Instead of recreating the entire fundraising process and starting from scratch to banish the staleness, tweak your PTO’s gameplan just a touch to net higher profits without much effort.
The trick is to make smart, strategic changes!
This post has some clever, yet small and virtually effortless fundraising tweaks that will yield results you’ll love: more participation and more money!
Change it Up
An easy way to light up interest in your PTO fundraiser is to do something a little different and new.
This is something stores already do, keeping things fresh for customers by moving products around on shelves and even switching their location in different aisles.
When things are the same, brains tune out and don’t notice things.
It’s easy to overlook things when you know what to expect, so stores switch things up to help you see things again.
Steal this concept for your PTO’s next fundraiser and try something new.
Especially if your PTO has mainly stuck to product catalog fundraisers, it’s a fantastic time to try something entirely different to mimic what stores do.
Try a Walk-A-Thon, Read-A-Thon, a Peer 2 Peer, or even a silent auction.
Just this little change can make families stop and take notice, boosting your fundraising income and overall participation.
Get it Online
Next, try lowering the bar for participation and add an online component to any fundraiser.
This one tiny tweak makes it easy for anyone to participate, no matter where they live, meaning people can donate to support your PTO even though they’re not able to attend your event.
Think about what a difference that would make for an auction fundraiser! Participants can bid on items of interest to them during the live event, meaning your group will come away with more money in the end.
The other fantastic benefit to your PTO Treasurer and Fundraising Chair, especially, is that there are no checks to cash with payments accepted online, which in turn means no bounced checks to worry about!
Add to all of this is the fact that an online component will be expected by your community, so don’t disappoint by not having one.
Help Them Picture It
Be like Sophia from The Golden Girls and help them picture it.
In fact, having a picture of the item or experience alongside a good description is a time tested way to generate more interest in it.
So be sure to do the same with your fundraisers!
This is especially necessary if you’re running an auction fundraiser since seeing an enticing picture can make the item more desirable, and in turn, tempt more people to bid, which raises the end price of the item.
Items without images will struggle to get attention and bids, lowering the success of the fundraising campaign. So avoid this situation!
Another way to help potential donors see what their donation will do is to add some pictures of what your PTO plans to use the proceeds of the fundraiser on.
Highlight the impact of donations to demonstrate why donors should support your effort.
Track it
One final tweak to boost fundraising income is to add an automated fundraiser progress tracker (a.k.a. a profit thermometer).
This visual representation of the fundraiser’s goal is a fantastic method of letting a picture do the talking for you!
The tracker instantly adds a game element into the mix that will likely motivate students and parents to spread the word, as well as for donors to generously give to help reach the overall goal.
Having a digital tracker is far more effective than only having one on a bulletin board in the school since not everyone will be in the school to see it.
Over to You
Change up your PTO’s fundraising plan with any of these four easy strategic tweaks and be wowed by the end result.
You’re sure to see either greater participation, more revenue generated, or both!
