Podcast – Episode 36:The Fundraising Event Playbook Nobody Hands You
In this episode of Auction Is Action with U in It!, Bobby D. Ehlert is joined by his Gala Toolbox co-founder Beth Sandefer of Beth Sandefer Events for the show's first ever guest conversation.
Beth brings 14 years of professional gala planning experience and a nonprofit development background to a wide-ranging discussion about what separates events that perform from events that just happen. From the metrics that reveal where your revenue is really coming from, to the paddle raise planning mistakes that cost organizations thousands, to the gala trends worth keeping and the ones that need to go, this episode covers the playbook that nobody hands you when you take over the gala.
And stick around to the end for a 25% off code for the Gala Toolbox.
Key Takeaways
The Six Words of Death: "This Is the Way We've Always Done It"
Repeating the same event year after year without evaluation is how galas stagnate. You do not need to burn it down and start over. But identifying three things you can do differently is how events keep improving and donors keep coming back.Planning and Designing Are Not the Same Thing
Planning is logistics: vendors, timelines, invitations, check-in software. Designing is the emotional arc of the evening, from the moment the save the date goes out to the last moment of the night. Great galas are designed around a feeling. What do you want your donors to feel when they leave?Start with ROI, Not the Theme
When evaluating an inherited event, the first question is how much did you make and how much did you spend to make it. Best practice is spending no more than 25 cents on the dollar for a fundraiser. Events spending 60 or 70 cents are not just inefficient. They are undermining the mission.Dollars Per Minute Is One of the Most Valuable Metrics in Event Planning
If you need to raise $100,000 and you have 50 minutes of fundraising time, that is $2,000 per minute. Every six-minute speech that adds nothing to donor engagement is $12,000 walking out the door. Know your value per minute and protect it.The Biggest Signs a Gala Has Stopped Evolving
The same auction items every year. No growth in ticket sales or sponsorship. Difficulty recruiting committee members and volunteers. These are the signals that donors and supporters are getting bored. And boredom is your biggest competition.Bigger Is Not Better. Right Is Better.
A room of 300 engaged donors with connection and capacity will outperform a room of 800 people filling seats and eating food. Oregon Food Bank cut their guest list, repositioned disengaged sponsor tables as paddle raise lead gifts, and increased their net revenue. Smaller and more intentional is the trend that is here to stay.Paddle Raise Planning Should Not Wait Until the Week of the Event
Most organizations spend months on auction items and barely touch the paddle raise until the last week. If the paddle raise is your biggest revenue generator, it deserves the most planning time. Pre-secured lead gifts, matching fund opportunities, and defined giving levels should all be in place months before event night.Revenue Leaks Come from a Lack of Strategy, Not Bad Luck
Not knowing where your revenue goal is coming from. Not intentionally engaging major donors before the event. Not having board members committed to securing lead gifts. These are planning failures, not bad luck. The money is there. The strategy has to be there to capture it.Sponsorships Need Year-Round Cultivation
Many companies make their marketing budget decisions in Q4 for the following year. If you wait until January to make asks for a September gala, you have already missed the window. Think about sponsorship as a year-round relationship, not a transactional ask tied to one event.The Best Fundraising Events Start with Purpose, Not a Theme
If you could hand every nonprofit leader a playbook, the first page would ask: why does this event exist? What role does it play? What are we trying to accomplish? The best galas do not start with a theme. They start with a purpose.What Is in the Gala Toolbox
Available at galatoolbox.com, the free Event Blueprint includes an 11-month planning timeline built from the combined experience of Bobby and Beth across hundreds of events. The full toolbox is $199 and includes a do-the-math revenue worksheet, sponsorship tracker, auction procurement tracker, bid paddle best practices, clerking sheets, video training, and more. Use code ACTION for 25% off.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Bobby D.: Excerpt:
Most nonprofits plan their gala the same way they did last year. Same format, same vendors, same assumptions. In Episode 36, Bobby D. sits down with his Gala Toolbox co-founder Beth Sandifer of Beth Sandifer Events for a wide-ranging conversation about what it actually takes to design a fundraising event that performs. From the difference between planning and designing to the biggest revenue leaks most organizations never see, this episode is the playbook nobody handed you when you took over the gala.
Post URL: /podcast/podcast-episode-36
Remember to update the Categories and publish date in Options before publishing.
SEO Title: The Fundraising Event Playbook Nobody Hands You | Gala Toolbox
SEO Description: Bobby D. and Beth Sandifer break down the fundraising event playbook nonprofits never get: planning vs. designing, revenue leaks, paddle raise strategy, smaller smarter galas, and the systems that separate high-performing events from average ones.
Podcast – Episode 36: The Fundraising Event Playbook Nobody Hands You
In this episode of Auction Is Action with U in It!, Bobby D. Ehlert is joined by his Gala Toolbox co-founder Beth Sandifer of Beth Sandifer Events for the show's first ever guest conversation.
Beth brings 14 years of professional gala planning experience and a nonprofit development background to a wide-ranging discussion about what separates events that perform from events that just happen. From the metrics that reveal where your revenue is really coming from, to the paddle raise planning mistakes that cost organizations thousands, to the gala trends worth keeping and the ones that need to go, this episode covers the playbook that nobody hands you when you take over the gala.
And stick around to the end for a 25% off code for the Gala Toolbox.
Key Takeaways
The Six Words of Death: "This Is the Way We've Always Done It"
Repeating the same event year after year without evaluation is how galas stagnate. You do not need to burn it down and start over. But identifying three things you can do differently is how events keep improving and donors keep coming back.
Planning and Designing Are Not the Same Thing
Planning is logistics: vendors, timelines, invitations, check-in software. Designing is the emotional arc of the evening, from the moment the save the date goes out to the last moment of the night. Great galas are designed around a feeling. What do you want your donors to feel when they leave?
Start with ROI, Not the Theme
When evaluating an inherited event, the first question is how much did you make and how much did you spend to make it. Best practice is spending no more than 25 cents on the dollar for a fundraiser. Events spending 60 or 70 cents are not just inefficient. They are undermining the mission.
Dollars Per Minute Is One of the Most Valuable Metrics in Event Planning
If you need to raise $100,000 and you have 50 minutes of fundraising time, that is $2,000 per minute. Every six-minute speech that adds nothing to donor engagement is $12,000 walking out the door. Know your value per minute and protect it.
The Biggest Signs a Gala Has Stopped Evolving
The same auction items every year. No growth in ticket sales or sponsorship. Difficulty recruiting committee members and volunteers. These are the signals that donors and supporters are getting bored. And boredom is your biggest competition.
Bigger Is Not Better. Right Is Better.
A room of 300 engaged donors with connection and capacity will outperform a room of 800 people filling seats and eating food. Oregon Food Bank cut their guest list, repositioned disengaged sponsor tables as paddle raise lead gifts, and increased their net revenue. Smaller and more intentional is the trend that is here to stay.
Paddle Raise Planning Should Not Wait Until the Week of the Event
Most organizations spend months on auction items and barely touch the paddle raise until the last week. If the paddle raise is your biggest revenue generator, it deserves the most planning time. Pre-secured lead gifts, matching fund opportunities, and defined giving levels should all be in place months before event night.
Revenue Leaks Come from a Lack of Strategy, Not Bad Luck
Not knowing where your revenue goal is coming from. Not intentionally engaging major donors before the event. Not having board members committed to securing lead gifts. These are planning failures, not bad luck. The money is there. The strategy has to be there to capture it.
Sponsorships Need Year-Round Cultivation
Many companies make their marketing budget decisions in Q4 for the following year. If you wait until January to make asks for a September gala, you have already missed the window. Think about sponsorship as a year-round relationship, not a transactional ask tied to one event.
The Best Fundraising Events Start with Purpose, Not a Theme
If you could hand every nonprofit leader a playbook, the first page would ask: why does this event exist? What role does it play? What are we trying to accomplish? The best galas do not start with a theme. They start with a purpose.
What Is in the Gala Toolbox
Available at galatoolbox.com, the free Event Blueprint includes an 11-month planning timeline built from the combined experience of Bobby and Beth across hundreds of events. The full toolbox is $199 and includes a do-the-math revenue worksheet, sponsorship tracker, auction procurement tracker, bid paddle best practices, clerking sheets, video training, and more. Use code ACTION for 25% off.
FULL TRANSCRIPT
Bobby D.:
Well, hey there everyone. Bobby D here, your host of the Auction Is Action with You in It podcast. And I am super excited today because we are going to be talking about event planning and the playbook that nobody handed you when you started planning your event. And I've got a very special guest, a great friend, and also my co-founder of the Gala Toolbox: the one and only Beth Sandifer of Beth Sandifer Events. Beth, thank you so much for being here today.
Beth Sandefer:
Thank you so much for having me. And I'm your first guest, right? I get that distinction as well.
Bobby D.:
That's absolutely right. We are talking about our little baby that we put together here for nonprofits. And I'm excited to have this conversation and share all of this wonderful knowledge that you and I have combined over, I don't know, 40, 60, 80 years. A millennium.
So Beth, why don't you give a little bit of background about yourself because some of our listeners might not know who you are.
Beth:
Sure. I'm Beth. I'm based in Northern California but I have clients all over the country. I am an event planner that specializes in fundraising events with nonprofits, typically ones that have a pretty large auction component because I'm a little bit of an auction nerd. I come from a nonprofit background. I moved to California to work in the development department of a nonprofit. I worked in theaters before that doing both development and marketing. And I got to a point where I felt like if all I did all year long was the gala, I would be so happy. So 14 years ago as of June 1st, I launched my own company, and now that's what I do: about 40 times a year I help different nonprofits plan their big fundraising galas.
Bobby D.:
Awesome. I love that. And you and I have known each other now, I don't know, five, seven, ten years. Just to see how the evolution of events has been. I know pre-covid we had some really good ideas, and during the pandemic you and your teams really just went out there and made some amazing things happen. You were a huge inspiration to me. So this really shows how you're constantly pushing the envelope of what events are.
Beth:
I know. It's crazy. That feels like a lifetime ago.
Bobby D.:
It really does. All right, let's get going. We're going to be talking about the fundraising event playbook that nobody hands you. So Beth, why do so many nonprofits simply repeat the same event year after year?
Beth:
I think because it's easy. It's easier to just repeat the same steps. Maybe you're new in the position and you've got the documents that someone left you from last year and you don't know what you're doing. So it's like, well, I'll just do that. Nobody likes change. It's just easier to keep repeating it.
Bobby D.:
That's right. I always call it the six words of death: this is the way we've always done it. I want to challenge our friends that are listening to think about their events differently. There are some tools and a toolbox we're going to talk about later that can help you make your event better, but also have stuff put together in case you're passing the gala on to somebody else.
Beth:
I'll say before we fully launch into all this: I'm not advocating for someone to completely rebuild their gala from scratch every year. But are there three things you could be doing differently? What are those little baby steps so that you're always finding a way to improve or make it better? Don't think of it as burn it all down and start all over. That's also crazy.
Bobby D.:
Yeah. We're all about creating a drama-less, stress-less environment because yes, galas are stressful and there's a lot of drama. Sometimes it's just about improving what you have and keeping evolving.
So what is the difference between planning an event and designing an event?
Beth:
When I think about planning an event, I immediately go to logistics. Are my vendors lined up? Did my invitation go out on time? Is the timeline put together? When I think about designing an event, design is thinking about the guest experience from start to finish and the emotional arc you want to lead people on, starting from when the save the date goes out all the way through to the end of the evening. What is that emotional arc? What is the story? Where are we trying to get people to go with us? What is our end destination together as a group of people trying to raise money to fund a mission? That to me is design. I always like to say we are designing a feeling.
Bobby D.:
And what is that feeling that we want to instill or inspire within the guests and donors that are there? Planning is logistics: check-in software, flowers, decor, auction items. Designing is building that story arc, building that crescendo, creating that feeling that your donors are going to take with them into the night. And event design really does so many things. The way the room looks, the lights, the sound, the smells, the tastes, the food, the program. Nobody likes the boring speeches. And nobody ever said I wish we had one more speaker.
Beth:
No one ever said that.
Bobby D.:
So, if you inherited a fundraising event tomorrow, what would be the first thing you would look at?
Beth:
The first big general thing I look at is ROI for the total event. How much did you make? How much did you spend to make it? I think it's pretty widely accepted best practice that you should not be spending more than 25 cents on the dollar for a fundraiser. And there are a lot of fundraisers out there spending 60 or 75 cents on the dollar. Events have a reputation for being expensive and not worth it, and I think that when they're not planned well and you are spending 60 or 70 cents on the dollar, that is bad event math. So I want to look at the overall ROI first, and then start drilling down into specific revenue streams.
Bobby D.:
And I always like to look at dollars per minute as well. We were just talking about boring speeches. Are they helping you raise more money? Probably not. But your auction and your paddle raise definitely are. If you're looking to raise $100,000 and you've got 50 minutes to do it, that's $2,000 a minute. If your boring speech is six, ten, or twelve minutes, how much did that cost you in fundraising potential?
Beth:
That's one of my favorite metrics. I introduced it to a client last year and it absolutely rocked their world. They actually added it to the bottom of their budget spreadsheet so it was constantly tracking their value per minute. It kept everybody in check about whether something was really worth adding.
Bobby D.:
And there's a tool in the toolbox that talks about budgeting. Just saying. So, what are the biggest signs that a gala has stopped evolving?
Beth:
The same auction items every year. No growth in ticket sales or sponsorship. It starts to get hard to recruit committee members and volunteers. Those are all signs that a gala has stopped evolving and people have gotten bored with it.
Bobby D.:
And boredom is what we're fighting. We're fighting against so many other things trying to capture attention, especially on those valuable Thursday, Friday, Saturday nights. People don't want to go to an event to be bored.
Beth:
Something that COVID specifically changed is that I think it's easier for people to blow off plans now. We all got very comfortable at home during the lockdown. And when things opened up, some people decided they actually like being home. So there are fewer organizations they want to support and fewer plans outside the house they want to make. If a couple decides to go to a gala, they are making a big decision. They are going from stretchy pants to black tie. And then there's the outfit, the Uber, the babysitter. You want to make sure you are the most interesting and attractive thing to get somebody out of their stretchy pants for an evening.
Bobby D.:
So what parts of a traditional gala deserve to be challenged?
Beth:
The number of speakers on stage is the obvious one. Bigger is not always better. I would rather see a gala with a tight 90-minute program than performances and honorees and keynotes and all those things. The same applies to the auction. Adding more items for the sake of having a bigger auction is not the best strategy. Your auctions should be more curated. And the metric that bigger attendance means a more successful gala needs to go. I have said for years that you do not need the most people in the room. You need the right people in the room: the ones who are going to actively bid, give during the fund-a-need, buy raffle tickets, all of those things. I do not care about 150 people in the back who are just there to party and are a distraction to those who are actually connected to the cause.
Bobby D.:
More of the right people is what we are looking for. And you can still include people who are not in the room through online auctions, donation buttons, and email campaigns with your appeal video after the gala. You can still engage people without having them in the room. But the right people in the room make everything work.
So can you share an example of an organization that transformed its event and saw dramatically different results?
Beth:
I've seen it happen multiple times. One that stands out is Oregon Food Bank. We did a data analysis and saw that there were a large number of corporate-sponsored guests who were not engaging in anything when they were there. They were just rowdy in the back and eating. We cut those people from the guest list and approached the sponsors differently. We said: if you are not going to fill a table, would you rather have your money positioned as a lead gift in the paddle raise? You still get the promotion, your name is still out there. And at the end of the day, their gross revenue was slightly down because they had fewer people, but all the expenses were down too, and their net revenue actually went up by cutting out the people who were not engaging.
Bobby D.:
And that is something we are seeing more and more. Audiences are shrinking but fundraising is growing because of having the right donors in the room with the right motivation to take action.
So what are the biggest revenue leaks you are seeing at fundraising events?
Beth:
It comes back to bad planning and no strategy. You have a revenue goal but no thought behind where it is coming from. How many sponsors do you need? How many paddle gifts at each level? People are not intentionally engaging their major donors. They are just trusting they will be there and make big gifts. And nobody has a board member or committee member dedicated to securing lead gifts to the paddle before the event. It is bad planning and bad strategy. And everything that happens on that event night takes six, seven, eight, nine months of planning to get there. It does not just happen in a vacuum.
Bobby D.:
Yeah. So if a nonprofit wanted to increase their event by 25% or more, where should they start?
Beth:
Start by looking at your existing results. I am a big data person. See where your revenue is really coming from. Do not just start adding things. Do your fundamentals better. If sponsorship is 40% of your revenue, that might also be where your biggest growth opportunity lies because you are already doing it well. If your paddle raise underperformed compared to your attendance, focus there. If your board is not helping fill tables and sell tickets, that is an opportunity. Start by looking at where you are, identify your strengths and weaknesses, and build out from there.
Bobby D.:
And if you are looking to add 25% to an event raising $100,000 in sponsorships, you are talking to five different $5,000 sponsors or one title sponsor at $25,000. There you go. And I think specifically with sponsorships, you need to back it up and look at it for the year. Many companies are making their funding decisions in Q4 for the next year. If you wait until January to make asks for a September gala, companies have already made their decisions. The best organizations think about sponsorship not just as one event but as a year-round relationship.
Beth:
Right. How are you engaging those sponsors year round? Your gala is one night, but how are you cultivating donors, sponsors, and bidders all year so that they are part of your family?
Bobby D.:
Super important. So what role is the paddle raise playing in today's fundraising events?
Beth:
I think it is the most important thing. There are always going to be two kinds of people at an event: people that want stuff for their money and people that just want to give for the sake of giving. And I think the gap between those two groups is getting wider. The paddle raise should be your biggest revenue generator. It should be where the bulk of your funds are coming from.
Bobby D.:
And are you seeing some events that are only doing paddle raises?
Beth:
I have seen that. It is still the minority on the West Coast, but it is one of the shifts coming out of COVID. Live auctions have gotten smaller: the average live auction near San Francisco went from 16 items pre-COVID to about eight now. And the paddle raises are just getting bigger in terms of their percentage of total revenue.
Bobby D.:
And when you start to look at the fundraising opportunity, dollars raised is one thing, but guest engagement is another entirely. Someone who raises their paddle at $500 is not just giving you $500. That becomes a test donation. Did they give them the warm and fuzzies? If yes, they come back. They become a monthly donor, a corporate sponsor, a major donor. A lot of those conversations start right there at the paddle raise.
Beth:
Right. And I think one of the keys is that people spend a lot of time on their auction items and wait until the week of the gala to put together their paddle raise plan. If it is going to be the biggest revenue generator of the night, it should not be an afterthought. It should be getting more attention in the planning process than the auction.
Bobby D.:
I had a conversation today with a client whose event is not for six months and they were like, "What should we be thinking about right now?" And I said: find your lead gifts. Find your pre-secured gifts for your paddle raise. Start looking for matching fund opportunities and incentivized giving. Here we are six months out because we know that is our biggest revenue generator and we need to be spending as much time strategizing for that as we are for our live auction.
Beth:
And how many times have you had the conversation: "What's our top level going to be?" And they look at you and say, "I don't know, what do you think?" And it is like, no: what money is in the room? Who have you talked to? Your top level should be wherever you have a gift pre-secured. Have you done that work?
Bobby D.:
So let's move to a bit more of a logistical conversation. What systems and templates separate high-performing events from average ones?
Beth:
Shareable templates and dashboards that are actually used. If you have a timeline, it needs to have the task, the due date, who is responsible, and a status column. Anyone at any time can look at it and know exactly where things are. Creating those dashboards: a task list, a sponsorship tracker, an auction procurement tracker, all of those things. And meetings with agendas and structure. Are we hitting all the things? Are we recapping action items and looking at what is coming up next week? I also love giving auction committees a job description and a goal: we need you to bring in this many auction items in these categories at these value ranges. Make it clear what they are doing. Some organizations put together a board and committee playbook: a one-sheet on what the event is, what the selling points are, how we need you to help, and template emails they can send when they are trying to get friends to sponsor. Make it easy for someone to fundraise on your behalf.
Bobby D.:
I wish there were a toolbox out there with some things like this in it. Oh, wait.
Beth:
There is. This exists.
Bobby D.:
This is not one big infomercial, friends. But let's talk about where this Gala Toolbox idea came from.
Beth:
It started from a conversation over dinner when you and your lovely wife were out in Napa and we all got together. You and I had been ideating on it individually and then our ideas came together. For me, a lot of it came from being a baby development person at an organization, getting handed the gala from someone who left, having a mess of documents, not knowing what everything was, being scared, not having anyone to ask. And then as I grew in my career, I kept getting asked the same questions over and over: do you have a spreadsheet for that? Is there an example you can show? Can we borrow this or that? When you and I started putting together the list of documents that we both use all the time and that clients ask for all the time, it was like: well, there it is. These are the tools. We just need to package it up and put it out there.
Bobby D.:
And it lives and it breathes on your computer. It is sharable docs. It is a way for teams to work together, hold each other accountable, know who is doing what when, do the math, track where things are, find the holes.
So if you were to pull one tool out of the toolbox, what is the most valuable resource every nonprofit should use?
Beth:
It is hard because we have what is out now and I think 14 other modules coming. But of what is in there right now, I really love the blueprint and specifically the 11-month timeline in it. You had a timeline. I had a timeline. We put them together and there was stuff in yours I never would have thought to include. And at whatever level you are performing, going through that timeline can affirm you are on the right track, identify places to think about differently, and reveal things you never considered. Even for me, seeing your timeline made me realize I had never formally built in all of the gratitude moments after the event. Having it on a page as a checklist makes you stop and say, did we check that off? Are we doing that?
Bobby D.:
And it spreads things out. It is not giving you too much to do early on. Here are the things to be thinking about 11 months out, 10 months out, 9 months out, and then here are the things for the week of. And that feeling when you make that final checkmark on that final checkbox: we have prepped and created and designed something that is unlike anything they have ever seen before.
Beth:
Yeah. Okay. One gala trend that needs to disappear.
Swag bags. People don't really want them. A lot of it ends up thrown away at the venue. I prefer a gifting suite over a swag bag. You get all the stuff donated, people come in and take the things that matter to them. It is like a swag buffet. They can cherry pick or you give one really good gift to everyone. The big bag filled with tissue paper and junk that half gets thrown away? I don't love that.
Bobby D.:
Nobody ever reads that stuff anyway. But with the swag buffet, your sponsors still get the exposure and people see everything instead of dumping out a bag at home and wondering where the good stuff is.
Beth:
And especially if you are doing an afterparty, that is a good place to set up the gifting suite.
Bobby D.:
So what is one gala trend that is here to stay?
Beth:
Being smaller and more intentional about your gala. Not bigger is better, but small and intentional. Being very purposeful about what you are trying to accomplish: cultivating relationships, building sponsorships, identifying new donors, celebrating a milestone, funding a new program. And it can still be a great party. Have the DJ play for 90 minutes after the program. Just make sure that everything you are doing is working toward the guest experience, the feeling you are trying to create, and ultimately the mission you are trying to fund.
Bobby D.:
We could do this for hours. And that is what is great about the Gala Toolbox: Beth and I literally sat down for hours and hours and compiled so much together, made for nonprofit professionals just like the ones listening and watching today. We want you to succeed in every way you can. So what is the biggest event planning myth?
Beth:
That it is glamorous and fun all the time. Everyone focuses on the centerpieces and the catering and all the fun stuff. The times I have stood over a trash can eating a meal because there are no plates left, or stood on a lawn at an outdoor auction getting my legs eaten alive by bugs while waiting between lots with a clipboard and a pen: it is not the glamorous existence that everyone thinks it is.
Bobby D.:
So what is one physical thing in your actual toolkit that has saved you at an event?
Beth:
Earring backs. Zip ties. Gaff tape. Band-aids, Tylenol, Advil, blister bandages. I always have a hot spot because I never know when venue Wi-Fi is going to go down. I did an event a couple of weeks ago where the venue Wi-Fi went down and the organization's Starlink went down and I was running registration off my hot spot.
Bobby D.:
I have had three events this year where someone ran up and said, "Bobby, I'm having a wardrobe malfunction, do you have a safety pin?" And I get to be the hero going into my backpack and saying, "Do you want black or silver?"
Beth:
And I found on Amazon a ridiculously large quarter for a heads or tails game. An auctioneer came to me and asked for a quarter and I was like, "Oh, do I." Anything I've ever found myself without at an event eventually makes its way into my little bag of goodies.
Bobby D.:
We are going to have to do another episode just on what is in your gala bag. We were actually at the Elevate conference a few months ago and we made a physical Gala Toolbox and filled it with all of these gala necessities and the person who won said, "I love this because it has everything in it."
Beth:
And I stole your Call to Auction branded Post-it notes from the sponsor booth and they are in my tool kit. Every time I pull one out I'm like, thanks Bobby.
Bobby D.:
You are very welcome. So most overlooked fundraising opportunity?
Beth:
I think I touched on it earlier: the paddle raise. A lot of people do it but a lot of people leave the planning until the last week or two. Looking at it five or six months in advance is the overlooked opportunity.
Bobby D.:
And it still surprises me that there are events out there that are not doing a paddle raise at all. I'm like, you are leaving money on the table.
Beth:
Nothing can replace the momentum and positive peer pressure of seeing paddle numbers go up. Looking out at a room and seeing paddles in the air: there is nothing that can replace that emotion. And for groups not doing a paddle raise, you are leaving tens or maybe hundreds of thousands of dollars on the table not just at the event but following the event.
I will add: if you are doing online silent auction bidding, add a donation button. Someone might be attending who is a program recipient or a teacher or a parent who cannot give at even the lowest level of your paddle raise but could give $25 or $20. And if you've got that button, they can give in a way that is still meaningful to them. Just make sure there is a way for everyone to give.
Bobby D.:
And I always say at the end of the paddle raise: we want to recognize those who have not raised their paddle but want to give behind the scenes. We love you for that. You have the donation button in the mobile giving software, the QR code, the card at the table. Create an opportunity for everybody to give.
Beth:
And acknowledge it from the stage. We love all the gifts however they came to us. We love you all. People want to feel seen and appreciated.
Bobby D.:
And then the post-event gratitude process: your gala is one big night that lives for 12 months. It never really goes away. Most organizations get their standard thank you letters out within a week. But a board member handwriting even a one-line note on a form letter makes a difference. And then following up later: here are photos of the playground that you helped us build. Here is what your gift made possible. One organization I know sends out cards at Thanksgiving and Valentine's Day: not asking for anything, just saying we are grateful for you, you are our sweetheart. You cannot thank people too much.
Beth:
Planning for that thank you process is so important. And in the toolbox there is a gratitude checklist for that, with ideas people may never have thought of and a process that can turn on immediately following the event.
Bobby D.:
So best investment a nonprofit can make in its event?
Beth:
Planning. Analysis. Strategy. I think we all get so busy just trying to keep it all on the rails that we never really stop and ask: are we doing a debrief at the end of our event? Are we looking at last year's notes when we start planning this year? Are we analyzing our auction revenue? Are we looking at our sponsorship prospect list? It can feel like a lot, but you will pay yourself back in spades if you just take the time to plan properly.
Bobby D.:
Fail to plan, plan to fail.
Beth:
There you go.
Bobby D.:
So if you could hand every nonprofit leader a playbook for creating better fundraising events, what would be on the first page?
Beth:
My question would be: why are we doing this event? Why does it exist? What role does it play? The best fundraising events do not start with a theme. They start with a purpose.
Bobby D.:
Mic drop. That is it. The why behind the event. That becomes your guiding light, your north star. That is why you are putting yourselves through so much stress and drama and blisters and blood and sweat and tears. This is why we are doing this.
So Beth, now we get to the fun part. Where can people find this blueprint?
Beth:
Galatoolbox.com. And the blueprint is free. You can download it. Your first taste is always free. And if you want to upgrade into the full toolbox, it has about 16 or 17 supporting documents: the do-the-math revenue worksheet, a sponsorship tracker, auction procurement tracker, bid paddle best practices, clerking sheets, an auction donation form, video training from Bobby. If you purchase the whole toolbox, it is $199. And we have about 14 other modules coming: sponsorships, working with your board, auction procurement. Each one is a one-time download. No subscription. The stuff is yours.
Bobby D.:
And Beth and I just made a decision on the fly right here. Use the code ACTION at checkout and you will get 25% off just for listening to this episode today.
Beth:
Done deal.
Bobby D.:
Any final thoughts for our gala friends?
Beth:
You are not alone. You've got this. Do not be afraid to break out of your box a little bit. Look at your event, think of three things you can change to make next year better, start getting your systems in place, and know that you've got this.
Bobby D.:
That is right. And thank you so much Beth for coming together with me, for developing and creating the Gala Toolbox, for continuing to push this information out into the world and being the biggest cheerleader for our gala development and planning friends. Thank you for being on with me today.
Beth:
I was happy to be here. And I'm glad I get that first-ever guest status. Never forget your first.
Bobby D.:
Never forget your first. Thank you so much. And thank you to our nonprofit friends that are out there listening. Thank you for the impact you are creating in the world and striving to create better events. The more better events you create, the more money you raise. The more money you raise, the more impact you have. Thank you again for joining us on the Auction Is Action with You in It podcast. We will see you on the next episode.
Ready to Raise More?
At Call to Auction, we specialize in turning galas and fundraising events into mission-driven, revenue-generating experiences. From paddle raises to live auctions, our team knows how to excite donors, engage audiences, and inspire generosity in the moment.