“…I think there's a lot to be said for knowing more about your existing audience, because just knowing their age, whether they're male or female... you've got to learn a bit more about that now. What's their life like?” - Lee Clark
In this episode producers Samuel Davies and Bharpur Singh Gill speak with Founder of Givepenny. We speak about online giving and how charities should think about it as part of a wider opportunity to engage meaningfully with their supporters. We also talk about gaming for good and GivePenny’s new gaming event for charities.
1. What is it that drives us to fundraise?
In Lee's case it's been wanting to take on a challenge and then retro-fitting this to supporting a charity. For some it's the connection to a specific cause or encouragement from friends, family and work colleagues to join them in a team endeavour. Many of us will have first hand experience of doing events and will all have our own reasons for doing them.
Whatever the reason, charities need to make sure that they are giving their supporters and potential supporters a clear understanding of how their participation will help their cause. In the case of charity owned events, charities need to calibrate these to meet the needs of their target audience. It's therefore important that charities understand the trends affecting and receiving buy-in from their supporters and their potential supporters, to better understand their lives before offering an event for them to join.
2. Charities need to evolve to meet cultural changes
Society is evolving, perhaps at the greatest rate in many of our lifetimes. We haven't seen things changing at this rate before and so it is important for charities to learn to move more quickly and change with the times. The massive impacts of the climate crisis and the socio-economic crisis that we are seeing is likely to only increase the rate of social change and fundraiser behaviourial changes. Charities need to ensure that they have an open ear to make sure that they can adapt their fundraising.
Charities are already pivoting to accept and reflect the changes in appetite for different types of events. It's hard to recruit people to orthodox fundraising events like runs, cycling events, and overseas treks. The market is facing the challenges of potential participants being out of the habit of taking on these types of events because of Covid.
3. Online fundraising might provide possible solutions to charities better connecting with their supporters
Online fundraising events and other digital solutions to fundraising, including connectivity to existing apps and social networks, may be one of the areas that charities can seek out as an alternative - an added fundraising stream to their existing efforts.
Find out more about Givepenny and their gaming event for charities - World Gaming Day: https://home.givepenny.com/world-gaming-day
This episode of Charity Chat has been brought to you by our platinum sponsor Work for Good. Work for Good believes everyone should be able to turn the work they do into good. Through their fundraising platform, they offer charities a way to engage and work with small businesses, including founders, owners and sole traders who want to make an impact for charities through their sales. To find out more, please visit workforgood.co.uk.
We hope you enjoy this week’s episode.
Related episodes that you may be interested in:
E180 - Charities and the world of gaming with Tom Downie -
E129 - The Charity Digital Code of Practice with Zoe Amar and Graeme Manuel-Jones -
E:67 Gaming for Charity with Lucy Squance -