How Nonprofits Can Benefit From Events

Traditionally, events were perceived to have little financial significance among nonprofit organizations since they’re often reluctant to invest already scarce time and resources towards such endeavors. But this belief is more driven by notion than facts.

Nonprofit events offer some of the best fundraising opportunities and are worth the investment in terms of finances, manpower, and resources. Be it any charity occasion, the impact of events can be colossal for nonprofits, and through the course of this article, we’ll take a deeper look into the concept of events for nonprofit organizations.

How nonprofits can benefit from events
There are several ways a nonprofit can benefit from events:

• Awareness for their cause
  Key highlight: According to popular surveys, as many as 43% nonprofits host events to raise awareness for their cause.
  
  While conventional methods of advertising can boost awareness among the community, events can market your brand on two levels. First, your organization will benefit from greater online exposure as participants help you push your event through social media platforms. Second, the event will connect your organization with local volunteers and participants at a personal level. It will help you establish deeper roots in the community with collaborative planning efforts.


• Fundraising opportunities
  Events offer huge potential when it comes to raising money for a social cause within a limited period of time. Their ability to create a personal touch among the genuinely interested audience is infectious and sparks a desire to contribute more.


• Contributing back to the community
  Key highlight: As many as 64% nonprofits organize events to offer some kind of training and education for the community.
  
  Events also provide opportunities to appreciate the efforts of your community and organization’s team. You can also appreciate your audience by offering freebies and simply thank them for their unconditional support.


• Building relationships
  Key highlight: Surveys show that up to 63% nonprofits host events to build their network
  
  Another aspect of event organization is the opportunity to create deep meaningful relationships on an individual level as well as on business aspects. As the audience pour in for your event, you can build a team of volunteers within the community and seek support on various future events. The relationship is mutually beneficial and can land you exciting prospects such as event sponsorship and other support.

How to plan an event for a nonprofit
Event organization can be stressful for nonprofit organizations as the funds are tighter and resources scarce. But with effective planning and creative methods, nonprofits can host events successfully. Here are a few tips that you can follow:

• Seek Volunteers
  As nonprofit events are usually reliant on external resources, seeking volunteers within the community is the best way forward. Volunteers closely relate to your cause and will enable you to build a strong workforce even before the event’s planning starts. You can start by looking into your audience list and people registered in your newsletters and mailing lists.


• Select a venue that promotes inclusion
  The event venue should have enough space to host all participants and should be accessible geographically to all participants. About 84% event organizers consider location as the critical aspect of a successful event. You should take special care of differently-abled people and make the event friendly for visually impaired and deaf individuals. Your event should be ready with a contingency plan for each of such occasions to promote inclusion. You can also incorporate virtual aspects like live streaming and online polls to include more audiences through the outreach of the internet.


• Promote your event
  While nonprofits can’t spend much on promotion, they can still utilize their community network to put the word out. If the budget allows, you can also devise a digital marketing campaign to improve the outreach of your event through social media platforms. Studies show that almost 22% nonprofit event creators regard social media marketing as the best strategy to promote their events.


• Take feedback
  Even if your event was successful, you should seek the opinions of the audience as there is always room for improvement. You can include survey forms that allow people to share their insights on several aspects of the event. The survey should be short and precise otherwise the audience may leave inaccurate and random answers.

The most common types of events nonprofits organize

A majority of non-profit organizations usually host social cause, community, and educational events. While the primary goal is to build community and raise awareness for the cause, there are a variety of formats to raise funds and entice donors.

• Arts and entertainment events
  Key highlight: As many as 31% of nonprofit events are some form of art exhibitions or involve entertainment aspects.
  
  Such events usually are organized in the interest of selling premier work from artists for charity purposes. Some may involve a contest among artists too where a nominal fee is charged with donated prizes for winners across categories.


• Networking Events
  Most extensively organized event among the nonprofit community, 37% of all charity events are networking events.


• Gala and fundraisers
  Large fundraising events such as galas are extravagant affairs that may include dancing, entertainment, and silent auctions. As they require many resources and large upfront costs, such events are mostly preferred by large organizations.

Evaluating events organized by nonprofits

While there are obvious benefits of organizing nonprofit events such as greater outreach, personal connection, and large fundraising opportunities, underestimating the challenges would be a mistake. However, if managed carefully, the pros clearly outweigh the cons.

Advantages

• Greater brand awareness with online exposure and local outreach.
• More opportunities for raising money for the social cause with a personal to connect with the audience.
• Enjoyment and engaging activities for the audience while being associated with a social cause.
• An opportunity to build a stronger community with a pool of volunteers that can help in future events.
• Exposure to business aspects such as event sponsorship.

Drawbacks

• Planning and executing an event requires effort and coordination.
• Budget is a crucial aspect that needs to be analyzed before finalizing the event type. 45 percent of all events suffer from insufficient capital when it comes to nonprofits.
• Securing sponsors can be troublesome.
• Nonprofits usually have to rely on external help and resources which can be unpredictable.

Do you wish to organize an event for your nonprofit organization?
If you’re looking for assistance with organizing an event for your nonprofit, try using Bitpod Event. Bitpod Event is a one-stop centralized event management software equipped with powerful yet very flexible features that you can use to plan different kinds of events including fairs, festivals, fundraisers, concerts, galas, etc. Offering seamless and smooth set-up and navigation, this is one platform that offers true value for your money.

Bitpod Event can help you:

• Manage registrations
• Engage attendees and sponsors
• Collect donations
• Promote your event
• Manage event ticketing
• Handle seat mapping
• Schedule sub-events

You can achieve a lot more with Bitpod Event taking care of all the nitty-gritty’s of your nonprofit event. The platform offers 700+ integrations with popular online meeting platforms, video streaming platforms, emailing platforms, cloud apps, as well as accounting software, so that you can concentrate on your core goals while it handles everything else.