Why your Gala is Not Working Anymore?

About two years ago I was invited to my first fundraising gala. It was for a community center in the San Francisco Bay Area. Both my wife and I put on our nicest suit and dress and joined a group of respected and wealthy people form the local community.

At the dinner, the host was getting everybody and their wallets warmed up. She was very excited, but the crowd was less so. The evening was somewhat of success but at the end of the day the organization was still short in donations from what had been expected of the event (which itself had been very expensive), which was supposed to be the boost to their yearly development program.

Are the days of the gala over? Well, not entirely, but it’s definitely important for development managers out there to consider more options, so they will not have to pull out some last minute tricks from an empty magician’s hat.

How it was and how it could be?

The traditional solicitation for donations can be a long process that takes anywhere from a few weeks to a year, or even years. To get the big checks there is a lot of time and effort spent, leaving a big gap around the bigger pool of small donors. But new and different methods are paving the way for a whole new system that can generate donations on a regular basis with minimal effort. Squeedeal is a great example.

A new way to connect everyday shopping to fundraising generation

Squeedeal has developed an E-commerce platform that is designed to generate donations on a regular basis for non-profit organizations. By offering shoppers the chance to get expensive items for a fraction of their retail price by donating to charitable campaigns, it reaches donors outside of the regular geographical landscape that the organization is used to focusing on. Since the nature of the platform is to generate more donations, the opportunities for each organization are endless. The only rule that Squeedeal applies is that the item has to be expensive in it’s category, in order to make it affordable for consumers. But an organization can run two or more campaigns simultaneously and once a campaign ends, can automatically launch another one – creating year round support for the development team.

Personalized their products to your audience

In order to make the most of every campaign, Squeedeal usually have a discussion with each organization to understand their ‘home base’ audience. It helps them to see what kind of a campaign might be the most relevant for their initial launch. Then, they set the minimum amount of participants and launch the campaign.

What do they ask from a Non-profit organization? Not a lot really:

-Proof that they are a 501 3 ( c )

-Promotional material that they can use on the site

-Notice to their community about the fundraising campaign

There is no obligation and they don’t ask for money in order to run the campaign. Just your approval to participate. As this is year around, they aim to take the onus of collecting small donations off of your hands, leaving you more time, energy and resources to focus on reeling in the big fish.

For more details, check out squeedeal.