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Online Fundraising Proposal
Presented by
LEAD 355S Nonprofit Seminar in Fundraising
University of San Diego
December 15, 2015
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Table of Contents
Introduction……………………………………………………………………………..………....3
Utilizing Social Media.………………………………………………………………..……4-‐11
What is a Good Post …………………………………………………………………..4
Connecting through Personal Stories…………………………………..………5
Making Your Posts Seen..…………………………………………………...……6-‐8
Tumblr………………………………………………………………………………..……….9
Twitter ……………………………………………………………………………..……..10
Bringing the Platforms Together……………………………………….….10-‐11
Virtual Balloon Campaign…………………………………………………………..….12-‐15
Mother’s Day…………………………………………………………………………….….16-‐18
The Idea…………………………………………………………………………………….16
Viability & Objectives ……………………………………………………………..…17
Success, Value, Timeline, Methodology, Next Steps…………………..18
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Introduction This report was created to help Rady Children’s Hospital improve upon its online
fundraising platform. In order to do this, the key areas have been identified as improved
utilization of Facebook and other social media, the creation of a Virtual Balloon campaign, and
the development of a fun social media Jib-‐Jab (dancing video) project involving Mother’s Day
and the Miracle Month of May. We feel that the enhancement of these areas will help the
hospital achieve its fundraising goal. It is our hope that in identifying these areas and providing
suggestions on them, Rady can use the information to better generate online donations and
ultimately help children and families at the hospital.
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Utilizing Social Media
In today’s world, social media can serve as a powerful tool for nonprofits to spread
awareness and gain support for their causes. While we recognize that Rady Children’s Hospital
already has a presence on social media, we believe that this presence can be improved upon to
help raise more online funding. The suggestions listed below focus on how to improve both the
content and timing of posts. In addition, data has been collected from other children’s
hospitals’ online campaigns to help make suggestions specific to Rady.
Facebook Fun: What is a good post?
There are many elements that make up a good post, but the most important thing is to
connect with the audience enough so that looking at the post will prompt them to visit your
website and make a donation. As the manager of the Facebook page it is your job to design
posts to make this process as easy as possible. As seen in the PowerPoint slide below, we detail
what type of topics to post about and what to include in them. There are three topics that we
feel will be the most relevant and effective for Rady to use that will capture followers and make
them pay attention to what you post: personal stories, current events and holidays, and donor
and partner relations. On the left hand side of the slide, there is an example from another
charity’s Facebook page showing a great example of proper content and layout of a post. On
the right hand side we created a possible post for Rady’s Facebook page. These posts mirror
either another example or one of Rady’s previous posts in order to highlight it and exhibit the
types of posts that should be used again in the future. See below for an example:
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After the examples of the different posts, we created a short guide called “General Tips
and Tricks” to help create future posts. The most important point is to always include a photo
that relates to your post, ideally showing the kids or the people that helped support them in
action! In addition, try to get clearer pictures that look more professional, like the examples
used from the other posts we used. Also remember to link any stories that you post about back
to your website so that people can easily access more information. A link to the donation page
should be present and all donors, sponsors, companies, other parties involved in your post
should be tagged to create a wider audience and more views!
Hopefully with these examples and tricks your Facebook posts will be easier to create
and will be captivating, heartwarming, and fun. Through this, followers will become more
involved, donate, and share about what Rady is currently working on.
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Making Your Posts Seen:
Once you have good content to drawn in potential volunteers, donors, and advocates,
you want to reach as many viewers as possible! We have also researched ways to increase your
presence on social media.
The first way of doing this is through advertisements, which, although useful, are not
always as cost-‐effective as other methods. We are aware that your past Facebook
advertisements have not been successful so we suggest using other Facebook tools. The first
alternative is boosting Rady’s posts, which
is often more cost effective than ads. By
boosting posts for as low as $5, the post
will show up higher on peoples’ newsfeeds and will get more acknowledgements than an
advertisement would. Boosted posts have been successful for other nonprofits and are very
easy to set up. Below are the steps for boosting a post as the administrator so that you can
logistically know how to use this feature. We recommend boosting only posts about events or
very important or rare stories that would draw in more donors.
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We also recommend utilizing Facebook’s Page Insights tool. This can be accessed at
www.facebook.com/business/learn and is an effective way to see more than the number of
likes and comments a particular post received. Through this tool, a more useful count of the
number of people reached is provided. It also provides detailed charts and information to help
you analyze which of your posts were most successful. This type of information helps to make
the most informed decisions about future posting.
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In the same vein as Insights, Ad Manager can also measure the success of any
advertising you may do through Facebook. The Ad Manager tool can be accessed by clicking the
arrow in the top right corner of your profile and selecting “Manage Ads.” This tool shows the
type of ad you are running, the amount you have spent on various ads, and a schedule that can
be adjusted for how and when your post are run. This tool also gives suggestions on how to fine
tune your ad based on its performance and can help even the most novice of social media
posters become effective marketers.
Tumblr:
In doing our research, we noticed that Rady’s Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram
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accounts are very active. The Tumblr account did not seen to be as active though. As a result,
we would like to provide a cursory overview to Tumblr, another social media site to be utilized.
Tumblr is a blogging network that allows users to share stories through pictures, text, videos,
audio, and so forth. This platform seemed particularly well suited for Rady, as we have found
that bloggers have mentioned about Rady Children’s Hospital on the site. Because of this, we
see Tumblr as a great way to share stories about Rady’s events and network with those
interested in helping the hospital.
Twitter:
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Along with Facebook and Tumblr, Twitter is also a popular social media platforms that
influences the audience’s behavior. We noticed that on your Twitter page, there are a lot of
pictures of Charger’s football players, the SD Sheriff Department, and so forth. It is a wonderful
thing to post these kinds of stories because it brings awareness to the fact that our authorities
and celebrities are doing amazing things to serve the children. There is a theory called “social
learning” and within this theory, people learn from people holding these kinds of positions. As a
result, people are more inclined to do something when they see their counterparts engaging in
activities like this. Continuously sharing these stories will definitely boost awareness and
increase the chances of getting donations.
Bringing the Platforms Together:
Of all the platforms used by Rady Children’s Hospital, it seems that Instagram best
reflects the work done at the hospital. However, we noticed that Facebook, Twitter, and
Instagram have different content. Although it is good that different information is being
provided, not everyone has an account with each site, meaning people could potentially be
missing out on important information. As a result, we suggest finding a way to connect the
different platforms so that the same information can be distributed to everyone and the
maximum number of people are reached.
As discussed in the presentation, there are a few ways to go about this. Starting off with
Twitter, your tweet can show you how many people have interacted with or viewed it. It is
possible to share the tweet to other platforms by promoting it. We could not find a way to
connect it to Instagram, but you could still share the tweet from Twitter onto Tumblr and
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Facebook. Next up is Instagram. Once you’ve chosen the picture you want to upload, you may
choose to connect it with Tumblr, Twitter, and Facebook. For Tumblr, once you have chosen the
content you are going to upload, then you can choose to share the story through Facebook and
Twitter. Unfortunately, Tumblr doesn’t have the option to share with Instagram.
To help solve the issue of not being able to readily connect certain platforms, namely
Instagram with Tumblr and Twitter, we thought of a few alternatives. First up is the idea of
having a link to each platform on the other platforms (tweeting out your Instagram handle for
example), so people can engage with you through outlets they might not have known about.
Another option is to add Tumblr to the hospital’s page. The website currently has links to
Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter. Creating a Tumblr account and adding it to the webpage
could further connect your platforms and get your message out.
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Virtual Balloon Project
As a way to increase donations online, we are proposing a new Virtual Balloon campaign for the
Rady Children’s Hospital website. The idea expands the current in-‐store balloon donations by
adding the option to donate a balloon online during the month of May. The basic premise is
that individuals will be able to go online and donate money, and when they do so they can
receive a balloon similar to the ones they receive in stores. However, they will be able to
customize the balloon and post it on their social media or print it off as well. In addition, there
will be a donation tracker that will resemble the house in the movie, “Up!,” in which they can
add their custom balloon to the other balloons to help lift up the hospital.
Steps to Creating a Virtual Balloon on the Rady Children’s Hospital Website: 1) Since the Virtual Balloon campaign will focus only on the month of May, there will be an
option on the website to sign up to be notified when the virtual balloon launch will begin.
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2) In May users either receive the email or click the website link, to begin the process below.
3) After clicking on the, “Design a Balloon” link, they will be directed to customize the balloon. This is where you actually design the balloon by adding features like faces and messages.
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4) Once the balloon is finished and the donation is made, there will be a thank you page and a prompt that will let you print off the balloon or post it on social media.
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5) When posting to social media, donators will be given the option of having a ready-made post, or the option to create their own explaining why they donated. They will also have the option of making the balloon their profile picture. Using this idea, Rady Children’s Hospital could host a contest where they randomly select from those who donated and check their Facebook to see if they have a balloon as their profile picture. If they do, they would win a prize.
6) The final step is allowing them to track the progress of the virtual balloon campaign through a fun and interactive visual that takes the house theme from the movie, “Up!,” and applies it to raising the hospital above local San Diego landmarks.
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Mother’s Day
For Rady’s Miracle Month of May, we would like to focus a fundraising campaign on
Mother’s Day. We want to give people the opportunity to give their mothers a meaningful gift
on Mother’s Day in honor of all the mothers that will spend their day in the hospital, or who
have lost a child. We propose launching a social media campaign that gets people involved. This
social media campaign will allow people to give donations, receive a personalized video in
return, and spread the campaign with friends and family. The campaign’s design is innovative
and can be tailored year after year, or season to season, to remain creative and eye-‐catching. It
can also use some of the suggestions given above about social media.
The idea:
Our idea is a supplement to Rady’s current, tear-‐jerking video for Mother’s Day. We want to
focus on thanking the mothers, not just those that spend their day in the hospital, but also
those that are able to spend the day celebrating themselves outside the hospital. We want to
link the virtual balloon campaign to social media for a more attention-‐grabbing fundraising
campaign. When a donor comes to Rady during this campaign, they will donate, then be
forwarded to a Jib-‐Jab-‐esque video website where they will insert a photo of themselves, their
mother, and potentially a friend or family member (See example below). The website will
generate a video that the donor will then be prompted to link to their Facebook and email and
tag their mother, family, and friends.
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Viability:
This idea is viable. Faceinhole.com and jibjab.com show us that the technology is out there and
is relatively easy to figure out. Are there current hospital volunteers with computer skills? Could
you utilize USD’s Computer Science programmers or Web designers? It might cost money, but it
is doable with technology and social media. If these options are not viable, Rady can hire a web
designer to design the videos and web pages. These designers are typically paid per web page
and then per minute of animation.
Objectives:
1. Create a popular, interactive social media campaign that gets people to spread the
message and donate/encourage others to donate.
2. Utilize May and Mother’s Day as a opportune time for mothers and families to donate in
the name of motherhood/mothers of sick children
3. Create a creative model of social media campaigning that can be redesigned each year.
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Measuring Success:
This campaign’s success will be measured by number of participants, donors, and social media
shares. In the end, success can be measured by the amount of money donated during the
Miracle Month of May, as compared to past years and average increases in funding when the
program was not used.
Value to Client:
We have four people working on this project and have collectively spent an estimated 31 hours
on this project. This equates to $715.17 ($23.07/hour Latest Estimated Value of Volunteer Time
-‐ Independent Sector) of volunteer hours.
Timeline:
January – Get initial funding and find web designers
March – Create website and JibJab software.
April -‐ May 1 – Launch campaign
Methodology and Options:
Hire a web designer for $500 to create 1-‐2 minutes of animation and to create two webpages
(one linking donor to video; one linking video page to social media platforms)
Next steps:
1. Find web designers to give ideas and samples for video and web pages
2. Hire a web designer
3. Marketing for the campaign through social media promotion
