Online Fundraising :: An Additional Income Stream Beyond Just Donations And Sponsorship Income

Online fundraising is not all about donations. Online fundraising should be looked at in the round. Raising funds for your project is best achieved online. Fundraising can be achieved without any donations and without having inventory to sell. Read on .....................

I have read a number of articles and websites that give information and methods concerning raising funds from an online presence. All the advice is good advice. But it is good advice for those fundraisers that have a blinkered approach to fundraising.

The majority of the information is concerned with telling you how to maximise your efforts in obtaining donations. Sure, this has been the way to fund your projects. But not everyone has the means or has the motivation to give as often or as much as your project needs.

To open your mind to the possibilities I wish to ask you a few questions.

If you answer these questions for yourself and your situation, as far as your online fundraising activities are concerned, I think that you will conclude that online fundraising is not all about obtaining donations.

Relying on one, albeit tried and trusted, method for raising funds through your website limits the possibilities for maximizing the funds that could be obtained.

Diversification to maximize potential income is the name of the game in this modern online and wired age.

Would you consider an additional option for online fundraising?

If the donations you receive are single, one-off donations it must be difficult to budget for any length of time beyond that for which the donation / donations last.

Having monthly donations allows you to budget on a foundation of knowledge that next month will see a set amount of income arriving - and this is spread out over the month, so cash-flow is evened out somewhat. Which is a good thing.

Would you consider an option that brought online fundraising cash in on a regular monthly basis?

If you keep a database I presume that you utilise this to ask for further donations, increases in donations, and ask for regular monthly donations / subscriptions rather than one-off yearly donations. Do you find that this is effective? Do you get the feeling that you might lose some goodwill by trying to maximize your income this way?

Would you consider an alternative where you increase your income from those on your database without asking for more donations?

How effective do you find this? Do you ever get the feeling that you are alienating your email recipients to the extent that they feel as though you are spamming them?

In this day and age you must be very careful with email. Asking for something is the norm and it irks some when they get these requests.

Would you consider an alternative where, rather than asking for something, you actually give something away?

To maximize income from events there is usually an element of sponsorship. Again, this method has now tended to become a nuisance in households that receive sponsorship requests, what seems like weekly.

You must be seeing a dilution of income from this method now that we are all struggling to make ends meet. Although this is not an online fundraising method it is relevant to fundraising in general.

If there was a way to increase your income for your project that entailed giving something away rather than asking for sponsorship, would this be of interest?

However you do it there is always a cost. Whether it be

• time
• labour costs
• cost of setting up and utilising Credit Card transactions
• cost of running a website
• cost of creating and keeping a database (or spreadsheet)
• cost using the database (or spreadsheet) to create e-mail listings
• cost to implement an email campaign
• cost of printing sponsorship forms (that bring a one-off income)

and so on.

Would an option that minimised costs but maximized returns be of interest?

The task of asking is a difficult one, especially if you are asking friends and family to part with their hard-earned cash and the only thing you offer in return is a thank you and the opportunity for them to gain a glow of satisfaction that they have helped in some small way.

But constantly asking eventually results in resentment and lack of interest.

Would you consider an alternative where you do not ask for money but rather you give something that will be of benefit to the recipient; they will thank you for; that you will only need to give once; and that you will earn from every time the recipient uses it?

The alternative to asking for donations and sponsorship requests that I am suggesting has a number of benefits. This alternative is not really an alternative to your online fundraising activities. It is better described as an addition to those online fundraising activities. The benefits are:

1. It is an addition to your online fundraising activities (and offline for that matter)
2. It brings regular monthly income for your project, forever!
3. You do not ask for donations or payments in order to achieve income.
4. You maximize the worth of those on your databases / spreadsheets.
5. Your email strategy can be turned from asking for donations to giving something away for free.
6. A free gift that can be given away whether or not someone sponsors your event.
7. Your costs are utilized for maximum returns on an ongoing basis, rather than one-off.
8. You will be thanked for your generosity whilst you receive income from the efforts of those that thank you.
9. Your "good user online experience" will go up and people will want to read your emails, flyers and whatever other written material you currently use to obtain funds.
10. Write to me or leave a comment below with any other benefits you find from using this alternative / addition to your online fundraising activities.

Sorry to have taken so long to get around to telling you what it is that will enhance your online fundraising activities. I thought that you should be given the opportunity to consider whether alternative / additional strategies might be beneficial to your fundraising efforts. I also thought that summarising the benefits would assist in any decisions you need to make.

So, in conclusion, what is being offered is:

1. An alternative to asking for money.
2. A gift you can give, as a thank you, and / or as a welcome gift, to everyone.
3. A gift that can save the recipient money.
4. A gift that generates income for you every time it is used.
5. A gift that can be given away to others, by any recipient, without them losing access to its benefits, (and produces more income for you).
6. A gift that has unlimited usage. It never wears out. In fact, the more it is used the better it is appreciated.
7. A gift that is not insignificant (like a corporate gift such as a pen or keyring).
8. The gift does have a cost, but not on an individual basis. You can give away as many as you want for the same cost. The more you give away the less each gift costs.
9. A gift whose cost is offset by the income each can generate.
10. A regular, usually increasing, level of income which is based on usage. This usage can go down as well as up of course (vagaries of holiday periods for instance).
11. There is no inventory to buy, store or keep.
12. There is no delivery expense.
13. It is not perishable and you can give away as many as you like.
14. It is completely free to those you give it to. There are no obligations whatsoever on the recipient.
15. A gift that, when used, will cause the recipient to thank you and be glad that they are associated with you.
16. A gift that can be branded with your details so that whenever it is available for use your name is there to remind the recipient that you gave them a useful gift.
17. A chance to make yourself "flavour (flavor) of the month" as an online fundraiser.

The buzz at the moment is all about apps. You get them for your iphone, ipad, internet browsers and numerous other interfaces. Well, you are being introduced to an app that can be used with major search engines that finds the best deals, bargains and coupons for those that install it and use it. This app saves time and money and is an invaluable tool for achieving best prices for any comparison shopping undertaken online.

Anybody that uses it saves money. And since it is free there is no cost to the user to save that money.

Every time that the app is used you earn money.

1. By being paid for the click that the recipient did to see the results of a comparison shopping experience.
2. By being paid for leads that a search generated.
3. By being paid for sales that were made.

You get paid directly by the owner of the gift you are giving away. You also get paid by companies that run affiliate programs that you are linked to (like Amazon and Clickbank). In fact you have multiple streams of income just for giving away the free app.

There are more income-generating opportunities but this article is about a simple and effective way of undertaking an alternative / additional online fundraising activity.

If you wish to take advantage of the option to raise funds by utilising the free app giveaway for your online fundraising (as well as your offline fundraising) activities then:

Please refer to the person that introduced you to this page to review your options.

If you arrived at this article without being pointed here by a sponsor then you can obtain a FREE app from free app download to test it out for yourself.

If you have decided that this option is for you and your online fundraising activities then the same link will point you to the sign up pages.

If you decide to go ahead and use this method, please contact me via skype: chazfox, so that I may help you every step of the way (for free).