HOW TO RAISE MORE FUNDS FROM CHALLENGE EVENTS

Sir Erich Reich & Gina Thomas

Classic Tours

Originators of charity challenges45,000 participants

1000 challenges

800+ charities

20 years

Over £75 million raised!

Classic Tours – Our Credentials

• Raise MORE funds

• Motivate your supporters

• Attract new supporters

• Increase awareness of your cause

Why Offer Challenge Events

• All socio economic groups

• Generally more men on bike rides / more women on treks

• 35 – 55 year olds - bike rides

• 45 – 60 year olds – treks

• Younger supporters - shorter events with lower sponsorship

Who Do They Appeal To?

• Many of the UK’s 180,000 UK charities have never tried this type of fundraising

• Large section of society never done a challenge event

• Majority of funds raised from new sources

• Family, friends & colleagues get involved

• Supporters often become lifelong ambassadors

Challenge Events – Key Factors

• Economic climate – demand for lower sponsorship

• Mass participation events popular

• ‘Olympic effect’ – boom in cycling

• Rise in obesity – get fit & healthy on a challenge

• Internet & mobile phones – changing how we communicate

• Social media – can now engage & interact with challengers & reach their friends & contacts

Where Are We Now?

Our Top 10 Tips to make challenge events work for you

• Bespoke Challenges

• Consortium Challenges

1. Choose the Type of Event

• Corporate Challenges

• Open Challenges

Bespoke Challenges

What?

Exclusive challenge for 30+ supporters of ONE charity

Benefits

• High potential fundraising return due to group size

• Supporters are a captive audience on the event

• Free place for every 30 recruited

What?

4-5 charities team up to find 30+ supporters between them.

Benefits

• Good potential fundraising return

• Offer a challenge without the commitment of filling a whole group

• Limited charities involved often from the same sector ––feels like “your” event

• Operator usually does the mailings & admin.

• Free place for every 30 participants recruited

Consortium Challenges

What?

Exclusive challenge for 30+ staff of your corporate partner(s)

Benefits

• High potential fundraising return due to group size

• Bonds the company and its staff to your charity

• Encourages team building & offers the company great PR opportunities

• Free place for every 30 recruited

Corporate Challenges

What?

Range of challenges open to supporters from ANY charity

Benefits

• Fundraised income for little effort

• No minimum number of participants to find

• No risk & no financial outlay

• Classic Tours does all the admin.

• Free place for every 20 recruited (in a calendar year)

Open Challenges

• Look at your database – try to profile who is your typical supporter - their age, sex and income.o Bike rides generally attract more men and the average age

is 30 – 50o Treks generally attract more women and the average age is

40 – 60 (excluding Kilimanjaro)o Short haul challenges like London to Paris attract a younger

market and are ideal for corporates.• Look at any links you have with certain countries• Do you have a project anywhere that could be visited?

2. Choose the Right Destination

• Allowing yourself enough time to market the events is key.

• For a long haul event you need at least 12 months from launch to departure.

• Aim to have your group signed up 6 months before departure so they have time to fundraise.

• The time you have available each week to support your fundraisers will help them raise over and above the minimum amount.

3. Give Yourself Time

• Identify your target market - who are they? Past participants, supporters you currently have, new supporters.

• Message – what’s unique about your challenge –highest mountain, see a project, raise funds to build a school. Highlights and Benefits.

• Method – how are you going to tell people? Do you have a budget? Who can help you?

4. Design a Marketing Strategy

oWebsite

oNewsletter

oMailings

oCorporate Supporters

o Email footer

o Speculative ads

oWord of mouth

o E-shots

oUse Incentives

o Social Media

oGet Trustees on board

oOther events you can promote at e.g. annual dinner.

5. Marketing Ideas

TELL AS MANY PEOPLE AS YOU CAN!

6. Get Online!

• Google Grant – you get £6300 worth of Google advertising for free as a charity! For details see: www.google.co.uk/grants/

• Facebook & Twitter – set up a group just for this event or for your events in general. Update regularly with images and stories. Encourage signed up participants to join in and “meet” others.

• Set up online fundraising page for your supporters e.g. Virgin Money Giving.

• 2.5% -4.5% of enquiries should immediately convert to bookings• 10%+ conversion is possible

• HOW?o Send out Registration Pack ASAPo Follow up EVERY enquiry –up to 3 times if there is a possibility they will sign

upo Become an expert on the challenge –product knowledge trainingo Provide help & advice with fundraisingo Promote Info Days held by Classic Tours

7. Convert Your Enquiries

• Provide strong fundraising support – tried and tested fundraising tips, info about the charity, sponsor forms, collection tins etc.

• The more support you give = more fundraising income

• There is a natural drop drop-out rate of around 10% -reduce this by helping and encouraging participants

• Keep in regular contact and thank them on behalf of the charity.

8. Retain Your Supporters

• Celebrities can really help raise the profile of an event. They don’t have to participate, they can endorse it, tweet about and encourage their fans to take part.

• Champions – if you have some really proactive supporters encourage them to bring a team. Ideal for corporate partners. Offer a special offer like a discounted reg fee if they get a team of 5.

9. Find Celebrities & Champions

• You need to understand the event you’re selling. How high is that mountain, how far do they cycle, where do they stay.

• Talk about it with passion and enthusiasm.

• Read up on the destination and what’s happening in that country. Take note of special dates.

10. Knowledge is Power!

Zoe’s Place Baby Hospice, a small charity based in Liverpool, operated their first ever bespoke challenge event in February 2012. It raised £112,000!

So how did they do it….

Case Study

As this was our first ever overseas challenge we were looking for something really special that would give our participants an incredible and unique experience that they would never forget.

Cuba ticked all of the boxes being culturally so different to anything we know over here but also such a beautiful country to travel around.

A bike ride seemed to offer the best way of seeing the country whilst at the same time giving them a huge personal challenge.

Why Cuba?

• We launched 12 months prior to the trip departing.

• Community and corporate support - able to promote the event directly to a large number of local businesses and community members .

• Targeted mailings - made contact with local gyms and sport groups to encourage participation.

• Arranged presentations at large workplaces such as call centres.

• Local celebrity on board from the start – really helped. Attracted the attention of local newspapers and radio.

How did they market the event?

• 1 unfortunately had to withdraw just prior to the event due to injury.

• Of these approximately a third were existing supporters.

Who Participated?

• 21 participants who raised/exceeded the set sponsorship

• A few of our participants were themselves wealthy. • However we were very fortunate to get participants from all

walks of life who all exceeded our target of £3,200. • The way our participants raised the funds varied greatly, some

deciding to run large scale events (caberet, karaoke nights) whilst others did more traditional bucket collections, bag packs.

• Many of our participants who were perhaps concerned at the outset about how they would raise the target were really motivated by just how quickly they were able to get up to the target. One participant who did bag packs with family and friends in local supermarkets raised on average over £500 each day so in no time the target was raised.

How did they raise £112,000?

• Choose the right event to work for your charity.

• Devise a marketing strategy.

• Allow yourself enough time to promote it.

• Support your participants and they will go over and above the minimum amount.

• Challenge events can raise substantial funds for your charity.

Challenge Events – You can do it!

Thank you!For more information on any challenges:

www.classictours.co.uk

020 7619 0066

info@classictours.co.uk