For the past several weeks, my daughter’s soccer team has been involved in a massive fundraising campaign. However, nothing was sold and no money changed hands. That’s a breath of fresh air, now isn’t it???
There was no peddling of ridiculously priced magazines, creepy chocolate candy that makes your mouth feel like you’ve simultaneously been sucking on candle wax and cotton balls, or gift wrap that turns out to be so flimsy and see through that you have to use ALL of it just to wrap a shoebox sized present.
There was also nothing that the girls (ie, their parents…{ahem}…ME) had to fill out and mail to “10 Friends and Family Members”, forms to be distributed at mom and dads’ places of business, tables to be set up outside Wal-Mart, or going from house to house to knock on doors in an effort to push their wares in a “grassroots kind of way”. In case you’re wondering, ALL of the aforementioned scenarios have been provided – in one way or another – in the “helpful hints” literature that has accompanied the various school fundraising activities that we’ve been guilted into invited to participate in over the course of the last eight years.
This fundraising effort was of a completely different breed. It involved email and social media. AND THAT’S IT.
The fundraiser – or, in this instance, sponsorship – was set up by Pear, a Chicago based company that works to bring big name sponsors (in our case it was RitzBits crackers) together with “little name groups”. Honestly, it’s a win-win situation for ALL involved and is an ingenious marketing strategy to boot. Here’s how (for us, anyway) it all came together:
Several weeks ago, as I was scrolling through my Facebook feed, I happened upon an ad for “Pear”, a company that claimed it could hook up “my team” with a sponsorship that would allow us to earn money towards new uniforms and what not. I figured it couldn’t hurt to take a peek, and followed the link to their website (follow the link pearup.com to check ’em out!). Signing up our team was simple and easy – I created a “PearUp” account, answered some quick questions about our team (what age, whether they were school affiliated or not, etc) and then was directed to the meat of the program – how to go about earning the funds we were looking for. I was able to look through a list of available sponsors (like Safeskin, Apartments.com, Chips Ahoy, and Ritz Bits) and choose the one I wanted our team to work with, which happened to be Ritz Bits crackers.
The whole shebang was based on online participation ONLY and, in all honesty, was pretty darn brilliant in its design. Every activity was point based, which translated into a certain dollar amount earned for the team. For instance, the mere act of signing up earned 25 points, which translated into 25 cents. The next step was answering two very simple questions which, once answered, earned an additional 350 points ($3.50) each. Now, I know what you’re thinking – how simple could these questions possibly be?!? The answer is: REALLY SIMPLE. (Nothing trying or complex or gut-wrenching, unlike the “Which Star Wars Character Are You?” quiz that my 11 year old son recently made me take – those types of quizzes have the potential for major, life altering consequences. Seriously – NO ONE wants to be branded as Jar Jar Binks. NO ONE.) The first question wanted to know if I preferred cheese RitzBits or peanut butter RitzBits. The second was a variation of the first.
There were several other activities, including emailing friends and family about how to participate in the sponsorship, sharing the sponsorship on Facebook, following RitzBits on Instagram, sharing a soccer photo on Facebook and making sure to thank @RitzBits for the opportunity and, finally, sharing a soccer video on Facebook.
The brilliance lies in the fact that there’s a little something for everyone. Don’t have a Facebook or Instagram account? No worries, you can still help the team just by answering a few multiple choice questions. Don’t want to bug your friends with an email? No big deal – YOU DON’T HAVE TO. The participants are able to interact on their terms and to their comfort level. And all without writing a check. They could answer the questions and post pictures over their lunch break. Or while sitting in their skivvies as they enjoy their morning coffee – try doing that at a booth outside Wal-Mart. Wait. Poor example. There’s whole websites devoted to pictures of people doing just that. Sorry {shudder}…my bad.
Our goal was simple – to reach the $1000 limit that had been set by RitzBits. However, that’s not what wound up happening. The peeps at Pear kept a very close eye on how we were doing and kept in close contact with me, as well. Daily emails were not uncommon and, when I would email back with a question, someone would actually get back to me – often times in less than 30 minutes. We were initially given a 10 day time limit which was increased to 20 days and, once we reached the $1000 mark, our limit was raised to $2000. Shortly after we passed $1200 I got an email from Pear asking if they could chat with me via phone for just a few minutes – they wanted to know how things were going, what was working for us in terms of getting the word out, how we were getting people to participate, and so on. In turn, their interest and interaction with our group and with me, personally, helped keep me pumped up and motivated, too – in the end, I think I shared the sponsorship four times on Facebook, sent out two separate group emails, and one group message through my Facebook account. All tolled, 151 individuals opted to provide some level of support to our team – many of the names I recognized as extended family of team members and some of the names I didn’t recognize at all. Friends that I haven’t seen in years jumped in and participated, as did friends of those friends.
IT.WAS.SO.COOL.
It was also pretty amazing to see what we were able to accomplish AND how receptive everyone was to this – people were logging on to their Pear accounts multiple times a day just to see what dollar amount we were at and then calling, emailing, and texting me because they were so darn excited about how it was all coming together!
Our 20 days is over and we’ve now gone into “design mode”. That $2000 was enough for each of our girls to have personalized “Titans” (that’s our team, the CSA Titans) warm-ups created, as well as personalized gear bags for every team member. Plus, we’ll be able to create a team t-shirt for all the girls AND their parents. And, yes, “RitzBits” will be emblazoned somewhere on all of it. Do we care? Not one single bit – in fact, it’s a great conversation piece and is something that we’ll be proud to talk about.
And that, my friends, brings us full circle, save for the following question – what does the sponsor get out of all of this??? Well, for starters, they get their name on tons of sports apparel – not just from our team, but also on the shirts and pants and hats and bags of every single team that chooses to participate, which means that their name will be EVERYWHERE. Their brand will be walking through the halls of schools across the country, and showing up at sporting events every weekend. Plus, they’ve got parents extolling their virtues far and wide. Oh yeah – they’ve also got a whole gaggle of kids – and parents – who have probably had the words “RitzBits” exit their mouths more times this past month than over the course of their lifetime, which means that they’ve now become a household name for a LOT more people.
And that, in turn, means there will probably be a whole lot more post-game RitzBits snacks being handed out because they’ve just scored a whole new subset of consumers – the children. I know this because now, every time my kids go with me to the grocery store, they’re actively seeking out the product – and, ultimately, that’s the end goal, right?
Please note: The author was not compensated in any way for writing this post. She’s just so happy that she’s not stuck with a years supply of creepy chocolate candy that she just can’t help but share her experience. Which is a LOT better than having her sharing that chocolate. Trust us…we know.