Fundraising / Charity Ideas Blog

How do you prepare for your fundraising this year? Will the tentative recovery lighten the mood with donors? Regardless of what may come organizations and charities still have to raise money. No choice about the matter but what’s the correct route to take?

Take a Little from a Lot of People
I recently saw an ad for a Charity in Detroit (can’t remember the name) that is sending out envelopes and asking you for $1 for children with medical needs. This is a brilliant idea! How many times have you thought you would give to a couldn’t seem to part with the money. Everyone can spare $1 and they even provide the envelope. Brilliant!

Online Giving
You might want to find a way to aline your cause with online giving. Incorporate website donations that are simple to use. In just five days, the Red Cross has raised more than $21 million for the relief effort in Haiti through text messages. Mobile marketing is huge and donors appreciate is simplicity. Might want to get your organization on board with that.

Loyal Followers
You’ve got to reward recurring donors. Those people who are regular and repeat givers. Send out a flyer, give them a call, just make sure they feel appreciated for their help. At the same time make it easy for first time donors to sign up as montly contributors. You want to make sure there’s a stable repeat donor base.

What’s working for your Organization? What does your youth group, sports team, school have planned for fundraising this year?

Comment with ideas you’ve come up that are working for you

Did I mention that justfundraising.com works with schools and their sports and music groups to help raise money for their funding?

We help raise money for new equipment, uniforms, transportation, training and other expenses. If your university or school needs a hand raising money this year we might be able to help you out.

In the meantime check out some great drumming from the Hampton University Drumline!

See … again I’ve worked music into the blog.
My powers are uncanny!

Do you think you’ve got a good idea for Charity? Do you have something in mind that has potential that you would like to get in front of somebody with money. What if it wasn’t even one person or company that judged you, but an honest assesment from an audience?

I came across this site yesterday and wanted to share this with you. Before we go much further this is only open to the US and to implement for the benfit of US citizens. I’m mentioning this to our audience that the idea can be copied and used in other countries.

The Pepsi Refresh Project takes 1,000 submissions for charitable projects a month from individuals, organizations and businesses. They award 32 prizes a month ranging from 5k to 250k. No matter what your idea targets, The Pepsi Refresh Project has a category that it can be submitted to ; Health, Arts and Culture, Food and Shelter, The Planet, Neighborhoods and Education.

The idea is put up on their website and once their audience registers they can have 10 chances a day to vote for the best idea. Ideas like this level the playing field. You can get noticed and get funded all you need is a solid idea.

The Pepsi Refresh Project even has a blog that keeps you up to date on good ideas and funded ideas that are coming to fruition.

I gotta say this is a great way for a business to become socially responsible and step up to the plate.

Nicely done Pesi.

If you have a similar project like this running in your country then drop a comment and we’ll talk about yours as well.

We’ve given 250 cards away, so we’re up to $28,750 for Haiti. Not bad huh. You guys are doing a good job, but we still have 250 more cards that we are giving away.

If you want to help fundraise for Haiti please contact us at:
1-888-440-4114
www.justfundraising.com

February is:
American Heart Month
National Children’s Dental Health Month
Spunky Old Broads Month.
(Somebody must make this stuff up)

Freelanace Writers Appreciation Week 8 -13
International Flirting Week 8-14
(looking forward to that week!)
Random act of Kidness week 12 -15

Feb 1 – National Freedom Day
Feb 2- Groundhog Day
Feb 10 -Chinese New Year
Feb 14 – Valentine’s Day
Feb 15 – Presidents Day
Feb 16 – Fat Tuesday
Feb 17 -Ash Wednesday

I’ve been taking a look at how people are coming together for Haiti. It’s like everybody wants to do their part. It’s like we get blase about our daily life but when the call to action goes out…BAM we’re there!
That’s definately cool…

Anyway, I’ve been looking at celebrity fundraising for Haiti and how movie stars, musicians and athletes are all giving up time and talent to raise money.

Last Friday night the TV was filled with Telethons as celebrities in both the US and Canada

Here George Clooney outlines the need to give:

Hope for Haiti New featured Madonna, U2, Bruce Springsteen and
Sting, Beyonce and more:

I have some tennis heads in my life and they’ll be puffed to see Roger Federer, Rafael Nadal, Andy Roddick, Serena Williams and more come out for a game:

Don’t believe the press baby. Still plenty of good people around willing to help out. Most of them don’t make the news but you are still there!

Ok we’re off and running for our Haiti Fundraising. We have given out 90 cards so far. With each card raising $115 that’s a potential of $1,0350. Not bad….

However we’re looking to hand out more. If you feel like you would like to fundraise for Haiti, please contact us at:
1-888-440-4114
www.justfundraising.com

This Haiti fundraising campaign is good for individuals but would thrive in groups. Please contact us if you have a class, church or business group who would like to take part.

You are in charge of raising money for your school, church, or cause and you don’t know where to start. lets take a look at the basics to get you moving….

Set a goal – How many people do you want to help, what’s the cost of new equipment for your school, repairs to your building or the cost of adding a new counselling service? You may even be able to review last years figures and add 20%. Give updates on your fundraising goal to keep your donors involved. Some may even give again if your close to succeeding. You can add our free Fund raising thermometer to your page to keep people posted on your progress.

Tell your story – Nobody is going to particpate or donate if they can’t relate (not bad huh, just made that up.) You have to tell people why your fund raising, why it’s important and why their donations will make a difference. You can add our facebook or twitter pages to your social media sites and plug into our network to reach more people.

Keep Sharing – Have a masterlist of people and organizations that have given. Send Thank You cards when you’ve reached your goal. Also through the year send a newletter to keep them up to date. This keeps your donors educated on how they have made a difference and your responsibility with their money. This will make asking for donations for next year easier.

Tell us your story how you put together a great Fundraising campaign and we’ll post it to the comments section so everyone can learn.

The disaster in Haiti has galvanized the world to help out. We’re going to do our part and help you give as well.

We’re giving away Haiti Donation Cards for free. We will supply scratch cards to help you raise money for Haiti. Justfundraising will supply the cards free to approved groups.

If you want to get involved, get active, or help out in any way you can, these Haiti Donation Cards are a great way to raise money quickly.

Check out the page here for more information or call us now at:
1-888-440-4114

* If you agree with what we’re doing please consider posting the to your social media sites. This will work a lot quicker with your help *

It’s been all over the air so we won’t spend too long on the specifics. On January 12, 2010 at 4:53 p.m a 7.0 earthquake and its 33 aftershocks, shook Haiti. The aftermath is devastation and rubble. I think everyone agrees on this.

Immediate aid is necessary. What I’d like to comment on is giving to established agencies and organizations. All over twitter comments are sent about where to send your money and it seems like money is flowing. Please use caution when texting your $5 or $10 donation to organizations who you’ve never heard of before. Some people text to give money because it’s quick and easy to do although it may not be the most effective. The most important thing is that the money gets to the intended.

Among this hustle and bustle of what’s going on, scammers are going to try and take advantage. Here’s a great article on what to watch for.

Here is a press release from the Better Business Bureau on donating to an effetive organization.

If it all seems like a lot of research and you would just like to donate call up the 1-800 numbers or go directly to the webpages of established organizations like:
The American Red Cross – 1-800-REDCROSS or 1-800-257-7575 (Spanish)
Canadian Red Cross – 1-800-418-1111
British Red Cross – 0845 053 5353

One thing I’d like to add here. We really seem to be under seige lately with severe weather all over the globe and devastation from natural disasters. But take a look at how countries are coming together quickly to help Haiti. Maybe we’re learning under the stress and hardships?

There’s hope still.