How do you increase £300,000 on your charity’s trigger with a small crew and a restricted price range? At this time, you’ll discover out!
We talked with Georgia Akers, Head of Occasions at Spinal Analysis, about precisely how the charity plans, promotes and raises a heap of cash in direction of its mission within the London Marathon utilizing JustGiving.
And we get particular. Georgia shares…
- How she recruits dependable and motivated fundraisers from day one
- Retains the hype going during race day
- The game-changer that raised an additional £100,000 and halved their dropout price!
As you’ll see, it’s about getting in entrance of the proper individuals, discovering the technique that works for you, and taking advantage of alternatives to achieve assist.
Let’s bounce into it.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
- The way to establish your potential for achievement
- Setting the proper goals
- Recruiting one of the best supporters
- The optimum London Marathon fundraising timeline
- The technique that raised an additional £100,000
- Digital fundraising instruments for achievement
- The JustGiving London Marathon Fundraising Hub
Small charity…big outcomes
Spinal Analysis is the UK’s main charity funding the invention and improvement of efficient remedies for power spinal wire harm.
With work like that, you may suppose the charity has a crew of 100+ individuals. However they’re smashing it with only a small however devoted crew of solely 15 individuals, and their London Marathon crew solely two: Georgia and one assistant!
And regardless of their modest crew dimension, the charity crew of 184 London Marathon runners mixed to boost £300,000 on JustGiving alone in 2024.
The way to establish occasion potential, then check and scale
Success in London Marathon depends on cautious effort, and ongoing stewardship. How does Georgia inform if it’ll have a optimistic ROI?
“I have a look at the prevailing demand from runners, contemplate the cost-per-runner, and assess the fundraising potential of the occasion to see if it’s value buying charity locations.”
GEORGIA AKERS, HEAD OF EVENTS, SPINAL RESEARCH
From there, she assesses if the worth’s value the fee. “If I believe it’s value it, I’ll buy a small variety of charity locations to check the demand, then slowly enhance.”
TOP TIP
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Setting the proper goals
Setting goals comes all the way down to your charity’s particular targets. For Spinal Analysis, the primary purpose in 2024 was constructing model consciousness while gaining new supporters.
“We regularly discover that, as a small charity, individuals haven’t heard of us until they’ve been immediately affected by spinal wire harm. This occasion provides us the chance to get in entrance of people that don’t learn about us.”
GEORGIA AKERS, HEAD OF EVENTS, SPINAL RESEARCH
The charity additionally leverages London Marathon to construct even stronger relationships with their current neighborhood, while elevating as a lot cash as attainable.
The way to recruit new and current supporters
The charity has an ongoing checklist of people that have expressed curiosity within the subsequent yr’s occasion, which they faucet into when their London Marathon locations are confirmed.
For additional recruitment, they cut up their outreach into chilly and heat audiences. Spinal Analysis entice chilly audiences (reaching new individuals not accustomed to the charity) with Fb advertisements, and interact heat audiences (their current neighborhood or individuals who learn about them) via natural social posts and electronic mail.
“The demand is there; you simply have to determine get in entrance of the proper audiences.”
GEORGIA AKERS, HEAD OF EVENTS, SPINAL RESEARCH
Then, as quickly as individuals are accepted into the crew, they get a collection of assets by way of electronic mail to welcome them and assist them begin fundraising:
- A immediate to arrange their JustGiving web page
- Marathon coaching plans
- Fundraising concepts and inspiration
- Reminders for upcoming milestones (extra on this later)
- Personalised assist
TOP TIP
For extra on entice and activate new audiences, get our free JustGiving Information to London Marathon 2025.
The optimum fundraising timeline: hold individuals motivated all yr lengthy
Georgia and her crew take into consideration London Marathon all yr lengthy, because it’s their flagship fundraising occasion. And London Marathon wastes no time in releasing poll locations and charity locations. They typically do it the day after London Marathon, for the following yr’s occasion!
Right here’s the fundraising timeline we’ve seen work time and time once more:
To maintain the joy going, Spinal Analysis connects with their crew and helps their crew join with one another via:
- A WhatsApp group for answering questions and sharing ongoing inspiration
- Exhibiting as much as cheer on their London Marathon runners through the occasion
- Internet hosting a post-marathon meetup at a neighborhood pub to satisfy and congratulate their fundraisers after their monumental effort
The £100,000 fundraising difference-maker
Right here’s the one change to their fundraising technique that helped Spinal Analysis increase an additional £100,000 in London Marathon 2024.
They mapped out a required milestone for his or her fundraisers, then had a backup plan if individuals didn’t meet it in time.
“We launched a required fundraising milestone – individuals wanted to hit 50% of their particular person FR goal by January to proceed on the crew.”
GEORGIA AKERS, HEAD OF EVENTS, SPINAL RESEARCH
This strategic milestone attracted extra dedicated runners from the beginning. On prime of that, their fundraiser waitlist allow them to to drag in new individuals if others needed to drop out.
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Spinal Analysis use JustGiving Marketing campaign Pages for all their London Marathon campaigns.
It’s straightforward for the charity and their fundraisers to verify in on their particular person or collective fundraising whole. Plus, everybody can see how they’re measuring up in opposition to others on the leaderboard – that little bit of pleasant competitors encourages individuals to boost extra!
One other time-saver is having JustGiving linked to their Salesforce CRM by way of the JustGiving API, which exhibits all of them their fundraisers’ information in a single place (together with how a lot they’ve raised on their JustGiving web page) – particularly useful for such a small crew!
What are your London Marathon targets for 2025?
Spinal Analysis is in the midst of their 2025 London Marathon marketing campaign and aiming to boost greater than ever subsequent yr.
“We’re rising our particular person fundraising targets this yr to push our supporters to boost greater than ever.”
GEORGIA AKERS, HEAD OF EVENTS, SPINAL RESEARCH
Georgia says, “The cash raised will assist our mission by permitting us to proceed to fund cutting-edge analysis, advance scientific trials, and fund our PhD programme, which is coaching the following technology of specialists within the subject of spinal wire harm.”
Spinal Analysis are heading towards their 2025 London Marathon fundraising targets by…
These good methods are serving to them get donations every single day. Our recommendation: adapt these methods to spice up your charity’s London Marathon marketing campaign too!
Take a look at our 2025 London Marathon fundraising hub for much more assets that will help you plan, promote, and succeed within the greatest fundraising occasion of the yr 👇
EVERYTHING YOU NEED
The JustGiving London Marathon 2025 Fundraising Hub
Get all the most recent London Marathon 2025 fundraising assets, incentives, and instruments to construct your charity a profitable marketing campaign.
