Shared Fundraising: A Marketing Strategy for Social Entrepreneurs

Few of us would disagree that we live in challenging times. From the stress produced by careers, family issues, financial issues & health issues, to the information overload we experience on a daily basis – it just seems to be getting more difficult for anyone to stand in one spot, take a deep breath, and be able to focus on any one thing for any length of time. The end result is creating ever-increasing challenges for two important entities in our communities – small business owners and non-profit organizations. For small business owners, the challenge involves how to market their businesses without going broke. As the amount of information available to us continues to mount, we become increasingly desensitized and unaware of typical “advertising messages” that come our way. Protection afforded to us from the “Do Not Call List” and technology such as Tivo has allowed us to effectively screen out many of the traditional ways that business has informed consumers about their products and services. In the Information Age, spending large amounts of money on traditional advertising is not only financially difficult, it is also largely ineffective. For non-profit organizations, the challenges may be even larger. As stress levels go up, our ability and/or willingness to donate time and money for our worthy social causes appears to be going down. Many grant programs are now requiring a non-profit to show how they will become self-sustaining, while continuing to broaden their reach and increase their capacity to provide client services. Unless new sources of cashflow and people-energy are found and developed, the ability of non-profit organizations to provide services even at their current levels will likely suffer. Together – these two separate but synergistic challenges provide a unique opportunity for a special type of entrepreneur. We call them Social Entrepreneurs – specifically, entrepreneurs who have an interest in creating positive social change. Social Entrepreneurs are becoming increasingly interested in a relatively new sales & marketing concept – we call it Shared Fundraising. The basis for Shared Fundraising is simple. A group of Social Entrepreneur small business owners agrees to partner with a non-profit organization that they care about and wish to support. The business owners typically represent a variety of products and services – many of which could be helpful to the non-profit itself, or to its’ volunteer and/or supporter base. One option that works well to bring the business owners and the organization’s supporters together is an educational seminar event that provides education, products and services to the supporting community. The role of the non-profit is to help publicize the event. The role of the business owners is to educate the seminar attendees and make related products and services available to them. Each business owner decides before the event what amount of donation will be made to the non-profit for each sale completed. It could be a flat fee per sale, a percentage of each sale, or even a flat fee for appointments secured with attendees. Depending on the business model each business owner is working with, and the level of participation the non-profit chooses, percentages of profit per sale can go as high as 50% to 100%. In effect, these shared fundraising events create an outside, contracted fundraising team for the non-profit. The business owner only makes money when the non-profit has made money. The other large benefit to the non-profit is a reduced need for volunteers to help with fundraising. The business owners are getting paid to help, but only when they produce results. The benefits to the small business owners are equally impressive. They now have assistance from the community to help market and grow their business, which helps to fuel continued economic growth – without breaking the bank of the small or start-up business. The business owner Social Entrepreneur also has the benefit of knowing they are supporting the causes in their community they believe in, regardless of how much “extra money or extra time” they may or may not have to donate.