Public Relations
Project Summary
As part of the fundraising team at United Way (a nonprofit), my job is to find ways to engage the decision-makers of local organizations in a way that will inspire them to donate money to fund our programs. My goal is to increase the amount of donations we receive from our current partners, as well as find new companies to partner with.
My first step towards accomplishing this goal was establishing a relationship with our current and prospective partners. I arranged meetings and attended community networking events to meet with outreach representatives from various local companies. I gauged their business’s potential for charitable giving and explored ways in which we could create a mutually beneficial partnership.
Once my relationships with these companies were established, I invited them to engage with our organization. I offered opportunities to tour our facilities, volunteer, enhance existing employee giving campaigns, attend community assessment seminars, meet our CEO, and attend partner luncheons. The goal of these activities was to help these companies understand the value of our nonprofit. By engaging with our people and seeing our impact, I hoped to inspire them to choose United Way as their charity of choice.
Through these efforts, I increased the number of new partners by 25%, donations by 46%, and number of volunteers by 11% as compared to my accounts last year. I noticed that although I did influence the number of people in each organization that donated, the amount at which they donated was low compared to last year. My goal moving forward is to find new ways to motivate companies to give at higher levels.