Our tips to organise a fundraising event

For many schools and asso­ci­a­tions, organ­is­ing an event is the per­fect oppor­tu­ni­ty to raise funds. Lot­ter­ies, music shows, bake sales, karaokes, quizzes, dances, or galas can help them reach their goals and finance projects. How to do this? What are the most impor­tant choic­es? Whether you are a first-timer or an expe­ri­enced event plan­ner, we have list­ed our best tips to organ­ise a suc­cess­ful fundrais­ing event.

Con­tents

1. Choose the right venue
2. Get peo­ple to attend
3. Col­lect more dona­tions

1. Choose the right venue

First of all, the loca­tion of your fundrais­ing event must be easy to get to by sev­er­al means of trans­port: car, pub­lic trans­port, on foot, etc. Park­ing should also be tak­en into con­sid­er­a­tion. Then, access to the venue must be easy for every­one — includ­ing peo­ple with dis­abil­i­ties — visu­al­ly impaired peo­ple, preg­nant women, fam­i­lies, the elder­ly, etc.

The size of the venue itself also mat­ters. If it is too small, it will be uncom­fort­able for your par­tic­i­pants. If it is too big, you may not achieve the atmos­phere you’d like. Be care­ful about the size of the venue in rela­tion to the num­ber of peo­ple you want to accom­mo­date at your fundrais­ing event.

Final­ly, ask the venue man­ag­er for as much infor­ma­tion as pos­si­ble about the equip­ment and ser­vices includ­ed in the rental:

• Legal doc­u­men­ta­tion — food & drinks licence, insur­ance…
• Staff — wait­ers, clean­ers, secu­ri­ty…
• Sound sys­tem — speak­ers, micro­phone…

2. Get people to attend

Use rel­e­vant and adapt­ed com­mu­ni­ca­tion chan­nels to pro­mote your fundrais­ing event sev­er­al months in advance. Local media, social media, your work­place, friends and fam­i­ly can be very good word-of-mouth relays. Be care­ful not to spread your­self too thin. Weigh the pros and cons of each, and only select those that work well for your events, sim­i­lar events, and in your geo­graph­i­cal area.

Design a mes­sage that clear­ly states why your event is unique, inter­est­ing, and enter­tain­ing. Stand out! High­light the cause your fundrais­er sup­ports and its val­ues. No one wants to give mon­ey to an asso­ci­a­tion or organ­i­sa­tion if they do not know where their dona­tion is going and what it will actu­al­ly be used for. What­ev­er the amount, it rep­re­sents a form of char­i­ta­ble invest­ment for your par­tic­i­pants. If they do not feel they are sup­port­ing a good cause that is in line with their val­ues, they will not par­tic­i­pate.

With an online tick­et­ing plat­form, you can even send invi­ta­tions to all the con­tacts in your asso­ci­a­tion that you know are inter­est­ed in your cause

3. Collect more donations

Sell tick­ets in advance. This will avoid the uncer­tain­ty of peo­ple telling you they will par­tic­i­pate and end up for­get­ting or plan­ning some­thing else. An online tick­et­ing solu­tion will also let you know the num­ber of reg­is­tered par­tic­i­pants. You can even send them reminders by email.

Share your tick­et­ing plat­form every­where: social media, local online media, your office… Be strate­gic and tar­get the time of the month when salaries are paid — usu­al­ly at the begin­ning of the month. Poten­tial par­tic­i­pants will have more mon­ey avail­able and will be more will­ing to donate.

If you plan to sell tick­ets on loca­tion on the day of the event, Weezevent helps you track your sales in real time so you know how many peo­ple are attend­ing your fundrais­ing event. This allows you to max­imise the amount col­lect­ed while not exceed­ing the venue’s max­i­mum capac­i­ty.

Whether your tick­et grants entrance to the event only or includes a gift for each dona­tion, you should set fair prices. Our online tick­et­ing solu­tion allows you to cre­ate pay what you want tick­et types, which can increase dona­tions. Then, it is up to you to decide whether the activ­i­ties inside the event should be free or not. It can increase dona­tions but may also both­er par­tic­i­pants. It’s all about bal­ance.

Final­ly, be sure to inform the venue man­ag­er that you are organ­is­ing a fundrais­ing event to sup­port a wor­thy cause. Per­haps he will be enthu­si­as­tic about sup­port­ing you, mak­ing a dona­tion, or even rent­ing the place to your organ­i­sa­tion for free.

With these tips, some effort and com­mon sense, you are ready to launch your fundrais­ing event. Dis­cov­er all the ben­e­fits of our online tick­et­ing solu­tion by click­ing below:

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