A Successful Year-End Fundraising Campaign [Case Study]
Under Cogeo’s guidance, Saint John Bosco School (SJBS) launched a highly successful year-end fundraising campaign. Through an Annual Appeal, layered marketing efforts, a leveraged challenge grant, and proper stewardship, SJBS was able to raise over $30,000 in just one month.
Annual Appeal
An Annual Appeal is a highly strategic method to reach your recurring donors and attract those community members who have yet to donate or donate seldom.
This is a mass outreach that provides an update on the organization’s activity and recent successes, tells an impactful story, and makes an ask for a donation to support the organization’s future work. It takes place during a crucial time of the year for your nonprofit. Typically, this is the last couple months of the calendar year (including Giving Tuesday). However, if your nonprofit has a bigger presence in the Spring, Summer, or Fall, you can launch your Annual Appeal then.
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SJBS created their own Annual Appeal around their roof renovation project. They reminded their members about the dire need for a new roof and provided an update for the amount raised for the project thus far. They then encouraged members to donate to the project.
Weekly Email Series
A pinnacle piece of SJBS’s Annual Appeal campaign was the weekly email. Overall, there were 4 emails sent over the course of a month.
The initial email was sent from the Head of School to their community, discussing some of the key high points that the school had experienced that year before stating their fundraising need -- a new roof for the school. He then announced their Annual Appeal campaign and asked the community to donate.
The following 3 emails were sent generically from the school with updates around the campaign, including:
How much had been raised through the Annual Appeal campaign
How much had been raised overall for the capital campaign
How much time was left to donate to the Annual Appeal campaign
Each email provided a list on how to support SJBS, such as:
Sharing what your #stjohnboscoschool means to you on social media
Spreading the word to family and friends
Get involved in other initiatives happening at the school
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Social Media
SJBS has a healthy presence on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. To add a layer to their marketing, SJBS included their social media in their Annual Appeal campaign.
These posts were a truncated version of the email, highlighting the campaign updates and providing a link or opportunity to support and donate.
Creating social media presence for your campaign will give your campaign the opportunity to reach your community additional times, which can be a key piece to converting donations, and is one of the most efficient ways to reach new audiences.
Leveraged a Challenge Grant
SJBS executed highly strategic fundraising tactics to be able to leverage a challenge grant during their Annual Appeal campaign. A challenge grant is a marketing strategy that many nonprofits use to inspire community members to give generously to the campaign.
SJBS received a $40,000 gift from a major gift donor that they used to match any Annual Appeal campaign donations 1 to 1.
Proper Stewardship
As donations rolled in, the SJBS team made sure to track each donor, their contact information and any additional details, and their donation amount and date. This level of data tracking helps ensure that these donors will be properly stewarded and become recurring or annual donors.
For the remaining donors, SJBS emailed to announce the final amount raised during the Annual Appeal campaign and to thank the donors for their contribution.
For those who donated a major gift (at Cogeo, a major gift is a donation that meets or exceeds .1% of a nonprofit’s annual budget), the SJBS leadership followed up on a more personal level. The Director of Development and Board President would either call, write, or email to thank them. This helps build relationships with the major gift donor to encourage future donations.