Top-5 Giving Tuesday Tips, Tricks and Takeaways from Heartland Farm Sanctuary
Fun, furry, photogenic… another successful Giving Tuesday for Heartland Farm Sanctuary! If you Facebook Live it, they will come!
Executive Director Jen Korz and her small team at Heartland Farm Sanctuary did just that and more in raising over $28,000 in their latest Giving Tuesday campaign. Aided by the generous support of their board (100% participation!), who committed a $10,000 match, they crushed their original goal of $20,000 for their biggest Giving Tuesday yet.
“It took a lot of thought and a lot of energy, but we really know our online audience and love to engage with them,” said Jen with a smile. “We love what we do and were excited to tell our great, impactful stories.”
How Did They Do It?
After focusing on a capital campaign last year, Heartland Farm Sanctuary featured many of their furry friends and their amazing stories in hopes of support for their individualized needs and care. They utilized both Facebook (11,500+ followers) and Instagram (4,800+).
Posts like this highlighted each of their friends and their heartwarming stories with a donation link included at the end of each Facebook post and a bio link on Instagram.
Jen took to Facebook Live throughout the day to say THANK YOU! She would read off and sometimes display the individual names of donors on Facebook Live throughout Giving Tuesday with an assist from her friends :).
Jen's Top-5 Giving Tuesday Tips, Tricks and Takeaways!
1. ENGAGE, ENGAGE, ENGAGE
We sent an email to all of our board members and volunteers ahead of time so they could be social media ambassadors throughout the day to get them involved. It is important to know your online audience and figure out what platform will be most effective.
2. BE POSITIVE
Don’t depress people, tell the story with hope and positivity and make sure the potential donor knows the impact they will be making!
3. MAKE IT EXCITING
This goes back to being engaging. We send out our first Giving Tuesday post a couple days before to tease what’s going on!
If you got a great story, tell it! Right Tuesday?
4. USE PEOPLE POWER!
A Giving Tuesday campaign is more of a time cost than anything. Facebook and Instagram is free unless you boost a few posts for cheap and we use our Constant Contact subscription for a couple emails. It takes more people power and enthusiasm than a big budget.
5. HAVE A PLAN
We pieced everything together about 6 months ago. The biggest thing is figuring out what your subject or topic will be. What in your organization is going to move people? A crying baby, a puppy, farm animals… It all depends on your organization. Keep your progress up to date, don’t over saturate and update everyone periodically. Set a realistic financial goal, one that you won’t overdo, but won’t lowball either.
BONUS: How in the world did you get your board to match $10,000?
We have a philanthropy committee with one of the board members as a chair. She spearheaded it and brought it up to the board. We didn’t set a number, we just asked each board member to discreetly email a gift that they felt comfortable contributing for Giving Tuesday. We ended up with $10,000 and 100% participation on a match!
Check out Heartland Farm Sanctuary on Facebook and Instagram!
