Boosting auction fundraising success with Bloomerang’s Giving Platform

Key Nonprofit Highlights

Boys & Girls Clubs of Mason Valley offers resources and support for all children, regardless of background. With six clubhouses, trained staff, and over 15 programs, they provide tools and skills for success in life. The Club faced challenges with donor management and fundraising due to limited resources and an outdated system.

By transitioning to Bloomerang’s Giving Platform, they gained access to unlimited users, intuitive tools, and customizable donation forms, streamlining workflows and improving collaboration. Features like built-in donor stewardship tools, digital auction capabilities, and seamless payment options boosted the Club’s fundraising success. This resulted in more monthly donors than ever before and an increase from $17,000 to $25,000 raised at their annual auction. The platform’s flexibility and continuous innovation have significantly enhanced the Club’s efficiency and donor engagement, driving growth across their initiatives.

Challenge

Improving donor management and fundraising efficiency for a small team

The Boys & Girls Club of Mason Valley, like many nonprofits, faced a significant challenge in managing their donor relationships and fundraising efforts efficiently. With a lean development team of two, supported by billing staff needing access to donor reports, they operated in a high-pressure environment where maximizing resources and streamlining workflows were crucial to success. Their previous donor management system, which was charged on a per-user basis, restricted access and limited collaboration. Beyond this, tailoring donor communications and finding ways to enhance donor stewardship had become a growing burden, requiring a more intuitive nonprofit CRM solution.

Solution

Bloomerang’s Giving Platform delivers “wildly easy” user experience

In search of flexibility, efficiency, and enhanced functionality, the Boys & Girls Club of Mason Valley transitioned to Bloomerang’s Giving Platform. “The user interface is so wildly easy to use on the back end, in terms of finding constituents or inputting a gift or changing information,” said Nick Beaton, Director of Development. “It feels fresh and it’s very intuitive, which makes our job a bit easier. We never have to struggle to find something or look up the help article for how to do something because it’s just right there.” Another game-changer for the Club was the inclusion of unlimited users. “With us having two people in our development department, plus the folks in billing that need to be able to access reports to see where certain donations and gifts are being coded to, the unlimited users might have honestly been priority number one for us,” said Beaton. This upgrade not only ensured everyone could collaborate effectively but also empowered the team to work better together.

Bloomerang Giving Platform’s built-in tools for donor stewardship further addressed the Club’s pain points. “Bloomerang makes it incredibly easy to steward your donors. The fact that you can get the letter made, edited, downloaded, all right there from the donation window is huge. Every letter you send to a donor might be a bit different from the one you did before, so the fact that we can do that right in Bloomerang really grabbed our attention,” Beaton explained.

The mobile app also improves donor stewardship by enabling easy data research on the go, “If I’m in a meeting and need to look up something real quick, I can just pull my phone out and it’s right there.” Flexibility and continuous innovation in the Bloomerang system also resonated deeply. “Being able to really customize the donation forms has been fantastic,” shared Beaton. “The fact that you can either send people to it, use an iFrame, embed it, whatever you need to do—that makes us able to put it where we need to, which is super helpful.”

Results

More monthly donors and bigger auction success with Bloomerang

Bloomerang’s Giving Platform not only addressed the immediate challenges of the Club but also helped amplify their fundraising success. For instance, integrating Bloomerang Fundraising donation forms for their annual gala streamlined registration with options like Apple Pay, leading to increased convenience for donors. “People no longer had to scramble to find their credit card and risk giving up on donating. This has resulted in more small donations and monthly donors than we’ve had before,” Beaton noted.

The impact of Bloomerang’s Giving Platform was monumental for their annual music festival’s silent auction. The transition to a digital auction format meant expanding the audience from a local 1,000 participants to an unrestricted, online audience. “We went from a $17,000 grand total last year to making more than $25,000 in this year’s auction, including plenty of fund-a-need donations throughout the auction.” The platform’s advanced notification system—via app, text, and email—also streamlined the winner notification and checkout process, adding further convenience. “The new platform allowed us to extend the auction to twice as long as we normally run it, and it made checking out a cinch,” said Beaton. “Instead of having to call winners, those who won their item could see easily from their app and also received a text and email. Our silent auction staff loved it, and the growth in funds raised speaks for itself!”

Through their partnership with Bloomerang’s Giving Platform, the Boys & Girls Club of Mason Valley not only strengthened donor stewardship but also expanded their fundraising horizons and operational efficiency. Beaton sums it up best: “It’s a product that we have found continually improving itself and continually improving us.”