Running a successful charity event and ensuring it reaches the fundraising goal can be a big challenge. If you’re in the event planning stages of your charity, you’ll probably want some pointers. It may be hard work, but with successful planning and organising, your fundraising efforts will work out. We’re going to go through 10 steps on how to organise a fundraising event.

1. Determine what the event is

Why are you running this event? This is more than just saying the charity event will be in support of, for example, health research or animal rights. People aren’t going to donate their money if you haven’t given them a good reason to.

It’s about sharing and showing the importance of such a cause. Write up a clear mission statement and promotional material, and how their help will benefit the cause.

2. Research

Have you properly researched, or figured out ways to get the donations into the right hands? There are many charity organisations, but it’s important to ensure that the money will be used in a way that lines up with your goal. Google “charity organisation reviews” to get a clearer understanding of what donating to them specifically entails. It may be, they’ll use your hard-earned fundraising efforts in a way you’re not entirely happy with.

3. Promote, promote, promote

The only way to get the word out there is through promotion. Write up, design, and print out flyers and hand them out in public places like shopping centres, local parks, and on notice boards. With that said, flyers and posters will only go so far.

Think about broadening your horizons and promoting online. Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter are great. You can create an event or an ongoing blog to keep potential attendees informed about the status of the charity event. If there have been changes to the date due to bad weather conditions, most people would be happy to reschedule, as long as you’re open about why.

Create a Facebook event, and set up a blog site or a Twitter account. You can also do interesting things with social media, and post which fundraising goals have been reached that day.

4. Set a fundraising goal and create a budget

On the subject of fundraising goals, you’ll need to have an understanding of what your target is going to be. Planning a successful fundraising event is about determining how much you hope the charity will make on that day.

Consider the number of tickets you’ll need, what functions are going to be there, and whether there is going to be catering. The scale of your event is going to greatly determine what’s going to be there.

Whilst it’s important to have a solid figure to work towards, don’t reach too high. Only so much can be done, so be sure to set a realistic goal you think your event can achieve. The same goes for your budget, it’s no good if the event costs more to set up than what was actually earned that day.

Consider everything in your budget plan: food, venue hire, drinks, entertainment, and equipment hire. These things all add up, but they’re important to include in a good event. People want to go out and have a good time as much as they want to ensure their money is donated towards a good cause.

5. Choose the right venue

The venue location is perhaps one of the most important aspects of running a successful event. Consider what you’re going to be hosting there. Like any good event, is yours going to have a few site attractions? Think about how much room they’re going to take up. If it’s going to be a more physical event with obstacle courses and jumping castles, somewhere outside with lots of space will be best.

On that note, if your event is outside, continually monitor the weather. Notify everyone if it’s going to be bad weather, so you can reschedule the event and not lose ticket sales!

6. Find some sponsors

It’s time for some networking and bringing in potential sponsors. Begin with your inner circle and get them engaged and interested in your event. Contact local businesses that may be interested and slowly branch out your networking. Explain that your event is mutually beneficial, as it will increase brand recognition for the businesses involved.

The sponsors can even become your board members who may have great suggestions, ideas and new sponsorship opportunities.

7. How will you collect donations?

In this day and age, the best way to collect donations is through digital technologies. It’s always about the easiest and most simple way for potential attendees to pay money because if it’s complicated and difficult people are likely to give up and not bother. A great way is to set up a website with a ticketing program and do a simple search to find one that suits your needs.

8. Get willing volunteers

It’s hard to run a big event without some help, and you need to get the right people to help you out. A simple way is to put up ads on job search websites, you’ll be surprised by the number of young people looking to just volunteer for a worthy cause.

Another way is getting in contact with your attendees and seeing if anyone is willing to help. When they purchase a ticket, have a little questionnaire asking if they’d like to volunteer for the event.

A great way to entice people is perhaps with a paid-for dinner or awarding them with tickets for some other event. Just be realistic with the costs of this and plan accordingly to ensure it won’t eat into your fundraising efforts.

9. Be active at the venue

Show that you can run a charity event and that you’re happy to engage and participate in the venue. Do your best to cater to the needs of your guests. This will encourage them to visit again if you run a fundraising event again in the future. You could very well begin a yearly event for the local community.

10. Event attractions and equipment

What are you doing to make this a unique charity event that people are going to enjoy? Consider your target audience first, and who you’re going to promote the event to. Then plan what to have there.

Depending on your target audience it’s best to come up with attractions that will engage and excite them the most. For a more social event, hire local talent like bands and singers to perform, and bring some guest speakers in. Perhaps you have a younger audience, hire some obstacle courses or bouncy castles as they are always a big hit.

Speaking of hiring equipment, check us out at Monsterball. We have some fun and exciting products like obstacle courses, gladiator rings, and of course, our bouncy castles hire in Perth! Get in touch today for a quote or for advice on our products!