Office Fundraising Ideas

With rooms full of adults with disposable income, the office is one of the best places to organize a simple fundraiser to benefit a local nonprofit. At the same time, fundraising events in the office is a great way to build camaraderie among co-workers, especially between departments that do not interact with each other often. With that in mind, here are a few fundraising ideas you can try out in your office:

Poker Tournament

Do co-workers brag about being the next Phil Ivey or Liv Boeree? Test everyone’s poker chops by organizing a poker tournament for the company. Consider setting a $100-$500 buy in, with the overall champion winning half the collection while the other half is donated to a nonprofit the office supports.

“Ducky Tie” Contest

Inspired by an episode from “How I Met Your Mother”, this idea involves having employees design silly neckties. The entries are then displayed in a central area for voting. Each vote costs a dollar. Once a winner has been determined, a manager or executive must wear the tie for a month.

Match It Challenge

Do you need an extra shot of inspiration? Ask an executive if the company is willing to match whatever amount you and your co-workers raise. Needless to say, this is a fantastic way to raise a large amount of money quickly.

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Safe Toy & Gift Fundraisers

December is Safe Toys and Gifts Awareness Month, which makes the topic a great theme for your upcoming fundraisers. The concept would particularly be fitting if you’re planning an online fundraising for nonprofits, whose cause is related to child welfare or disabilities. Here are some ideas you can try which can be carried out (in one or more ways):

• Solicit toys or gift items that are labelled/proven safe or recommended for certain age groups, and sell them online. For instance, you can limit the donations to items for newborns or for toddlers. Aside from playthings, you can also look for accessories or apparel for children, baby essentials like strollers or diaper bags, etc. Make sure that all items are made of safe materials and designed to be non-hazardous to its users.
• Alternatively, sell appropriate toys or gifts for children with disabilities, such as talking dolls for children with blindness or interactive books and gadgets for children with autism or attention deficit disorders (ADD). Research the items that would truly be beneficial or appreciated by kids with special needs, so you know what you will solicit.
• As another variety to the selling event, let generous individuals or corporations buy these toys and gifts for the beneficiaries of your organization. If you don’t have any yet, partner with orphanages, special education schools, and other institutions to find recipients for the sponsored gifts.

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Fundraising Challenges

Non-profit organizations like the one you head will always find individuals who sympathize with your cause. However, just like any other business, you will inevitably come across some bumps along the way, especially when fundraising is involved. Here are some of the most common fundraising mistakes and obstacles:

Being repetitive with online auction items

Using an online auction website is effective in generating the funds your nonprofit needs, but the items for auction can get pretty repetitive over time if you don’t change them up a bit. What you can do to avoid the monotony is to establish a theme for each auction. For instance, if your organization is devoted to literacy causes, sell first-edition books that belong to one specific genre at a time, like horror or fantasy.

Limited audience

People can’t donate to your cause if they aren’t well-informed about your upcoming online fundraising event in the first place. Take advantage of social media and promote your event through sites like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Unclear goals

If you’ve managed to reach out to a wider audience, you certainly wouldn’t want to lose their attention by being vague about your goals. What is your end goal for the fundraising event? Is it to raise funds for future use—which is too general—or is it to use the money for something specific and urgent? More often than not, you’ll get people to listen if you state what you really want.

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FB: 3 Ways to Help Nonprofits

Despite the growing popularity of Twitter and Instagram, Facebook is still considered the king of social media platforms. As such, you’ll want to be sure to utilize Facebook if you plan to launch a social media fundraising campaign.

With its many functions, Facebook opens up many avenues for you to try out when it comes to fundraising. Here are a few ideas you can try on this versatile platform:

“Changing for Change”

Have people change their profile pictures to something that helps raise awareness for your cause (e.g. a picture of a cartoon animal). As people donate, you can send them a new cover photo that shows they donated and how others can donate as well.

“Sponsor an Artist”

Are you trying to promote a local arts nonprofit? Ask the beneficiaries to submit their best photos or photos of their best artworks and compile them into a Facebook album. You can have people place bids on the artist(s). Winners will then receive an exclusive artwork (not necessarily the one from the photo) from the artist he or she sponsors.

“It’s All about Connecting”

Do you know a popular celebrity or athlete? Ask them to help you raise funds for your cause. The celebrity can then ask for donations through their Facebook profile on your behalf and redirect traffic to your fundraising page. You can then reward a lucky donor (through a random selection process) with a dinner with the celebrity.

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Give Annual Funds another Look

As fundraisers, we’re often on the lookout for strategies we can implement that can help us achieve our organization’s goals. Having the cash on hand to pay the overhead necessary to push work on these goals forward naturally goes a long way to ensuring success, and a recent survey by the Nonprofit Research Collaborative has found annual funds to be highly effective in this regard.

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How to Use Clothes for a Cause

Are you thinking of ways to raise money and awareness for charity? What you’re wearing might just be the key! By soliciting and selling clothes on our platform, you can get more funds and followers. To give you an idea, here are some trending fundraisers for nonprofits:

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Twitter Tips for Nonprofits

Many who initially used Twitter to keep in touch with friends and family may not have envisioned that the site would have evolved from a simple social outlet into a massively effective business tool. Professionals of every kind now use the social networking site, nonprofit organizations and corporate leaders included. The nonprofit sector, in particular, has been very active on Twitter, given the opportunities it presents in terms of audience building, marketing, and fundraising.

If your nonprofit is new on Twitter, you might be tempted to simply tweet a call to action every day. As ideal as this may sound, this is the wrong way to go about your Twitter use. With that in mind, here are a couple of tips that can help you use the social media site more effectively.

Be professional

Choose a catchy and professional-sounding Twitter handle or username. Upload your nonprofit’s logo or a decent photo of yourself to serve as your account’s profile picture. Set up your profile so that it’s easy for people to understand your org’s cause. Make it clear if you are tweeting for your organization or for yourself.

The power of retweeting

Sharing and promoting content is what social media is all about. The trick is to not make your Twitter page all about you. People who can only talk about themselves tend to tick many people off, and the same can be said about organizations.

The more you use Twitter, the more you’ll find these tips useful. Happy tweeting!

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Great Non-Profits for Animal Lovers to Support

Humans may be on top of the food chain, but one shouldn’t forget that animals play a vital role in the web of life, too. Fortunately, many people are animal lovers: Just look at the millions of pet owners in the country!

Still, there’s much more you can do to help the plight of feral and wild animals around the world. If you want to help these non-human friends, here are three non-profits you can support:

World Wildlife Fund

The World Wildlife Fund, more commonly known as WWF, is the world’s leading animal conservation group. Operating for over 50 years, this non-profit organization works in 100 countries, providing science-based solutions to protect the Earth’s biodiversity.

American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals

The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals or ASPCA is the first humane society established in North America. As its name suggests, the group aims to rescue animals from cruelty, pass human laws, and share important resources about animal cruelty.

Sea Shepherd Conservation Society

Not all animals are on land; many of them are ocean dwellers. Just like their terrestrial counterparts, though, sea creatures are also threatened and affected by pollution and illegal hunting. Thankfully, the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society works hard to protect and preserve marine biodiversity.

All these awesome non-profits are part of the eBay Giving Works program, so you can list your pre-owned items on the site and donate part or all of the proceeds to one of these great wildlife organizations. 

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Giving is Good for Your Donors

When campaigning for their fundraising efforts, many fundraisers focus their marketing strategies on showcasing the great benefits going towards the causes they support. However, many forget that while fundraisers do provide a lot for the people at the receiving end of the line, the donors themselves actually benefit greatly, as well. When fundraising, it may be be a good idea to highlight this benefit to donors so that they understand what they are getting in return.

On the immediate, personal level, donating money positively affects people’s psychological and emotional well-being. It makes them feel happy and activates the regions of the brain associated with social connection and trust. This positive feeling is often called the “helper’s high.”

Move a step further from the personal level, and you’ll find that when you help someone, others are also motivated to do the same. This social drive to exercise good will promotes a sense of interdependence and encourages cooperation in the community, which may eventually benefit donors as well in the form of better relations with neighbors.

Along each step of the way, benefits have the potential to trickle back to the donor in some shape or form until the donation finally reaches the end recipient. Even at this point, the donor stands to gain. With charities for the poor, especially, the investment on remedying social ills benefits everyone, the donor included, in the form of better quality of life or a better economy.

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