting Convio’s TeamRaiser company page feature with ten returning RACE teams. By recruiting multiple team captains, all participating under the same team banner, the piloted teams increased fundraising efforts, in some cases, by 100 percent.

In the past, the challenge for organizations has been finding the time to contact multiple fundraising teams at each participating company, helping them organize their teams and keeping them motivated to continue raising funds. The organizations’ strongest supporters would simply try to create teams at their workplaces and galvanize support on their own — sometimes with multiple teams at the same company working separately. The latest version of Convio TeamRaiser addresses this challenge with “company coordinator” functionality, enhancing the online software solution that empowers individual or team volunteer fundraisers to raise money on behalf of an organization with a convenient, effective way to solicit donations from friends and family.

This new capability allows an organization to set up special administrative access, with security levels, for a designated coordinator at each participating company. The organization can quickly and easily send updates and motivational communications to all company coordinators, their team captains and team participants. The coordinator can email updates, reminders, motivational messages and other communications to all team captains and participants within his or her company, encouraging them to tap their networks of friends and family to support the cause. Instead of having several teams at the same company raising funds without overall coordination, the company can now create a “super team” with a single point of contact between the company and the organization.

“The new TeamRaiser functionality is key to extending our reach through the volunteer fundraisers who help drive success for our annual Y-ME RACE Against Breast Cancer,” Margaret C. Kirk, chief executive officer, Y-ME National Breast Cancer Organization, said. “While we have used TeamRaiser to successfully empower our volunteer fundraisers for the last two years, this new functionality will help us continue to fully utilize our strongest volunteer fundraisers who want to build teams at their workplaces, as well as provide Y-ME’s corporate partners with an integrated way to involve their employees in this important event.”

  
Fig. 1 - TeamRaiser’s new functionality helps organizations leverage company volunteer teams more efficiently and effectively, reaching multiple supporters through a single point of contact. 

By giving the company coordinator online tools to create and motivate the company’s volunteer fundraising teams, an organization can:

• raise more money by getting companies involved in the fundraising event earlier;
  
• give the strongest volunteers a sense of ownership over their company teams;
  
• help companies to motivate their teams by setting company goals or encouraging friendly rivalry between teams; and
  
• reduce administrative work for the organization by automating email reminders, updates and other communications.

Conclusion
While many organizations already use online tools like Convio TeamRaiser to involve passionate and motivated volunteer fundraisers, TeamRaiser’s new functionality helps organizations to further increase volunteer participation. By providing online tools to company coordinators, any nonprofit can leverage corporations more efficiently and effectively for their fundraising events.

Find out more about Convio TeamRaiser.

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