Suburban fundraising events (Chicago, Naperville: buy, schools, live in)

[sgresident]

I am wondering how those of you who are involved with fundraising events for local charities publicize your events? Our Library Friends group is doing a big fundraiser and seem to be having a lot of difficulty getting the info into the newspapers. We have purchased some ads, but the expense is pretty high. We have not seen the press release info in many of the papers, even though we sent it numerous times and well in advance. It did appear in the Chicago Tribune (Trib Local section) last week. I would love to hear any inside tips!

[cdc3217]

Your local papers aren't running the press release!? They 're usually parched for easy copy. Sometimes they hold out for ads, but still, that's so irritating. If you buy a small ad they might be more likely to run the press release as well, but your best bet is calling and talking to the person who does those stories at the most local papers. Even if you just ask if you can fax the release directly to them, it puts in on their radar a little bit. Another trick is invite media members onto your planning committee so they are invested in helping the event get publicity.

[JustJulia]

I don't think most newspapers are doing very well right now--it's kind of a dying medium. While many people still enjoy reading a newspaper, a lot of people get their news online. Do you have a Facebook page? You can post upcoming events there and encourage people to become fans of your organization. Maybe get a corporate sponsor or two and get them to donate a book (dollar, whatever) for each fan you get in a certain period of time, which will encourage people who support what you do to talk to their friends. Cheerios is on a book donation kick right now; I became a fan of Cheerios to help out.

I don't use Twitter, but that's another very popular tool right now.

Craigslist has an events section.

chicago event calendar classifieds - craigslist

What about your city's website? I live in Naperville, and there are library-related events going on right now.

Naperville | Calendar

[JustJulia]

I followed one of the links from the Craigslist event calendar and found this site.

Chicago Events | Annual Event Post | Calendar of Events

I'm sure there are lots of similar sites out there. They rely on groups like yours to fill their calendars, which they market and get advertisers to sponsor. You should check out the different sites and get your event on some of them.

[cdc3217]

Also, local groups will often send flyers out through the schools, depending on the level of appropriateness. If its a book sale, the school might be OK with it - if its some kind of gala for adults, then probably not.

[loonybat]

I've worked on several projects for local clubs and agencies and have had pretty good success using the American Towns AmericanTowns.com: Online Local Community Network - Connecting The Community Is What We Do Best site.They have a press release tool that lets you choose which news orgs to send the release too, then it posts to their site and gives you a bookmark option that lets you share it with Facebook, etc.Someone mentioned Facebook, and that's a good point, but I've seen some events that just don't seem to take off on it, probably because not enough of the committee members share it with enough people to invite others... sometimes events look like they might be a bore because just a handful of people are "attending".One last thing is to make sure that the press release is being written well. It needs to be informative about something that is news to the community... not an ad.Good luck.

[linicx]

Some towns have a community calendar. Can you put flyers in stores or shop windows? Does the libaray have a website? Please do not take this as criticizm. I have never seen a release from your library. But I have read many a library release that were terrible. The writers did not know how to promote the event as the subject, nor did they know how to keep it simple and interesting on a website or in a press release. I wish you tons of good luck.

The few times I promoted a big ebents and wanted sponsors I started in January for a fall event - because it is when the advertising budget is decided. Depending upon the event you might be able to get Walmart, Costco, Kraft involved. If it is a big event and the big stores get free advertising they will be more willing to help the following year. Kraft was always good with give-away items for fund raising. Just my two cents.