How to choose the best fundraiser for your school, church, or youth sports team. There are evaluation criteria and factors to help you choose the best fundraisers for your group.
The most important thing you'll do is choose the right fundraiser. The timing of your fundraisers each year, the quality of the goods, how they will be sold and delivered, and, in the end, how much money your organisation will make are all important factors.
Think of yourself as the owner of a small business that is trying to build a name for itself by making new and good products. What are your financial goals compared to the expected number of units, sales revenue compared to the percentage of profit, quality of goods compared to cost, acceptable price points on the market, etc.?
You're on the right track if you think like a business leader.
First, decide on the type of fundraiser.
There are different kinds of "best" fundraisers, and you need to choose the one that works best for your organisation right now.
Your options for raising money are:
1 - Fundraisers based on events
2 - Direct donation fundraiser
3: Fundraisers with products that can be sent right away
4: Fundraisers whose products don't arrive on time
The first things you have to decide are what kind of fundraiser you want to do, which company or distributor will be your supplier, and what the fundraiser will be.
Things to consider
How do you decide what to do? A professional consultant can often be a big help when it comes to raising money. You can also check the Internet, talk to people you know, look at your group's past records, and so on. Most importantly, take some time to get the information you need to make the right choice.
You can make a simple survey that you can give to past organisers and other key people who can make a difference, like local business owners and organisation leaders. Give clear options to make it easier to decide how to answer. Print it out and get good feedback from people inside and outside your organisation about what has worked well and what needs to be changed.
Then, make a spreadsheet that can be used to evaluate and rank fundraisers. Separate the criteria for ranking into groups with subheadings in text boxes all over the spreadsheet. What criteria are most important to your group right now for this fundraiser? Give them numbers to show how important they are.
Things to think about when judging offers:
- Whether or not you can get free samples or catalogues
- Things that are a hassle, like policies on replacement goods and refunds
- The level of service provided by the supplier, such as pre-sorting goods, etc.
- The quality of the help materials like catalogues
- The quality of the items being sold
- There are costs that you don't see, like freight or the cost of brochures.
- List of suppliers
- Some goods need to be kept cold during delivery, for example.
- What the organisation needs in particular
Learn from what you've done in the past.
Results will depend on how many fundraisers have been done before, how many are going on at the same time (yours and others), the time of year, and other factors. Consider if this kind of fundraiser has been done before, if it's done every year, if a competing group just did it, or if our cheerleaders did it before and it was a big hit.
Fundraising ideas that worked in the past can and should be used again, but keep in mind that close to 80% of your customers are likely to be the same from year to year. Try something new and different that will help you make more money.
