New Team Member
Please welcome Michael Pierson to our Team O-H-I-O. Mike is Diane Leesman's son-in-law.
20th Anniversary of the James
Tuesday, July 27, Noon-1:30 p.m.
OSU Medical Center Plaza
If interested or planning to attend, please contact Lindsey Gale
Fundraising Tips for the Final Month
A few of your fellow riders have put together how they made their final push last year
Roland Kreml
Last year, in the last 30 days I sent updates about my training via email to a list of friends and family. This was a weekly update that would talk about my training adventures, but I also had a “thermometer” graphic of my current fundraising and my total goal of $1,000. By the week of the Pelotonia, I had less than half of that raised. In my final email before the ride I talked about the Pelotonia, how important the research was, and that 100% of all donations goes directly to funding cancer research. In that last week, my total fundraising jumped from less than $500 to over $1,100! Most gifts were in the range of $10 - $50. The key to fundraising for me was asking friends and family to support the James in honor of my ride, to let them know my goal, and how much I have raised.
This year I have a blog for my updates. On my blog I put information about my training as well as how my readers can help. I would think that people would become bored with my training updates, but I get many people telling me that they enjoy my blog. I also know people are reading because I can see the amount of traffic coming to my blog (I'm a techie- I do these things!)
Karen Longbrake
My approach has been similar and I have already surpassed my goal. I created a distribution list of friends and family including those that donated last year and I sent an appeal. I heard a little after the first appeal but donations really started to come in after the 2nd email. I changed up my email a little and made sure to let folks know that a gift of any size was appreciated. I recently took advantage of the link via Pelotonia to connect their icon to my facebook status page and so that has gone out to many more folks than the original email. I added a line about 2 weeks ago regarding my Miami, Michigan and Penn St tickets offering a donor their choice of 2 tickets to one of those games if they make a gift of $1000. I think I have a taker as of yesterday. It is a guy I don’t know but he is friends with my sister from facebook and saw it on her status updates. If I get that gift I will sign up for the high roller status because I am at $2000 right now. I figure I can eeek out a few more bucks to get to $4000. I think the key is to not feel bad or uncomfortable about “Asking” most people can afford $10 and that is what makes the difference those gifts of $5 and $10!! I will definitely send out a 3rd email to my group thanking those that have made a gift and letting the others know it is not too late.
Vince McGrail
My fundraising has been closely tied to my family and hometown friends, because it has focused on my two sisters. I emailed a list of about 25 friends and family to start, personalizing each email, with the body of the email mostly the same, explaining why I’m riding with a link to my page. I also posted info on Facebook – updating friends about my rides, number of days until Pelotonia, and information about my family (since I was riding for my sisters). I sent a reminder email to all the week before Pelotonia, then an email the night before. I had raised about $800 toward my goal of $1,500 with a week to go to the event last year. In the two days before Pelotonia I had over $1,500 come in and then another $1,000 – mostly from people I hadn’t talked to in years in the weeks following – people I knew had emailed others and shared via Facebook. Don’t underestimate the power of a simple ask – and then follow up as people get busy and forget. As the day gets closer, media coverage goes up, and it’s a good time to remind people to give in the few weeks before the ride.
After the ride is also a good time to thank people and remind others that they can still give to support your ride. I raised a lot after Pelotonia last year – I posted a personal video on YouTube about the ride and linked to it in my follow up thank you emails.
This year, I started by emailing all of the 80 who gave to me last year, to thank them again and ask for support this year. I also started a blog, and have posted updates on Facebook and on twitter. I’ll do another email to 2009 donors two weeks before Pelotonia. Pelotonia has two new Facebook apps to help – one is a Pelotonia app to add a tab to your profile page, and the other is to share your page on FB, with an update of your goal and amount raised. They just posted this on the Pelotonia site in the last few weeks. Posting on FB reminds people what you’re doing and why, so when you email them they are more likely to respond.
Tuesday, July 27, Noon-1:30 p.m.
OSU Medical Center Plaza
If interested or planning to attend, please contact Lindsey Gale
Fundraising Tips for the Final Month
A few of your fellow riders have put together how they made their final push last year
Roland Kreml
Last year, in the last 30 days I sent updates about my training via email to a list of friends and family. This was a weekly update that would talk about my training adventures, but I also had a “thermometer” graphic of my current fundraising and my total goal of $1,000. By the week of the Pelotonia, I had less than half of that raised. In my final email before the ride I talked about the Pelotonia, how important the research was, and that 100% of all donations goes directly to funding cancer research. In that last week, my total fundraising jumped from less than $500 to over $1,100! Most gifts were in the range of $10 - $50. The key to fundraising for me was asking friends and family to support the James in honor of my ride, to let them know my goal, and how much I have raised.
This year I have a blog for my updates. On my blog I put information about my training as well as how my readers can help. I would think that people would become bored with my training updates, but I get many people telling me that they enjoy my blog. I also know people are reading because I can see the amount of traffic coming to my blog (I'm a techie- I do these things!)
Karen Longbrake
My approach has been similar and I have already surpassed my goal. I created a distribution list of friends and family including those that donated last year and I sent an appeal. I heard a little after the first appeal but donations really started to come in after the 2nd email. I changed up my email a little and made sure to let folks know that a gift of any size was appreciated. I recently took advantage of the link via Pelotonia to connect their icon to my facebook status page and so that has gone out to many more folks than the original email. I added a line about 2 weeks ago regarding my Miami, Michigan and Penn St tickets offering a donor their choice of 2 tickets to one of those games if they make a gift of $1000. I think I have a taker as of yesterday. It is a guy I don’t know but he is friends with my sister from facebook and saw it on her status updates. If I get that gift I will sign up for the high roller status because I am at $2000 right now. I figure I can eeek out a few more bucks to get to $4000. I think the key is to not feel bad or uncomfortable about “Asking” most people can afford $10 and that is what makes the difference those gifts of $5 and $10!! I will definitely send out a 3rd email to my group thanking those that have made a gift and letting the others know it is not too late.
Vince McGrail
My fundraising has been closely tied to my family and hometown friends, because it has focused on my two sisters. I emailed a list of about 25 friends and family to start, personalizing each email, with the body of the email mostly the same, explaining why I’m riding with a link to my page. I also posted info on Facebook – updating friends about my rides, number of days until Pelotonia, and information about my family (since I was riding for my sisters). I sent a reminder email to all the week before Pelotonia, then an email the night before. I had raised about $800 toward my goal of $1,500 with a week to go to the event last year. In the two days before Pelotonia I had over $1,500 come in and then another $1,000 – mostly from people I hadn’t talked to in years in the weeks following – people I knew had emailed others and shared via Facebook. Don’t underestimate the power of a simple ask – and then follow up as people get busy and forget. As the day gets closer, media coverage goes up, and it’s a good time to remind people to give in the few weeks before the ride.
After the ride is also a good time to thank people and remind others that they can still give to support your ride. I raised a lot after Pelotonia last year – I posted a personal video on YouTube about the ride and linked to it in my follow up thank you emails.
This year, I started by emailing all of the 80 who gave to me last year, to thank them again and ask for support this year. I also started a blog, and have posted updates on Facebook and on twitter. I’ll do another email to 2009 donors two weeks before Pelotonia. Pelotonia has two new Facebook apps to help – one is a Pelotonia app to add a tab to your profile page, and the other is to share your page on FB, with an update of your goal and amount raised. They just posted this on the Pelotonia site in the last few weeks. Posting on FB reminds people what you’re doing and why, so when you email them they are more likely to respond.
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