charity event Archives

How to Create Successful Virtual Fundraising Events

September 9, 2020

COVID-19 has thrown non-profit fundraising for a loop in 2020. Many not-for-profit organizations that rely on fundraising events to fund their mission are scrambling to move their fundraising online. If you are one of those organizations, take a deep breath. With a little preparation, planning, and the right fundraising event partner, your next virtual fundraiser will be a success.

Tailor Your Fundraiser to Your Audience

One of the secrets to hosting an effective virtual fundraiser is having a well-defined audience. The better defined your event audience the more focused you can make your fundraiser to drawing donations from your audience. The easiest way to accomplish this is to make sure the WHY of your fundraiser is front and center. Don’t get distracted by transitioning to a virtual event. You can find success in this new medium by keeping your organization’s WHY at the center of your event.

Virtual Fundraiser Ideas

With your event’s WHY and target audience at the front of your mind, it’s time to determine what sort of virtual fundraiser will work best. What type of event best suits your audience and allows you to reinforce your event’s WHY? Below are few example types of virtual fundraisers you can run for your event.

Online Auction
Online Class
Online Contest
Online Open Mic
Online Raffle
TED-style Virtual Speaker
Virtual 5k
Virtual Concert or Festival
Virtual Tour
Watch Party

Drive Engagement Through Audience Participation

Without the stimuli of an in-person event your audience may feel disconnected to the content presented. There are many ways to stimulate an interactive connection. One of these ways is by encouraging audience participation. Ideas to add audience participation to your event include creating quiz questions for the audience to answer, operating online polls, or encouraging the audience to submit questions on social media for you to answer during the event.

How to Achieve Your Fundraising Goals

With the transition to virtual fundraising many organizations are worried about falling short of their fundraising goals. The first thing you can do to increase your donations is to make sure to follow up on potential attendees and RSVPs. Treat your virtual fundraiser like you are organizing an in-person event.

Another thing is to make sure you choose a donation goal that’s achievable. The silver lining of virtual events is they tend to have lower overhead compared to in-person events. This means you will keep a larger percentage of each donation. This helps to counterbalance the stigma from attendees that they don’t “get as much” out of a virtual event.

The single best advice to avoiding falling short of your fundraising goal is to make it easy to donate. This ensures you capture 100% of the donations people want to make. Make sure to choose a donation avenue that accepts many types of payment. Payment types your want to be prepared to receive include credit card, Apple Pay, Google Pay, PayPal, etc.

What Makes for a Successful Online Fundraiser

Planning is the key to online fundraiser success. The earlier you start planning your event, the better. You should begin planning a one-time event at least four weeks before the date. For more complex virtual events, like multi-day simultaneous channel fundraisers start your planning 12 weeks out. Because virtual fundraisers live online, it’s important you create a well-designed event page with registration, agenda, and donation capabilities. Your virtual event also needs to be optimized for mobile. It’s likely a significant percentage of your attendees will be interacting and donating to your fundraiser via phone.

And of course, to ensure your online fundraiser goes smoothly, spend the time to pick out the right platform, tools, and event partner.

Virtual Fundraiser Additional Considerations

Additional considerations for your fundraising event should include event promotion. For your fundraiser to be a success people have to know about it and show up. Get your event information out early and often. You can reach out directly using email, social media, and SMS. You should also create a press release to generate media interest and coverage of your virtual fundraiser.

After the event make sure to follow up and thank attendees for their participation. This is a good time to solicit feedback to improve your next virtual event.

Virtual Fundraiser Example: March for Babies StepUp!

For an example of a large non-profit changing their fundraiser see the March of Dimes, March for Babies StepUp! The March of Dimes annual walkathon “March for Babies” was transformed due to COVID-19 concerns into March for Babies StepUp! The virtual fundraiser allowed participants to track their steps individually through a pedometer phone app. They also created a TikTok dance challenge and hashtags to share individual progress on social media.

Virtual Fundraiser Event Production Partner

Just like producing an in-person fundraiser, there is a lot of technical work that goes into producing virtual events. Virtual fundraising events also have the added difficulty of making sure your fundraiser looks and sounds great over broadcast.

Trust an experienced, virtual event production partner to make your online fundraiser a success. Onstage Systems has 30 years of event production experience, including virtual event and live streaming expertise. Onstage Systems can help you with lighting, stage design, audio, and multi-feed setups.

Onstage Systems Virtual Event Production

See how Onstage Systems can help make your virtual fundraiser a success: Sonic Soul Tribe Virtual Concert. Onstage Systems produced the 12-hour international, virtual concert event. The event included on-location concert production and coordinating remote, international performances over the event’s 12-hour duration.

More Virtual Experiences by Onstage Systems

Boxing Events
Fort Worth Symphony Orchestra’s America Strong Concert
DAS Ultimate Typing Championships
Stitch House Dallas
And More

There is still time to meet your 2020 fundraising goals with a well-planned virtual fundraiser and the right event production partner. Visit HERE to see more of Onstage System’s featured work. Or, CONTACT US to get started with planning your next successful virtual fundraising event.

Event Management and AV Production for the Cattle Baron’s Ball

November 1, 2019

Cattle Baron's Ball AV Production / lighting solution / staging rentals by Onstage Systems

The Cattle Baron’s Ball is one of Dallas’ most well-attended fundraising events. Since 1974, the Cattle Baron's Ball has raised over $81 million for cancer research. For many years now, the one-night fundraiser benefiting the American Cancer Society has been hosted at Gilley’s Dallas.

The fundraiser contributes much of its success to the sponsors and partners that donate luxury raffle items such as vehicles from Volvo, Mercedes, Porsche and Range Rover, a Hawaiian Getaway, a $10K Debit Card, and a $10K Highland Park Shopping.

Onstage Systems has been a long-time supporter of the Cattle Baron’s Ball. For over 40 years we have provided this event with event management and av production services such as staging rentals, lighting, audio, live event production, and onsite technical assistance. Onstage organized the event logistics of the live auction by preparing lights, speakers, and microphones. Perhaps even more exciting than that, we were granted the opportunity to manage the full production and offer onsite technical assistance for this year’s headlining talent, Keith Urban.

Keith Urban and Travis Tritt on stage for the Cattle Baron's Ball, AV Production by Onstage

Keith Urban and Travis Tritt helped raise funds with spectacular performances. However, they are only the latest in big names to have performed here. Throughout its history, many adored country music stars have supported the cause with entertainment, including Tammy Wynette, Johnny Cash, Crystal Gayle, Willie Nelson, George Strait, Waylon Jennings, Brooks & Dunn, Clint Black, Dwight Yoakam, Big & Rich, Toby Keith, Sugarland, Brad Paisley, Zac Brown Band, and many more.

Cattle Baron's Ball AV Production / lighting solution / staging rentals / technical support by Onstage Systems

In the early years of the event, Onstage Systems faced challenges with venue preparation. The tent outside Gilley’s Dallas was unable to hold the number of video walls, automated lights, and large top-of-the-line speakers due to weight restrictions. Times like these are when having a staff of creative and experienced technicians become critical. Our staging department designed a custom indoor ground supported rigging grid that could fulfill all of our needs. This has since been certified by our engineers for safety and is now the standard for this event.

With Onstage’s complex staging, lighting, and audio visual elements, we had to coordinate our complex installations with vendors bringing tables, chairs, and decor that also required the space. Onstage contributes to the annual success of this event to our attention to detail and everyone’s dedication to cooperation.

Cattle Baron's Ball AV Production / lighting solution / staging rentals by Onstage Systems

AV Production and Decor Lighting for the 2018 Petroleum Ball

April 3, 2018

Dallas Petroleum Club wanted to shake things up a little more this year!

For years we have provided AV production, design, and technical support to include decor lighting, audio, and staging.

Each year the Petroleum Ball host one or two bands, usually a headliner followed by a party band on a separate stage. This year, however, our client wanted something different. They wanted no downtime and two national acts!

To accommodate a growing crowd, the decision to reduce the number of stages to one main stage was made. The logistical challenges of doing this with two bands were further increased with the client's request of one band to immediately follow the other without interruption. Our av production and creativity had to be at its best to pull off this exciting challenge.

The momentum of the event would continue after the headliner to the party band was solved by Onstage Systems to provide a 48’ diameter rotating stage this year to achieve that goal.

After dinner, the Petroleum Ball's main stage lit up with Pat Green and his band keeping the audience entertained. With both bands on the stage back to back and separated from sight by a drape, the guests were treated to not only a seamless performance but a creative transition as the real magic happened.

Huey Lewis and the News drummer took to the stage and started the sound of a heartbeat with his kick drum as the stage slowly turned. The band entered to the roar of an amazed crowd. Huey Lewis and the News moving performance electrified the crowd to an out of their seats experience for their entire set.

In addition to the great stage production and av production, Onstage Systems worked hand in hand with the decor design to help create exactly what the client was looking for.

Teamwork, across different companies involved in one project, is integral to a cohesive and well delivered overall product. In these cases, you know the left hand is talking to the right hand — and it shows in the final overall outcome!

The many challenges that we faced in presenting such an event push us to technical resolves and creative options that fuel us. These and other types of events are truly what drives us to the best at what we do.

The satisfaction of our clients in being able to take an abstract thought and transcend past even their greatest possibilities is what separates the good from the great.

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