Event Planning

Hosting events for your organization can be a great avenue for fundraising or even simply raising public awareness of who you are and what you offer. Pulling off a successful event—and hopefully drawing new and repeat supporters back to your organization—simply takes a great idea, organization, and good planning. Reaching out to potential partners for help and/or sponsors to underwrite the costs are both good strategies for increasing awareness and your capacity to carry out the event. If the event is being held within a museum or other building that houses collections, plans to protect them during the event should also be considered. Several tips can be found below.

Planning

• Association of Fundraising Professionals: “How to Plan a Nonprofit Fundraising Event (On a Budget)”
• Pamela Kilzer, Firespring: “Nonprofit Fundraising: Creating a Checklist to Plan Your Events”
• Minnesota Council of Nonprofits
  • “Event Planning Basics”
  • “Time and Money Saving Tips for Planning Meetings and Events”
  • “Getting Participant Waivers”
• Miranda Paquet, Constant Contact: “Nonprofit Fundraising, Part 1: How to Plan Your First Successful Event”
• Misty Cato, Nonprofit Expert: “Planning a Special Event? Here is How…”

Sponsorships

• Joanne Fritz, The Balance: 
  • “How Even Small Charities Can Get Corporate Sponsorships”
  • “How to Make Your Nonprofit Attractive to Corporate Sponsors”
• LiveAlumni: “Engaging Corporate Donors”
• KnowHow Nonprofit: “How to Approach Local Businesses for Donations”
• Mazarine Treyz, Guide Star: “6 Questions to Ask to Get That Corporate Sponsorship”
• Miranda Paquet, Constant Contact: “Nonprofit Fundraising, Part 3: How to Get Sponsors for Your Event”
• National Council of Nonprofits: “Corporate Sponsorship”
• Sean Horrigan, Nonprofit Hub: “The Five Things Corporate Sponsors Want From Nonprofits”

Protecting Collections

• Connecting to Collections Care
  • “Protecting Collections During Special Events” Webinar (Presenter: Barbara Heller, Detroit Institute of Arts, and Jenny Wiley Arena, Heritage Preservation)
  • “Seasonal Affective Disorder: Caring for Collections During Seasonal Special Events” Webinar (Presenter: Gretchen Anderson, Carnegie Museum of Natural History, and Rebecca Newberry, Science Museum of Minnesota)
• English Heritage: Practical Conservation Guidelines for Successful Hospitality Events in Historic Houses