There are a few ways to think about events – the details such as food, beverages, entertainment and venue, and (especially when you’re in the nonprofit world), the ROI details – the features that make the event a smashing success from dollars raised and new supporters earned.
Your event landing page plays a large role in the latter and acts as the backbone – the digital home – to where you want to lead your event attendees. To get started, take a read through the great features to consider for fundraising landing pages that convert to help with your event landing page set-up.
Next, think about how you will use technology for your events. Are you maximizing event revenue and engagement? Have you outlined key touchpoints before, during and after each event? If we think about these three buckets of event planning, your event landing page (technology) should be used in the following ways:
- Before your event: to attract attendees and raise money
- During your event: to keep attendees engaged and continue to raise money
- After your event: to thank participants and provide a final chance to give
Before your event
Build an effective event landing page that provides a variety of options for users to engage. This can include:
- Tickets and registration
- Donations
- Sponsorship sales
- Raffles and auctions
- Peer-to-peer fundraising
- Matching gifts
Before your event, use a combination of communication tools – snail mail, email, QR codes on banners and posters, social media, video – to get the word out about your fundraising event and lead potential attendees to your event landing page. Make it easy for these users to share their activities and registration on that page with their audiences as well through social media sharing buttons or even copy/paste email copy they can send to friends and family.
During your event
Utilize technology to build the ultimate engagement experience to event attendees. This is especially important with virtual or hybrid events but can be equally as important during in-person events. Engage your event attendees with:
- Games
- Polls or Q&A
- Videos
- Content downloads
- Fundraising progress tracker
- Social media shout-outs
- On-site apps or activities to involve multiple people in the room (virtual and in-person)
Again, because you have your event landing page setup, you can add in links back to this page during your event. You can provide scannable codes on dinner tables, event signage or even SMS message to in-person attendees throughout the event. For those tuning in from home or other locations, pre-schedule social media messages throughout the event that link people to your event landing page or stick in the URL or page code at the end of a slide, within a video or as a wrap-up during a game the attendees may be playing together. Think about how you can cross-communicate throughout the event so that page is top-of-mind for all attendees.
After your event
Think about your donor retention steps after your event. For most of us, we automatically assume thank you emails or communication. This is a great first step. Think outside the box as to how you can continue to engage event attendees even after the day-of fun has ended. Share campaign results, photos or recap videos. You can communicate with your event attendees through
- Emails
- Social media
- Video
- Photo boards
In all these instances, think about how you can provide one final link back to your event landing page. You can use this page to show results, give attendees a final chance to give, or provide links to some of the fun recap communication pieces from your event.
For an additional resource, check out our free, on-demand webinar, “How to Make Virtual Fundraising Events Work for Your Small Nonprofit”.
