Goals - budgets - plans ~ these can be scary terms and ones that make us cringe. Alternatively, these terms can be helpful and motivational to help us focus on the task at hand.
Do you have your fundraising goals outlined for Fall 2021? Do you have a clear-cut path on how to get there and to achieve these goals? All of the ICs are encouraged to spend some time writing out your goals for Fall 2021 and Spring 2022 and figure out how to get there. Here are a few ideas on how to help you achieve those goals:
1.What do you need? This can be a multi-part response. Do you need to make $X amount of money to hit your budget requirements? Do you want to get back into a specific target market that you’ve been out of for a few years? Do you want to get back into a specific school or school district that hasn’t been the “best” for fundraising in recent years? Do you want to renew relationships with former clients or reconnect with a customer that has moved to a different school or teaches a different subject or coaches a different sport now? All of these are valid answers to the things that you “need” in order to make a game plan to reach your goals.
2.Put the pencil to the paper Now comes the math skills from middle school. You want to make a certain level of money to meet your financial needs and goals for this fall. In order to do that you have to see and run a certain number of groups. Those groups need to do a certain level of sales that generates your commission. Always overshoot this goal for #’s of groups in case of a cancellation or delay in their start (moved to spring from the fall).
3.Stay on track Get up and get on with it. See existing customers and potential customers - BOTH. Ask for referrals. Go early and stay late. The fundraising season is not as long as you think it is. Be productive each day and have a plan. Don’t aimlessly leave the house without a plan of where you are going and who you are going to see. If you do these things you will hit those goals and stay on track throughout the Fall and into the Spring.
Here are a few items to help you with setting GOALS and achieving your target plan:
GATHERinformation Fact find about your group and sponsor as much as possible. What are their goals? Why do they need to fundraise? Is there a trip, competition, event, or something that they need to travel to? Local or out of state? What are the details? Dates? Requirements? The more information you uncover the easier it will be to “sell” the fundraising idea and identify how you can help.
OWN it Be the expert about fundraising and the products that you offer. Point out specific coupon offers in the book and on the app. Be knowledgeable about what you are selling and help them to utilize fundraisers for their goals and plans. Do your homework.
ASK for help We cannot assist if we don’t know what the need is or the questions are. Please reach out to the sales team or group relations so that we can help you in any of these areas. We are more than happy to help you and your success equates to company success so it’s a Win-Win situation if the “team” approach is taken.
LISTENcarefully Try not to do all the talking. People LOVE to talk about themselves and tell their story. That can be difficult sometimes if you are the extrovert in this situation and you really know your stuff. Remember that EVERYONE has a story to tell and to share. Give them that opportunity to talk about their club, their team, and their accomplishments. Meanwhile, they will uncover the plans and goals. Now you are in a position to help them achieve those goals and plans. You are encouraged to make NOTES so that you can refer back to those in future conversations. Work to make the conversation memorable while building the relationship at the same time.
SUPPORT your customers Don’t just show up to get the agreement signed. Be present and be available. You have a great support team in place to help you throughout the season, but you have to be the front line person to assist locally with your groups. Remember you are in the RELATIONSHIP business and those who give specific attention tend to keep those customers for a long period of time. If you don’t take care of the situation and your customers, over time they will look for someone else who will.
IC PAPERWORK
IC paperwork to renew for Fall 2021 and Spring 2022 has been sent out (multiple times) to our list of active IC reps. If you have not yet filled out your paperwork, please STOP now and take 5 minutes to do so. This will help us complete your onboarding and have you set up in the system. If you wait until you sign a group to do your paperwork, that could potentially delay things and especially a shipment of books. If you have any questions about the IC paperwork, please contact the sales team ASAP = sales@savearound.com. We’ll be glad to assist.
Pitching the Sprint Sale Option
Whenever you are pitching the idea of running a sprint sale option with a group - try this.
Coach Smith …
How would you like to raise money in less than an hour?
What if I had a solution to involve your players for one afternoon to raise money?
What if we could set up a fundraiser that doesn’t interfere with practice time?
How does $1000 raised in an hour sound to you?
Which sounds better? A two week fundraiser or one that’s finished in an hour?
These simple pitches and phrases might pique the interest of the coach or sponsor you are going after and get an appointment. That’s all you need is to get in the door. The coupon books and the Sprint program will sell itself on its own merit - but you have to be able to present it and know how to pitch it. (Refer back to the article from Dan Reyome on the Sprint Sales - he has some great ideas and proven things that work).
Fall ‘21 and Spring ‘22 Group Contracts
As you are meeting with groups and re-signing them or signing up new groups, be sure to send in those contracts to the Group Relations team. They will work to get your contract set up, product on order, and confirm anything else (prizes, brochures, etc). If you send your contracts elsewhere they might be delayed. Also, remember that this school year will include 2022 contracts (even if they run in the Fall of 2021). Think of it like the graduating class of 2022. That will help you remember the book year and the contract year to correspond correctly.So new contracts and all re-signs need to be emailed to: grouprelations@savearound.com.
1.Think about the results you want to see - personally and professionally.
2.Come up with SMART goals *Specific * Measurable *Attainable *Realistic and Relevant *Timeline
3.Write down your goals.
4.Create an action plan to achieve your goals.
5.Create a timeline.
6.Take action and set deadlines.
7.Re-evaluate and assess your progress. Make adjustments if needed.
Nothing fancy, but perhaps some talking points when you are talking with a prospect about the idea of fundraising and why it is necessary. This might help you describe fundraisers who are also referred to as “donors”.
1. The oldest recorded fundraising appeal was written by St. Paul around A.D. 55. It’s an appeal to a group of church members in Greece to help impoverished church members in Jerusalem. The appeal is a masterpiece of donor-centered fundraising, spending most of its words describing the benefits of giving.
2. Race and ethnicity are not good predictors of charitable giving. Age and sex, however, are strong predictors: women tend to give more than men, and older people tend to give more than younger people.
3. Someone who regularly attends a house of worship is twice as likely to give to charitable causes as someone who seldom or never does. The churchgoer gives 100 times as much to charity per year — including 50 times as much to nonreligious causes.
4. The most read part of a fundraising letter is the P.S. That’s why the professionals always use the P.S. to restate the letter’s call to action, rather than for the traditional afterthought.
5. When donors are offered choices — about how you communicate with them, where their money goes or almost anything else — their giving measurably increases. Even when they don’t exercise any of the choices offered (as most don’t), their giving is greater than the giving of those not offered any choices.
6. The working poor are the most generous Americans, giving the greatest portion of their incomes to charity of all U.S. economic groups.
7. Wealthy Americans follow in generosity, giving slightly less than the poor do on a proportional basis.
8. The rest of us? We’re way behind. But there are so many of us that the bulk of charitable giving comes from middle-class donors.
9. Donors are all-around excellent people. They are significantly more likely than non-donors to give blood, help the homeless with food or money, give up their seats to others, give directions to strangers, or return mistaken excess change to cashiers.
10. Givers are happier than non-givers. They’re 43 percent more likely to say they are “very happy.” Nongivers, on the other hand, are three and a half times as likely to say they’re “not happy at all.”
IDEAS, SUGGESTIONS, OR RECOMMENDATIONS FOR THE NEWSLETTER?
Do you have an idea or topic that you would like to see covered in the Community Conversation newsletter? If so, please send it to sales@savearound.com and we’ll get right on it. Remember if it is something that you would like to know more about or learn about then chances are someone else needs to know it, too.
