Fundraising - Basic Ideas

Basic Ideas that work

99.9% of our participants have never fundraised before so you are not alone!

Don’t try to reinvent the wheel. We’ve gathered feedback from our past participants to give you their secrets and share with you what has worked for them. See below for countless ideas and tips.

For more ideas, check out corporate sponsorships, matching gifts, creative ideas, and basic ideas.

Utilizing the Website

The Team Friendship website was designed to be very user-friendly and simple to use. Here are some things you can do on the site:

Send an e-mail through the site (sample e-mail templates are already set up for you!).

Customize your site’s URL. (Click here for a step-by-step tutorial)

Personalize your page with a profile picture and information about yourself and your reason for running.

Automatically connect your Facebook with your site. Facebook will automatically post each time you get a donation. Your other friends will see this as a reminder to donate as well.

Click here for a tutorial on how to utilize these tools.

Facebook

Say hi to your new best friend and fundraising partner.

Facebook is the ultimate way to get donations. With the click of a button, you are connected to hundreds of potential donors. When posting on Facebook, keep in mind:

Write with energy! Make sure that your friends can hear your enthusiasm through your posts.
Be personal! Give a public shout-out to each donor with a heartfelt personalized message. (TIP! Be sure to tag your friends so that all of THEIR friends see that they donated)
Post daily! Don’t be shy. People love tracking your progress and being a part of your journey.
Make goals for your donors! For example, post “looking for 10 donors to donate $50 to the Friendship Circle before Friday. Will you be one of them?!”

Check out some sample posts by Team Friendship Miami 2014’s 2^nd-to-Top Fundraiser, Robin Varon. Robin is this queen of Facebook posting and raised over $4,250 of her goal just through Facebook!

Snail Mail

People are much less likely to throw away a letter than they are to delete an e-mail. Since snail mail is so uncommon these days, people get excited by receiving an addressed envelope in the mail. This usually brings to a greater call to action.

Click here for sample letters.

Text/Whatsapp

Have any potential donors who are too busy to ever make it to a computer? Send them a text/Whatsapp reminder that they can donate from their phone! Remember to send them the link to donate.

E-mail

This one is a must! Your initial request should be a personal e-mail to all of your contacts, however, don’t expect a single e-mail to do the trick. Every 2 weeks, hit “reply-all” and send another e-mail to publicly thank those who donated, update the crowd on your progress, and be sure to include “for those who asked me to resend my link, you can still support me at teamfriendship.org/yourURL.”

Click here for sample e-mails.

Donation Cards

Personalize your very own Team Friendship Donation Cards. The template is made for you! All you have to do is upload them to Vistaprint.com and order them for as little at $0.04 a piece!

Hand them out to co-workers, friends, the grocery clerk, your chiropractor, or anyone you meet on the go. See the simple step-by-step directions below:

1. Download the donation card template and save the image to your Desktop.

2. Visit VistaPrint.com using this link.

3. Click "Get Started"/"Upload Your Own". (Text will depend on your browser)

4. Click on the first design.

5. Click "Browse"/"Choose File" (text will depend on your browser) and choose the "TFM Donation Card Individual" file you saved to your Desktop.

6. Click "Next".

7. From the "Insert" menu category, choose "Text".

8. Double click in the text box to type your name, then drag it to the blank line.

9. Set the font size to "8" and choose a color for your text.

10. Click "Next".

11. View the card preview and click the check box to give your "Online Proof Approval".

12. Click "Next".

13. Ignore three pages of upgrade options by clicking "Next"

14. Click "Go to Cart" on the bottom of the fourth page of options.

15. Fill out the requested information and your cards will be on their way!

Phone-a-thon

Gather your fellow Team Friendship buddies and invite other friends as well to spend a few hours making calls to community members about your run and asking them to donate.

Family

Tap into ALL of your connections including your father’s big clients, your brother’s poker game, and your husband’s co-workers.

Ask your family to spread the word to their circles. You’d be surprised who will respond.

Networking Guide

Training for a marathon is a serious commitment that requires hours of intense mental and physical preparation. Team Friendship has compiled the Step-by-Step Fundraising Guide to help you simplify the fundraising process, so you can stay focused on crossing the finish line with confidence. The guide is based on proven methods for building a donor network from existing friends and family and gives step-by-step instructions to ensure your fundraising campaign is successful, organized and not excessively time consuming.

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Fundraising - Basic Ideas