What makes a church fundraising campaign tick? This is one question most church fundraisers hardly ponder before embarking on a fundraising drive. But sparing some time to do this will produce a tremendous result in the long run. On the back of this, we explore the subject matter – a successful church fundraising campaign.
Why Your Church Might Need to Raise Funds
Churches are primarily classified as non-profit organizations; hence the need for funds may arise occasionally. This is true of both small and large churches – although the former tend to need funds more. Small churches may sometimes fundraise to cover basic needs like footing bills.
However, on a larger scale, churches may need to raise funds for the following reasons:
- To meet the needs of a charitable cause or provide relief to people needing it.
- To complete a church building project.
- To actualize the objective of a missionary journey.
- To take care of the operating costs, offset existing debts, and so on.
Steps Towards a Successful Church Fundraising Campaign
You should never start a church fundraising campaign without proper planning. The success of the entire campaign will be hinged on this. Remember that no one sets out to ‘build a house without counting the cost. In light of this, you will have to consider the following steps.
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Have A Clear and Specific Goal
First things first, there must be questionable clarity about your fundraising goal. You will give your campaign a sense of direction, and the target audience will not be left in the dark. This is as simple as stating the amount of money needed and how it will be used.
For instance, “we hope to raise the sum of $ XYZ for the renovation of our church building.” Additionally, you should avoid ‘beating about the bush’ – make the message straightforward and unambiguous. If possible, you can also communicate the project timeline with prospective donors.
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Identify Your Prospective Donors
Having a clear idea of your prospective donors can also help define your fundraising communication. Essentially, you can draft and send out messages that will be specific to certain groups. For example, the message for an individual may be slightly different from what will be delivered to an organization you are prospecting.
Knowing the donors in advance will help you determine the most suitable strategy for reaching out to your audience. You can increase your fundraising campaign’s efficiency by doing this.
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Present Pictures and Videos
Sharing pictures or videos of the project can give the campaign some credence. This exercise is yet an impressive way of sending out your fundraising message. Moreover, such elements – videos and pictures – appeal to people more than texts.
Given the foregoing, you should leverage this to boost the chances of getting more funds. You do not have to spend big on these elements but make sure they are of good quality.
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Utilize Multiple Giving Strategies
The significance of flexibility in fundraising campaigns cannot be overemphasized, especially with the repertoire of tools available. As such, any fundraiser that desires great results must explore multiple options for donation. By this, you will be able to ground better ground for your fundraising campaign.
As a church, you should look beyond printed envelopes and adopt technological means for your fundraising campaign. To this end, you can consider text-to-give, mobile giving apps, text-to-donate, and so on. You should be open to combining these approaches for tremendous success.
Relatedly, the fundraising campaign does not have to be limited to your congregation alone. You can write letters or send emails to other organizations that may be open to giving. Again, you should not hesitate to optimize social media channels to drive your activities and reach a larger audience.
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Broaden The Scope
This point may be seen in the same light as the one immediately before it. Still, it is worth discussing separately – due to its significance. It borders on ensuring that everyone – or maybe more persons – are involved. To do this, you may have to organize some get-togethers with the overarching objective of raising funds.
You can have a quiz competition, movie night, baked goods sales, etc., within the churchyard. And, in case your birthday or church anniversary falls around the fundraising period, you can request that friends, families, and well-wishers direct gifts and presents into the campaign account.
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Appreciate Your Donors
The church’s attitude of giving thanks is expected; you can incorporate this into your fundraising campaign. You have to be intentional about saying Thank You to every donor. A posture of gratitude has a way of causing people to commit more to a reasonable fundraising cause in the days ahead. You should, therefore, not undermine the importance of expressing appreciation to your donors.
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Keep Donors Posted
Communication with donors should not stop after thanking them. You can always keep them updated about the turn of events. You can take a cue from the reading meter that shows the donations generated so far – against what is needed.
Broadly speaking, however, you can also brief them about how the project is progressing once the fundraising drive is over. Consider having a message like this: “This is how far your contribution has brought us. We look forward to bringing about to a close by xxx month…thank you once again for your donation”.
Doing such regular updates will have some impact on the transparency of your organization. You can build on this to create a network of recurring or long-term donors. This act will make it easy for donors to tell others about your campaign.
Final Words
Fundraising campaigns present a leeway for churches to generate some of the funds required for specific projects. At least, it enables them to stay afloat and keep operations flowing. However, making a success out of it depends on different factors, as discussed above.
In essence, any church administrator or leader needs to meditate on all that has been discussed in this write-up before launching such a campaign. You must not treat this with triviality if you want a successful return.
