Imagine this: you set what you think is an ambitious fundraising goal for your virtual event and then watch as you double, triple, quadruple that goal in the days leading up to the event. Then, you cross the finish line – and end up raising 12 times your fundraising goal! Ah, the powers of technology.
This was the scenario for Mentor New York, a nonprofit that works with companies, schools and organizations to provide mentoring for organizations that serve more than 80,000 young people in New York. The 2021 Mentor of the Year Awards event–typically an in-person awards program with dinner–went virtual due to COVID and set a fundraising goal of $10,000.Instead, their event raised more than $124,000, thanks to the CauseVox digital fundraising platform and some creative ticketing and peer-to-peer strategies.
Like most nonprofits, Mentor New York had to pivot during the pandemic to virtual events and engagement for its supporters. The small nonprofit had just signed up for CauseVox’s digital fundraising platform in late 2019 for its end-of-year donor appeal and saw an immediate return, said Subira Taylor-Louineus, Director of Operations and Finance. Then, when the pandemic hit a few months later, it was time to get creative for fundraising.With in-person events impossible, Mentor New York utilized CauseVox to set up its annual signature event as a virtual fundraising event that relied primarily on peer-to-peer fundraising and creative ticketing.
Read more on CauseVox's website