Walk-a-thon Tracking

Miki Martin

We are planning on doing a walk-a-thon type fundraiser this spring for our students. The girls will be expected to seek "sponsors" or donations for their participation. Depending on each girl's participation in donations received, they can earn various incentives.


My quandary is whether to track these individual donations in the database. Many of the people contributing very likely will not already be Constituents, as they're probably going to be neighbors or family members just giving $10 or something. Is it worth it to add these people, many of whom we may not even have contact information, if they're just giving a bill to the girl? OR, can we add them without adding them as a Constituent and still track giving? I'm thinking not. Conversely, do we try and track current Constituents (like parents, grandparents) if they do give? Money earned will be funneled to our annual appeal so it's an on-going Fund. Right now we only track Funds with a couple of Campaigns but I think those may have been set up with a different idea in mind than the actual purpose. So this could be an opportunity for me to add something to our database "the right way."


Also, since we have the current students listed in our database, do I create an event for this to show the girls that participated? In the past we have not really tracked current students' activities, as my office is more alumnae/donor central.


Thank you for any suggestions! Learning as I go. ?

JoAnn Strommen

Miki Martin‍, I don't see any profile data for what type of org you are at. Do you have info that you want to get out to these people to promote your programs?


I previously worked for the YMCA and our childcare rooms participated in swim for the Y and dance for the Y which are these type of events. For years data was not recorded but it brought in thousands of dollars. We decided it should be recorded as there were always a few large gifts in addition to all the $10 ones. they also needed a better receipt process. So we made a plan - I helped design the pledge form. We stated that receipts would be sent for all donations of $25 or more unless they requested no receipt and donors of smaller amounts could request a receipt. This was just a column with two checkboxes. Address required for receipt.


It was a lot of work to enter all the records the first year especially. I got a system down. We did reference the child's name in the reference field if I recall correctly so it could be pulled into the receipt. Next year as audience the children asked was essentially the same for most, many less records to add. It worked well for us.


We also did have statement on the form and directions to parents that checks were to be made out to org / cash paid to org. Parents were not to collect cash and then write us a check.


We did not have even module so that wasn't an option for me.


Guess it depends on if you can use the data you gain for the benefit of your org.

Miki Martin

JoAnn Strommen‍ thanks for replying! We are a Catholic all-girls high school. So, locals already know who we are and extended family likely will be familiar with the generalities of the school if their niece/granddaughter/cousin attends.


I like the idea of only producing acknowledgements for a certain level unless requested, which we'd kind of discussed. We're hoping to get most of the donations via an online form, which would at least capture address and email, since they're required. It's more the physical donations that would likely not have the contact information and the girls aren't going to want to necessarily ask for that if they're just getting small amounts from people.


I think this will likely be an on-going fundraiser in future years, as we've recently revamped things a bit. We still want the girls involved in helping support their school and this seems to be a good way to get them involved. I hate the idea of adding (possibly) a good amount of new Constituents in the system but want to be able to report an accurate amount collected for the annual appeal.


Thanks again!