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Online Annual Fund – An Oxymoron? Recently, I’ve been asked about Annual Funds Online and my first reaction was, “What an oxymoron!” Annual Funds are about a yearly fundraising campaign, and the web is open 24/7. There is nothing “annual” about the web. In fact, the goal of an annual fund is to raise unrestricted money. Period. It may be that it was initially done once a year for cost efficiency measures or that people used to give only once a year. Maybe it was once a volunteer effort and the necessary planning limited the campaign to once a year. Certainly, there are secondary benefits for fundraisers. An increase in annual fund donors feeds the pipeline for major gifts, planned giving, and capital campaigns. All those things, however, are secondary to the goal of raising unrestricted money. Right? So if the goal is to raise unrestricted money and the web is “open” all the time, why call it an Annual Fund? Maybe your internal reason for an annual offline campaign is cost of mailing, processing, phoning, etc. You just can’t do it more than once a year. But sending email is cheap. If you are already paying for online donation processing, there is no additional cost there. Using this term also gives online donors an “out.” If they give online to the annual fund, does that mean that their job is done for a whole calendar year and they will never hear from you again? No emails, no asks, nothing? You better believe that somebody else is asking them during that year that you are silent. Instead, your job as the Annual Fund Director is to raise unrestricted funds and that's how I would approach it online. Your online fundraising efforts should be campaign driven – unrestricted campaigns, emergency campaigns, and even support of offline campaigns. NPA suggests that your organization (development department) create a master fundraising calendar that incorporates both restricted and unrestricted campaigns. That calendar should contain an online component that compliments the offline efforts. If you are going to raise money online, the ask is usually in the form of an email, and the "reply device" is the online transaction form. With email, you can interact with your donors more often than once a year. With an online form you can also give the donor options for how much and how often they want to give. The Care USA site has a great form that does just that. Take a look With all fundraising efforts, it’s important to return to the original goal of any effort. That way you can think through different approaches that may defy the conventional fundraising methods, language, and titles. February 2006 | |
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