Online Auctions: A Crash Course for Successful Fundraising

Let’s be honest— we’re now multiple years past the original “pivot to virtual.” Gone are the days of taking an originally in-person event, grabbing the first online event software you can get your hands on, and slapping together a virtual experience simply to have something that guests can attend.

Now, nonprofits are planning events to take place online from the start. You’re investing in online event software that has built-in engagement tools, to begin building relationships with guests near and far. You’re adjusting entertainment options to opt for experiences that look stellar over live stream and even shipping meals to event attendees to enjoy the full experience from home.

Your organization has adapted to the new reality of virtual events and it has paid off! But, we’re staring down a reality in which virtual and hybrid events are simply the norm. It’s worthwhile to revisit the foundation that you’ve built your virtual events on, to make sure it’s stable enough to support continued innovation.

At Handbid, we worked firsthand with nonprofits as they’ve hosted in-person charity auctions, pivoted to virtual, and now, created a sustainable virtual and hybrid event strategy to last for years to come. In this crash course, we’ll break down one type of virtual event — online auctions, since that’s our specialty— to help your team make sure you’re building from a strong foundation as you continue innovating these events going forward.

How do you host an online auction?

Let’s begin with a bare-bones discussion of planning and hosting an online auction from start to finish.

From planning the event, to promoting the auction, to nailing the day-of execution, these are the key steps that your team should check off to set a strong foundation for your next auction.

Step 1: Planning a Stellar Event

Hosting an online auction is not unlike being the main event at a circus, juggling many balls and working to keep each in the air as more are thrown your way by an off-stage assistant. You’re coordinating several moving parts, including but not limited to your auction software, items, marketing, event sponsorships, entertainment, and event registration. Skimping on preparation is not an option (at least, as long as you want to keep all of your metaphorical balls in the air).

To set a strong foundation for your event from the start, you’ll want to check off the following “to-do’s” during the planning phase:

  • Select the right nonprofit auction software. Your auction software will handle the behind-the-scenes work so you can focus on building excitement for your virtual event. Your platform should allow you to manage your guest list, process invoices, view stats, generate reports, and message attendees. And of course, it should empower guests with convenient mobile bidding! Having all of these features in a single platform will centralize your planning and save time that can be reinvested into making the event more engaging.
  • Set up your auction website. Your auction website will serve as your item catalog. This is where participants will go to browse and make bids. For each item, you should provide key details like the item name, category, item number, images, and description. This will help present the items in a compelling and accurate way to drive bids.
  • Procure auction items. We’ll discuss this in detail later in the guide— but essentially, you’ll want to procure items that are hard for guests to secure on their own, aligned with your guests’ interests, and generally in-budget for your audience.
  • Connect with potential event sponsors. According to Double the Donation’s guide to corporate social responsibility, “businesses are increasingly turning to CSR to make a difference and build a positive brand around their company.” Use this to your advantage when planning your online auction! For example, you can connect with companies to solicit donated items and services, or even invite them to sponsor the event financially.
  • Practice your live program. If you’re planning on having speakers, an emcee, prerecorded videos, or entertainment, it’s best to practice your run-of-show beforehand. Little things like internet connection, auction item promotions, and transitions need to work seamlessly so your guests stay engaged with your online auction.

By taking the time to prepare upfront, you’ll provide a much smoother experience during the auction itself. Once you’ve wrapped up these steps, it’s time to move on to marketing.

Step 2: Promoting the Event Far and Wide

Okay, hear us out — you can plan an awesome event… but if no one knows about it, the effort is moot!

Marketing your event far and wide is key to making sure it’s full of excited guests, eager to bid on auction items. As you plan your marketing strategy, narrow down your options to determine which channels will best help you connect with your audience.

Getting Attention’s guide to nonprofit marketing discusses a few avenues, including (but not limited to):

  • Email. Leading up to your event, send email announcements to people who haven’t registered yet and updates to people who have already done so. Create segmented email campaigns to appeal to various groups of supporters, so you can create highly-targeted messaging that appeals directly to their interests.
  • Sponsors. Not only will your sponsors help fund the event, but they also serve as a great marketing tool. They can leverage their own networks to spread the word about your virtual event. Ask them to make announcements to their customers and share your social media posts. To increase the chances that they’ll market your event, provide them with promotional materials they can use.
  • Social Media. Determine the social platforms where your supporters are active, whether Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, or the latest rising star, TikTok. Then, draft posts that highlight your upcoming event and high-ticket items to encourage people to register.

Center your outreach around three or four platforms. While multi-channel marketing will increase visibility for your event, limiting the number of platforms allows you to focus your efforts on the most effective channels.

Step 3: Knocking the Event Out of the Park

You’ve put in the work to plan and promote the event. Now, it’s time to drive it across the finish line with flawless execution!

While in-person auctions require more time to set up, online auctions are much easier to launch. Your nonprofit auction software will simplify many processes like registration, item management, and payment processing. So, with your auction software doing the heavy lifting, you only have to coordinate a few final details. We recommend the following tips to maintain momentum and maximize participation in your event:

  • Open your auction early. One of the best things about online auctions is that you have more flexibility with your timeline. Consider keeping the auction open throughout the week of the event to fully engage supporters. Providing plenty of time gives everyone the opportunity to browse at their leisure and bid on their favorite items.
  • Live stream during the event. Live streaming adds a face-to-face element to your virtual event, so consider hosting streams to kick off your event, provide periodic updates, and celebrate the end results. Some auction software even comes equipped with its own live streaming tools, so you can stream directly within your mobile bidding app or on the auction website. This way, users don’t have to leave the platform and risk getting distracted.
  • Create clear rules for your event and stick to them. Admittedly, “rules” at a nonprofit auction are more like guidelines than set in stone. However, creating these guidelines and communicating them to guests will set expectations around the event and ensure it runs smoothly. We recommend setting rules around how and when guests need to pay for won items, whether bids can be canceled, and how and when bidding will be closed.

Once your event wraps up, you’ll need to arrange for item delivery or shipping. Then, you’ll want to review your event’s performance. Take a look at which items were popular, which didn’t garner much interest, and who your top bidders were. Understanding what went well (and what didn’t!) will help you refine your future online auctions.

How can you set your online auction up for success?

Now that you understand the basics of online auctions, we can dive into the nitty-gritty details that will make your event shine. We’ve put together three tips to take your event to the next level: careful item procurement, gamification, and thoughtful post-event follow-up.

Procure items your guests want to bid on.

Remember, the success of your event depends on guests bidding (and counterbidding, multiple times!) to win items. So, the items need to be desirable for your specific audience and appealing to both their interests and pocketbooks.

Keep the following tips in mind to procure items that your guests want to bid on:

  • Take a look at past donations to gauge what your average donor would be willing to spend at an auction, then make sure your auction items fall within that range.
  • Focus on procuring items that guests can’t easily get themselves. So, rather than standard sports tickets, aim for the once-in-a-lifetime events like a big playoff game or the Super Bowl.
  • Align items with your guests’ interests. The items that empty-nesters would be interested in may be different than those that would attract young families (i.e. a vacation for two versus a vacation for four).
  • Bundle lower-value items to increase interest. Tying back to our standard sports tickets example, you could bundle the tickets with parking in a prime location, meal tickets, and early access to the stadium. The convenience increases the value of the lesser-value item.

From there, you also need to market and display your items to play up their value. So, in your event marketing, highlight hot-ticket items to build intrigue. Then, take pictures of multiple views of physical items and include them on your auction site— that way, guests can see a 360-degree view of each item.

Encourage (healthy) competition with gamification.

Historically, auctioneers have implemented game-like elements into auctions to liven up events and make them more engaging for attendees. With technological innovations, you can supercharge your events with more modern gamification techniques, such as:

  • Leaderboards to showcase top bidders.
  • Countdown timers to spark a sense of urgency.
  • Fundraising thermometers to display progress toward fundraising goals.

These tools will ultimately drive deeper bidder engagement and challenge attendees to continue participating until the final moments of your online auction. Intuitive nonprofit auction software will come equipped with gamification tools like these to make the most of your event.

Don’t forget the post-event follow-up.

Even once you’ve closed out your auction and distributed items to the winners, your work isn’t quite done yet! There are a few final steps you need to take before calling it a day. Post-auction, make sure to follow up and share results with:

  • Donors. Send thank-you letters to your donors. If possible, give them an update on the item they donated— such as whether the item was won and for how much! This is an easy way to put a number on the value they contributed to your event.
  • Bidders. Using your nonprofit auction software, automate acknowledgments and tax receipts. Then, go a step further by sending custom thank-you emails that emphasize the fundraiser’s impact.
  • Sponsors. Your sponsors make your event possible, from helping with promotion to providing funding and auction items for the event. Send personalized letters to show appreciation and encourage ongoing partnerships instead of letting the relationship dwindle.

Some event organizers skimp on this stage. However, sufficiently thanking donors, bidders, and sponsors will show your appreciation, cultivate relationships, and encourage them to continue supporting your cause.

While the initial pivot to online events was quick, it’s now clear that these events are sticking around for the long run. It’s worthwhile to revisit your online auction foundation to ensure you continue hosting successful events going forward!

Now that you understand the key steps and best practices for these events, you can begin planning your next online auction with confidence. Good luck!

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5 Best Practices for More Effective Fundraising Letters

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Fundraising letters are the backbone of any nonprofit’s direct mail fundraising strategy. Having the most effective fundraising letter possible maximizes the impact of your organization’s marketing spend and helps drive the most donations to ensure you can do what you do best—serve your cause. To help you make the most out of your fundraising letters, here are 5 easy-to-do best practices to think about when setting up your next campaign.

1. Segment your audience.

Segmenting your audience is critical to improving your fundraising results. If your donor list is small, this can be as simple as mailing different appeals to existing, lapsed (those who haven’t given in a few years), and prospective donors (those who have never given). 

For organizations with larger constituent lists, segmentation can get incredibly complex as it’s driven by a number of variables—recency or size of the last gift, total contribution amounts, donor age or gender, type of appeal, etc. 

If you’re worried your data is out of date — or if you’ve never collected that data at all — no worries! One-time data append services can help you fill in the gaps of information like date of birth, address, or telephone number. Additionally, some nonprofit tools like matching gift tools offer real-time appending of specific information, like employer data.

Here's an example of segmenting your effective fundraising letters.

The takeaway here is that regardless of your network of support, some sort of segmentation can have huge benefits to the results of your appeals.

2. Personalize your letters.

Personalization is also incredibly important. This might be the single easiest step a nonprofit can take to improving the response to a fundraising letter. There are levels of complexity that you can use when personalizing a letter—from including the donor’s name in the salutation (i.e. “Dear Jane,”) to referencing the state/county that the recipient lives in throughout the letter (i.e. “your contributions have supported so many impoverished students in the Atlanta area.”

The more the donor feels personally connected to the letter that they’re reading, the more likely they are to respond to the call to action in that letter. People enjoy seeing things addressed to them much more than they do to “dear donor.” Keep this in mind next time you write your fundraising appeal.

3. Incorporate a multi-channel strategy.

Fundraising letters drive the vast majority of individual donations to nonprofits in the US every year. It’s important to know, however, that using a multi-channel approach not only gets you donations from other channels (online donations, text-to-give, etc.) but improves the results from your direct mail campaigns too.

Here's an example of a multi-channel approach to run alongside your effective fundraising letters.

The more channels used for fundraising the better, as long as there is coordination between them. Consistent branding, messaging, and calls-to-action are key.

4. Partner with a fundraising platform.

Choosing a top-tier fundraising partner can help you get the most from your fundraising campaigns. You put in the time and effort to help your cause, so you’ll want to make sure that you use a dedicated direct mail fundraising partner that is easy to work with, affordable, and attentive. 

5. Thank donors for every contribution.

The fundraising campaign shouldn’t end when you receive a donation. In every other situation where you receive a gift, a thank you is appreciated. Donations are no different!

Thanking your donor for their contributions helps them build a stronger connection to your cause, lets them know that they are appreciated, and makes them more likely to give again in the future.

To get started, check out our arsenal of free donor thank-you letters! And when you need to get those letters produced and mailed, GivingMail can help.

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Nonprofit ADA Compliance & Web Accessibility: 3 FAQs

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Your nonprofit’s website is the hub of your organization’s online presence. This is where you host important information about your mission and programming, promote your fundraisers, post involvement opportunities, collect donations, and more. 

Clearly, your website is a critical tool for marketing your mission and connecting with your supporters, whether they’ve just heard of your organization and want to learn more or are regular visitors checking for updates on your work. 

But is your website optimized so that users of all abilities can use it? In other words, is your website ADA compliant? 

This is a critical question to reflect on because web accessibility isn’t just a nice bonus feature on a website that complements a beautiful logo or smooth navigation. In fact, it has increasingly become one of the most important elements of a showstopping nonprofit website.  

In this guide, we’ll cover three frequently asked questions about nonprofit website compliance and accessibility: 

  1. What are nonprofit ADA compliance and web accessibility? 
  2. Why is full nonprofit web compliance and accessibility important? 
  3. What are some quick ways you can optimize your website for accessibility?

Making your website available to all possible visitors allows you to expand your nonprofit’s reach, bolster your reputation, and ultimately pull in more support for your cause, so it’s more than worth the effort to learn about and implement! Let’s begin. 

1. What are nonprofit ADA compliance and web accessibility? 

Put simply, web accessibility is the idea that the internet should be usable by all people, no matter their location, device, or ability. This includes more than just user-friendliness and clear navigation. If the internet (and your website) is fully accessible, then people all over the online world with diverse abilities and devices should be able to engage with it. 

If you want to ensure your own website is accessible, you must consider the needs of all types of visitors, as well as make sure that your site is built with nonprofit web compliance best practices in mind. Nonprofit web compliance ensures that organizations and their websites are aware of and comply with relevant laws—in this case, the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). 

The ADA prohibits discrimination against individuals with disabilities and requires all public accommodations to be fully accessible. Physical offices and facilities of nonprofits that serve the public fall under this category, but legal cases have increasingly considered websites to be public accommodations, too. In fact, as explained in this recap from Venable, in 2019 the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals stated that some websites (including nonprofits) may actually violate the ADA if they are not accessible to people who have visual, auditory, and other disabilities. 

It’s imperative that your nonprofit and website keep the ADA in mind when designing or updating your website. If your nonprofit’s website is brought under scrutiny and is found to violate the ADA, you may even face large fines and legal action. 

To ensure your own website is ADA compliant, look to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), a set of usability standards developed by the World Wide Web Consortium.  With three levels of compliance (A, AA, and AAA), your website needs to adhere at least to the AA level to be considered legally acceptable.

2. Why is full nonprofit web compliance and accessibility important? 

Besides the fact that a fully compliant website could be legally required for your nonprofit in some circumstances, there is another key reason that accessibility matters. Without accessibility in mind, websites and other online apps can inadvertently exclude entire populations. Consider a nonprofit website that offers training videos for new volunteers but doesn’t offer any text elements alongside those videos. The videos aren’t fully accessible to people who are hearing impaired. To increase accessibility so that hearing-impaired visitors can get the information from those videos, the nonprofit would need to offer subtitles or a transcript of each video. 

On top of making your nonprofit more inclusive, ensuring your website is accessible can provide numerous additional benefits to your nonprofit. Full web compliance: 

  • Makes your website usable on all devices. The best nonprofit websites ensure that anyone can easily engage with them, no matter what device they use. After all, how your content is displayed can chage a lot depending on screen size and light settings. And with 85% of Americans owning a smartphone and over half of all web traffic stemming from mobile users, your website should definitely be usable on mobile screens.
  • Promotes a user-friendly experience. When your website is easy to use and engage with, people will associate it with a pleasant experience. They’ll keep coming back once they know that your website is effectively serving their needs. 
  • Minimizes loss of website visitors. Furthermore, if your website is hard to use and otherwise inaccessible, you’ll likely see a decrease in online engagement. Fewer people will refer to your website and your bounce rate will rise.
  • Improves search engine ranking. A fully compliant and accessible website can also boost your nonprofit’s search engine optimization (SEO) because search engines will have an easier time reading an accessible site. This can in turn increase your search engine results page rankings and increase the number of visitors to your nonprofit’s website.
  • Boosts engagement and fundraising success. The more people access and interact with your website, the stronger their relationship with your mission becomes, which makes it easier to conduct outreach for your fundraising campaigns.

Taking the time to make your website accessible to all truly benefits your nonprofit’s entire community and beyond. By creating a more inclusive online community, you’ll be able to expand your nonprofit’s audience and see more overall success!

3. What are some quick ways you can optimize your website for accessibility? 

In order to determine if your own website is fully compliant and accessible, let’s review the WCAG’s core principles of accessible design:

  • Perceivable information and intuitive user interface
  • Operable UI (user interface) and navigation
  • Understandable information and UI
  • Robust content and reliable interpretation

Considering these WCAG core principles, your top priority should be improving user experience. Consider the following quick ways you can prioritize user experience to improve your nonprofit website’s accessibility:

  • Make sure that all non-written content also comes with a text alternative. This applies to graphics, images, videos, and audio components of your website.
  • Avoid using sensory characteristics to relay important nonprofit content. For instance, if a field on your donation form is required but only designated as such by the color of the text, usually red, that has the potential to be an accessibility issue for colorblind users. Make sure to also indicate any important content or instructions with text as well.
  • Don’t use any graphics or videos with flashes and other bright lights. This can cause problems for those who are seizure-prone. If you really want to incorporate this type of content, make sure to include a clear warning.
  • Ensure that all page titles are clear and entry fields include the necessary instructions. You want to make your nonprofit website as easy to use as possible for your supporters. They should know exactly how to find your online donation page and should be able to fill out the giving form with ease. 
  • Design an intuitive and easily navigable menu. This is a great place to organize all of your most popular landing pages so that users can quickly access the content they want. 
  • Incorporate key calls-to-action (CTA) throughout your website. Make it easy for supporters to access the page they want by adding a link or button CTAs directing to it. This is especially useful for your online donation form and event registration forms. 

As you leverage these tips, rely on Google Lighthouse to give you an idea of how accessible your web pages are. Lighthouse will give your page an accessibility score out of 100 and then highlight opportunities for you to improve your page’s accessibility. 

Having an accessible and ADA-compliant website should be a priority for every nonprofit. After all, as you use tools like your website to connect with more and more supporters, you’re laying the groundwork for long-term relationships and sustained support for your mission. 

Use what you’ve learned from these FAQs to start improving your website’s accessibility today. You can also work with a nonprofit web design company to hone your website’s accessibility. According to Cornershop Creative, the right partner will understand your nonprofit’s needs, including accessibility and inclusivity, and empower you to make your website a useful resource for your entire community.

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