Online + Virtual Event Client Success Stories
A series of case studies and testimonials from clients who have successfully pivoted to an online/virtual event.
Online + Virtual Event Customer Success Stories
Examples, Best Practices, and Results
First thing's first: You can absolutely do this.
GiveSmart has you covered.
Soaring Owls Foundation
Embracing online through social media, sponsor recognition, and their online platform.
A great example of...
leveraging creative email outreach to engage donors AND encourage them to invite others to participate in the online fundraising.
Take a peek at some of their campaign emails:
View their GiveSmart campaign site here
View website event page, where they kept their community updated, here
A great example of...
Embracing the fun of staying at home!
A great example of...
Recognizing sponsors! At a physical event, you're accustomed to showcasing your sponsors and you want to make sure you bring that same element online!
Lafayette Elementary School
Breaking Fundraising Records Amid Uncertainty
"We broke our all-time fundraising record – amazing! GiveSmart and the team were an enormous reason for our success, and we appreciate it greatly”
-Christina Lisi, Lafayette Elementary School
A great example of...
Generating excitement on the day your auction goes live for bidding
View their GiveSmart site here.
The American Alpine Club
Making it Easy for Donors to Give
A great example of...
Making it easy for donors to contribute and ensuring your award recipients/speakers are still a part of your virtual event.
They updated all of their pages and included links to their fundraising campaign wherever possible.
View their GiveSmart campaign here:
Highlights
At 1:37, you'll hear their CEO Phil Powers discuss how ticket purchasers were generous in converting their purchase(s) into donations
At 31:25, you'll see a great example of leveraging speakers who would have been a part of the physical event still participating virtually
A great example of...
showcasing sponsors! At a physical event, you're accustomed to showcasing your sponsors and you want to make sure you bring that same element online!
Craft Alliance
Showcase Masters
"GiveSmart saved our online auction! We opened it up to our whole community. The auction did better than last year, despite having fewer items. Combined with other cost-saving measured we implemented, we actually netted $20,000 more this year."
- Jessi Goodhart, Craft Alliance
A great example of...
leveraging your social channels to showcase who won! Of course, promoting the raffle (and other fundraising elements) before and during the event is key. Still, don't forget to share who won with your donor base after the raffle has been pulled!
View their GiveSmart campaign here
A great example of...
(left) demonstrating your impact! During a physical event, your emcee or live auctioneer would usually articulate what donors' contributions will enable your organization to do.
and
(right) showcasing items and generating excitement among donors!
Huntington Christian School
Leveraging All Aspects of the Platform
A Great Example of...
So many things! From clear communication to donors, creative social media usage, leveraging GiveSmart's ticketing, raffles, Instant Buys, items, etc this organization did a fantastic job of pivoting including one of the most impressive website features to date.
View their GiveSmart campaign here
What They Did – Visitors to the school's website received the following prompt (left). This immediately took all their own traffic directly to their fundraising campaign.
How They Did It – "Sumo is a plugin for Wordpress web pages, so it will only work if someone has a Wordpress website. It is easy; I signed up for a free account and then linked it to my Wordpress dashboard. At that point it was a straightforward process with templates for building the plugin and once built, you just activate it. Because it is linked to my Wordpress site there is not much else to do after that step. It is also easy to edit. Not a lot of color or template options for the free version, but really pretty easy."
A Great Example of...
Highlighting donation matching! If you have a donor matching up to a certain amount, make sure you thank that individual/organization and display to others so that they know their own contribution is double or triple what it would be otherwise!
Keeping the momentum going! Why not extend aspects of your fundraising, such as the raffle, to keep things going and keep engagement high? Huntington Christian School updated their web redirect and sent out an email to all their users in the system to generate funds "post event". See email promotion, right.
A Great Example of...
Clear communication and a timeline for supporters to follow along-including an Instagram account solely devoted to the virtual event
Adopting virtual beyond fundraising! This virtual spirit week has nothing to do with GiveSmart or our platform, but we think it's worth sharing as a great example of how pivoting to virtual can go beyond fundraising.
Make It Nice Hospitality (Eleven Madison Park)
Responding to Need
A Great Example of...
Leveraging technology to quickly support a dire need! In addition, this is a fantastic example of getting your message out there AND making sure you drive traffic to your fundraising campaign where possible. In this article, you'll see that the organization ensured their GiveSmart fundraising campaign focused on supporting their employees in a tumultuous time by utilizing their own internal resources (dinners and unique chef experiences).
Feature: Auction Countdown Clock
With the pivot to online/virtual, it's more critical than ever to OVER communicate with your donors. Ensuring that you clearly provide the remaining time on your auction(s) will help ensure bidders are both informed and reminded of when they'll need to get those last minute bids in!
Columbus Blue Jackets
Driving Traffic to Your Fundraising Campaign
View their GiveSmart campaign site here.
Christian Brothers High School
Informing Donors How to Participate
A Great Example of...
Including bidding tips on your campaign homepage! The goal is to ensure that donors can bid and support your fundraising with ease- either via computer or through mobile. By giving them some best practices, you're ensuring they're best equipped to bid, bid, bid.
We had our event on [March 14th] and raised over $450,000!! Thank you for the tips on text messaging, that made all the difference as we felt we did a really great job in that area to aid our fundraising.
- Joanne McShane, Christian Brothers High School
View their GiveSmart campaign site here.
Seymour Johnson Air Force Base Officers and Civilian Spouse Club
Breaking Fundraising Records through Pivoting to Virtual
Thank you so much for all the help along the way! We raised $12,000 more than we ever have before!!! It all turned out amazing and everyone has had such positive feedback about the GiveSmart platform. Also, I've heard from many people how awesome it was to see something succeed despite the odds, when so much else is falling apart right now. Thank you for being a part of it and doing and great job walking me through everything
- Paige Kiser, Seymour Johnson Air Force Base Officers and Civilian Spouse Club
A Great Example of...
Communication, communication, communication!
Something to keep front of mind when making the pivot to online/virtual is that your donors are having to make the same adjustment(s) you are. A critical element is to ensure you're OVER communicating and giving them all pieces of information to empower their fundraising participation.
This organization did a fabulous job of conveying:
- the event timeline
- instructions on how to bid
- a video demonstrating the work this organization provides its constituents
View their GiveSmart fundraising site here.
A Great Example of...
making online/virtual fun with a highly creative 'selfie scavenger hunt' for a chance to win an Amazon Echo Dot! There are many ways to create hype around your online/virtual event and this is a fantastic example of how you can go about it. It also encouraged donor participation and engagement.
People started sharing their selfies with the link to their own personal accounts (Share Our Event widgets) for a chance to win an Amazon Echo Dot. We think this helped bring in a much bigger audience for us.
-Paige Kiser, Seymour Johnson Air Force Base Officers and Civilian Spouse Club
A Great Example of...
leveraging Facebook to keep donors informed, engaged, and to keep the virtual event as much fun as a physical one! Just because there's no in-person event doesn't mean your can't embrace your theme! Here, for the "Roaring 2020's" theme, dressing up independently was still encouraged.
You can browse all their Facebook content here. (In fact, we recommend it-there's so many great examples there!)
Facebook is also a great way to share exciting video content.
This video is a wonderful example of ensuring donors know what is happening with the event as things evolve. In addition, it serves as a reminder of the mission of your organization and why the support of your donors matters now more than ever.
View this video for an example of keeping the theme alive! Here, this organization informs donors of how to participate, and is just good old fashioned fun!!!
A Great Example of...
Driving traffic to your online fundraising campaign! Ensuring that on your own website and on social media you're driving traffic to your fundraising campaign.
Having your auction site be the permanent "link in bio" is another great way to direct your social media traffic to the site.
St. Joseph's Regional High School
Using visuals to communicate digitally
A Great Example of...
directly embedding the donor display board onto their home page! Usually, this screen is something that would be shown during the donation appeal/fund the need, but with online/virtual fundraising you can still recognize those who have donated and encourage others to do the same. In addition, they made their campaign home page a fantastic resource that explains what donors' support goes towards and encouraging a donation.
View their GiveSmart fundraising site here.
Community Sailing of Colorado
Breaking Fundraising Records through Pivoting to Virtual
A Great Example of...
pivoting to a virtual event in a short timeframe. They were able to still have an event while running it on live stream and having several fundraising components to end up netting the same amount as they would have live. Creating an experience through social media and expanding their networks beyond the local community allowed Community Sailing of Colorado to bring in new donors from areas outside of Colorado. A pivotal fundraising element of their live event is Heads or Tails and this was a fun way to incorporate the same game but with videos and social media. It actually raised MORE than it usually did live.
View their GiveSmart fundraising site here.
Fantastic use of video on home page
By utilizing Facebook Live, CSC was able to engage donors and supporters throughout the live event and they even ran a live appeal that surpassed their goal.
Heads or Tails: fundraising game of chance that only requires a coin.
What is it?
Heads or tails is a fundraising game of chance where participants pay to play and then compete to guess whether a coin flip will result in heads (put hands on head) or tails (put hands on tail). This keeps going until one person remains standing. The winner gets a big prize. The prize can be a percentage of the proceeds or a unique prize that was donated. The cost to play and the prize is up to your organization.
How did they play it?
By selling access to the game as instant items, they were able to involve people all over the country and ended up getting more players than they would normally get in a live event. This increased their amount raised even more so. The players each were sent a Google document to fill out their heads or tails guesses and each day leading up to the gala there was a coin flip. If you got it right you were still in the game and if you got it wrong you were eliminated. These videos were all from celebrities in their world and are actually quite hilarious. With this method, and having the campaign run for several days, you can also have people who sign up multiple times.
Pricing is totally up to you and depends on your donor base. Typically, we see pricing around $20-25.
They raised more virtually and had more participants virtually, than they'd ever had at their live event!
Windsor Chamber of Commerce
Supporting your community in challenging times
A Great Example of...
supporting your local community while pivoting to a virtual campaign. They were able to still have an event while running it on GiveSmart and promoting fundraising around two impacted nonprofits in the area. The chamber was able to collect gift certificates for a surprise game of chance campaign that supported local businesses and helped them raise more. Sponsors were able to participate and get awareness through the digital platform.
View their GiveSmart fundraising site here.
Taking care of sponsors with clean and tagged messaging
The ability to fundraise for several causes/missions/initiatives was one way Windsor Chamber of Commerce was able to support several organizations as they pivoted to a more community-oriented event that was exclusively virtual.
A Surprise Box is an instant buy item that creates that 'game of chance' and intrigue donors enjoy as part of a fundraiser.
A Wine Pull is a very popular fundraising game where people can win a nice bottle of wine but doesn't know what it is until they get it.
Learn more about wine pulls
McKenna Claire Foundation
Virtual wine tasting that went so well, they did it twice.
A Great Example of...
Pivot to Virtual, Donation Campaign, Live Stream
View their GiveSmart fundraising site here.
Ronald McDonald House Charities of Chicagoland & Northwest Indiana
A Great Example of...
Pivot to Virtual, Silent Auction, Donation Campaign, Live Stream, Sponsorships, Direct Donations
View their GiveSmart fundraising site here.
What inspired this fundraising campaign and how was it put together?
We had three options: We could cancel. We could postpone. We could go virtual. As our largest fundraising event of the year, we knew that canceling just wasn’t an option for us. Not knowing what the future holds, we were reluctant to postpone and decided to go virtual – and we had six weeks to figure out what our new virtual event looked like! We were full steam ahead with our combined Development and Marketing teams at the helm. This was truly an “all hands on deck” effort, and we leaned on the Board, our entire staff, volunteers, families who have utilized our services, and event sponsors and donors to help us pull it all together.
What were some of the challenges and how did you address them?
It was a challenge to pull it all off so quickly and was definitely a “learn as you go” process. Thankfully, we have a wonderful team and band of supporters who are creative, innovative thinkers. We researched and found solutions quickly to some of the technical and logistical challenges, we enlisted the help of media and local influencers to help spread the word and expand our reach, and we leaned on our community of supporters to help build content.
Silent Auction: One of their top performing items!
What was the most rewarding part?
One of the most rewarding parts of the process was seeing not only our internal teams come together, adapt, and produce the event so quickly, but also seeing how much our entire community rallied around us to make sure the campaign was a success. From sponsors and families who have utilized our services, to volunteers, influencers and media partners, we all had one common goal – and no one ever looked back. The icing on the cake was netting more revenue than originally forecasted due to significantly decreased expenses and the gift of over 130 new donors.
I cannot say enough about how well everyone at GiveSmart does with trouble shooting. Your team was wonderful in responding within a short period of time. Customer service is a big priority in my book, and you exceed in that department. In this moment of craziness and stress we are so grateful to the personalized attention and help making our largest fundraiser of the year successful. To know that we can close within minutes after auction, ease of use, knowledgeable representative is remarkable. Our decision to change over to GiveSmart and use you as our new fundraising platform has been the best decision we made for the school. GiveSmart are a true blessing right now in our time of need. Thank you so much for being our partner in our children’s school fundraiser. We can never say enough.
-Myra Kayser, St. Petronille School in Glen Ellyn, IL
View their GiveSmart campaign here.
In a world of no one leaving their homes – an online auction is worth every penny this year. We are still going to end up in the black on this event thanks to GiveSmart!
-Janell Pomeroy, Carl Sundahl Elementary
View their GiveSmart campaign here.
I appreciated the prompt response and the knowledge of both my Customer Success Manager and Event Specialist. They were both a pleasure to work with. I was very hesitant to use online bidding, but the Givesmart website was very easy to navigate and the end product was fantastic!
-Jackie Flom, Lial Catholic School in Whitehouse, OH
View their GiveSmart campaign here.
Additional Resources
Webinars, Blogs, and Checklists to Enable Your Online Fundraising
