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Top tips for Charity Fundraising on Social Media
CHARITY ADVICE
Top tips for Charity Fundraising on Social Media
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Many charities don’t know how to use their social media channels to fundraise; they spend a lot of time and effort putting information out there and don’t get much in return. This is a shame as social media can be a very valuable tool in an organisation’s marketing kit and you don’t even have to be a complete social whizz to utilise them correctly and get the results you want. All you have to do is a few key things.
Be authentic and personal on Facebook
Today, there is too much information being thrown at people so the way to break through this ‘digital noise’ is to be personable. Supporters will engage more with accounts that are ran by real people with real personalities, so communicate directly with them by saying things like “Check out our video…” or “We’d love to see you all at our fundraising event next…”
Get creative with your content
Supporters respond most warmly to creative and fun messages, so think outside the box and make your posts fun. The best content is a mixture of informative messages, inspirational stories, images or videos, and call to actions such as donating or attending fundraisers. You can even make these campaigns fun though by coming up with unique ideas, and these are often the ones to go viral. Take the “ice bucket challenge” and the Guide Dog’s “Winks” campaigns as great examples.
Encourage and train your employees to interact on social networks
Many charities and non-profit organisations have many employees so utilise them to help generate interest with your social posts. By simply liking and sharing, your employees can really help to increase your brand awareness and get more people interacting with your online efforts. They can even set up their own social channels, dedicated to sharing charity posts and reaching out to their own supporters. Again this method is much more personable and will receive much more engagement, so let them know how they can help and encourage them to do so.
Build a social calendar each month
The mistake a lot of charities tend to make is to think of social media as this big thing looming over them, a method that needs loads of content and they don’t know where to start. If you break it down by month and make a simple calendar, you can organise your whole social media posts in one sitting. Not only does this give you peace of mind, but it ensures that you’re posting consistently and that you post different types of content.
Separate everyday interactions from fundraising campaigns
To generate the most interest and engagement with fundraising campaigns, you need to highlight that they are different to your everyday posts. You can simply have a series of posts to do this: one announcing that a campaign will be coming soon, a couple of posts to countdown and generate interest, a couple of posts about the campaign, what is involved and why people should get involved, and then a final one to thank people for their support and to highlight the success of the campaign.
Get your supporters to vouch for you
Supporter’s testimonies are equivalent to restaurant or hotel reviews: people value and trust them so they give your organisation credibility. This is also a great way for charities to broadcast their success in a positive way. By simply reaching out to supporters for their feedback about a fundraising event, volunteering position or training programme, you then have numerous pieces of content that are valuable to share on your social channels.
Always think how you can solve problems
Do you have common questions that supporters or donors want to know about? Great social posts are ones that solve problems or inform people of something before they even ask the question, so how about making a list of what people tend to ask and generate a couple of creative and unique posts to provide your followers with valuable information? You can be sure that the response will be very positive.
