Did you recently launch a fundraising campaign, but it’s not going well and you’re not sure what to do next? You’re in the right place!
So you launched a fundraising campaign. Congrats! You’re past the first few days (or weeks) of excitement, the first few dollars have rolled in, and you’re in the middle of the campaign. Suddenly, everything stops and you’re at a standstill.
Now, what do you do?
First things first, don’t become paralyzed staring at your campaign clock as it ticks down to deadline. You’ve got to snap out of it and take action.
If you have a goal—let’s say, $20,000 in 20 days—then you already know whether you’re hitting your fundraising target or not (in this example, $1000/day):
- If you’ve exceeded your early goals and are slowing down a bit before the deadline, cool…just make sure you kick into gear in those final few days to carry you over the finish line.
- But if you’re WAY off target, it’s still early, and you’re nowhere near your deadline, it’s time to get creative.
If this sounds like you, here are 3 things you can do when your fundraiser is flatlining:
- Reach out to everyone who made pledges who has not donated yet and remind them to make their donations. Whatever you do, don’t stare at the campaign clock and just watch it tick down to deadline. You need to start taking evasive maneuvers right now. That’s one-on-one communication, reaching out to your network and reminding them that you are counting on their donation to reach your goal.
- Reach out to everyone who has donated already and instruct them to share your campaign with other people. That means they’re going to text, email, make phone calls, or post on social media on your behalf. And here’s a hot tip: send them some sample text that they can actually send to those people so the messaging is perfect and you don’t you don’t put any more work on their plate.
- Think about doing a fundraising activity that drives a lot of buzz and interest in your campaign. Everybody runs into that valley in the middle of their campaign, midway between launch and the campaign deadline, where people forget you’re raising money. So when you’re in the valley in the middle, you need to create campaign activities that get your campaign juices flowing. That could be some sort of contest giveaway that can infuse some energy into your campaign, or a matching funds sponsor, or a new reward that gets people excited. For example, you might say, “Hey, on Thursday, we have a new reward coming out! If you donate on Thursday, then you’re entering a chance to win these Broadway show tickets.” Now, doesn’t that sound fun?!
If your campaign is flatlining, you’ve got to do something exciting to get the energy rising and make people want to donate. It happens to the best of us, so it’s handy to have a few tips in your back pocket for what to do when this happens. For more fundraising tips, subscribe to the Crowdfund Your Dream newsletter!
