In the Shoes of a Fundraiser...

Many of you know that I've been involved in the fundraising business for almost 15 years. During that time, I've participated and volunteered at many special events- everything from golf tournaments (my favorite), telethons (least favorite), bowl-a-thon's, walk-a-thons, beef-and-beers, spaghetti dinners, and even No Limit Texas Hold 'em tournaments.

However, I didn't chair and organize one- until now.

Our recent event over the weekend pulled in over 200 people over 3 days and I think we had everything thrown at us, especially Mother Nature (there was an ice-storm in St. Louis the day before the event, throwing off all the flights). However, we got it done and raised a record amount of money (small to some of our clients, but still a record for this very small organization).

The event was also one of the beta tests for our new DonorPerfect social fundraising solution, codenamed spider.net, that helped generate a 20% increase over the previous event with half the volunteers and half the work. I'll mention the event and the official product name for spider.net when we get closer to public launch, that will occur at the AFP International Fundraising Conference in San Diego on March 30th, 2008.

However, here are some things I learned during 3 consecutive 15 hour days:

• Wear comfortable shoes and switch out your socks half-way through.
• Grow eyes in the back of your head. Seriously.
• Stock lots of extra batteries. Wireless microphones eat batteries for a living.
• Remember to eat- at least twice.
• Remember to drink lots of water.
• Count on at least 2 critical things to go wrong, and have the faith and planning to be prepared for it.
• Recruit one key person as your back-up/executive assistant you can count on for anything.
• Remember to have fun!

All in all, it's an event I will never forget and we raised a lot of money for a very special charity. Though we already have many clients using it in our beta test period, I can't wait to launch it to all non-profit organizations. It's going to turn special event fundraising on its head and increase fundraising revenues while decreasing expenses- all while making it fun and easy!

Something funny about RFP's...

Though I mentioned our philosophy about Request for Proposals (RFP's) in an earlier blog, I came across this gem predicting the year 2008 that was written by Jeff Brooks in Fundraising Success Magazine:

"Your organization will decide to issue an RFP for your general marketing needs. Unfortunately, so many people will be involved it will end up an impenetrable maze of vague philosophical rambling, wishful thinking, and outright lies. The only vendor that will respond will be an ice-cream manufacturer. To save face, you will retain the ice-cream company as your marketing agency."

Again, please think carefully before automatically issuing an RFP- it needs to be relevant, clear, and precise. "Must-Have's" should be clearly MUST HAVE's, and wish lists should be marked appropriately.

Also, please understand if any vendor asks to conduct an online demonstration first- this way, both parties can see if it makes sense to take the next step together before either one commits and wastes their mutually valuable time.