Hi all - I've participated in several great conversations (with many of you!) about how organizations pivoted their spring fundraising events this year to a virtual platform with varying degrees of success. From the panels I've attended, it seems the most successful events (from a fundraising standpoint) have been those which pivoted to virtual after the majority of their sponsorship and ticket revenue was already secured. My organization is starting to look ahead to next year and contemplating how to manage our annual fundraiser, which brings in about 20% of our overall contributed revenue budget. There is some conversation about planning a virtual event from the very beginning and forgoing any attempt at a "traditional" in person event. Is anyone else starting to think in these terms? I'd love to connect and springboard ideas of how to start, how to structure pricing, program content, etc.
We are planning our Virtual Gala at the moment. It is Virtual from the outset. We are asking our donors to organise dinner parties. Rather than charge an admission we are going to focus on the giving throughout the night. There is a thought that charging the $x for entry will be lowering the giving bar too much ie: setting a tone that that entry was the evenings donation. We are partnering with Givergy again for our donaton pathway.