Originally posted by wondering_why:
Tim,

It’s like having a baby that you nurture and have high hopes for their future; only to overhear someone say ‘God, that is one ugly kid’.

Didn't say at all that the business is ugly. Did say that the fundraising part is perhaps a lot flawed. You came here asking for honest feedback and then get hurt when you receive it? Sorry.

And, where do you get off saying,

…that's the reality of what would happen if schools participated with you.
If it's such a no-brainer, how about you take all the risk instead of the groups?
If your program is such a guaranteed seller, what's the risk?

.....

After providing all those tools and options, you want me to also guarantee that regardless of the effort the group puts in, they will receive $5,000. I’ll have to think about that.

If you'll read more carefully, I wasn't suggesting you guarantee everyone's success. I was suggesting that -- if what you need is a track record to help you sell and if you're confident that groups who run the program right can make $50,000 -- then perhaps one of your upfront efforts should be to pick 10 groups (out of the whole country) and work with those groups extra closely and remove those groups' (only) risk in working with you. Then -- assuming those groups do as well as you say they should -- you'd have no losses (because the guarantee would be moot) and ten great success stories to share. That's the type of thing lots of entrepreneurs have to do. You want your cake and to eat it too. Someone starting a new physical store, for example, has to lease space, buy products, buy ads, etc. -- with no guarantee of sales. You're less looking for customers than you are looking for groups to go into business with you.

You might say that the group's really don't have any risk or expense, but they do. The expense isn't just dollars and cents. The expense is effort. And more importantly, the expense is attention. Parent groups only get so much attention from the wider audience of parents at schools. Parent group leaders know this. They have to be choosy in the messages they send home to parents or else face a "boy who cried wolf" problem, whereby the more important messages get lost among a lot of less important noise. [/qb][/quote]

I thought about it. Nope, the only warrantee given is that they will receive the amounts promised, the results are auditable, and, as a member of the community and living at the same residence for 18 years, they may call me at home (they have my number) should any problems arise.

Folks aren't expecting problems. They don't think you're a bad guy. They don't think you're trying to steal from them. They just -- for good reason -- don't think this kind of program is going to be worth their efforts. You take that conclusion personally. You shouldn't. I commend the spirit with which you're making this offer. But I also agree with the groups in their assessment of the offer. Does that make sense?

Tim, now for the decisions that you helped me make:

We will not move forward on the co-branding of the site, based on the customer’s cookie, to show that the group welcomes and appreciates the patron’s support.

We will not move forward on the plan to allow the customers to opt in/out of a group newsletter program. This would have allowed us to provide the group the email and/or address of each person who created an account after using the group’s link and allowing them to market directly to their patrons.

We will not continue to offer our site to the PTO/PTA communities. So far, the psychic return on the time and effort invested has been negative. Completely opposite to the expected situation and in the final analysis has been a waste of time. I leave them to their own devises, the sales representative, and the scam artists.

I think that's a wise decision. Good luck with your work.

Tim

mom2m&a,
I appreciate your comments and they match my understanding of human nature and group dynamics. The number was reached using the other person’s assumptions, which I toned done. I don’t give sales pitches and fundraising is not a ‘business’ I would pick to be in. I am at peace with what I attempted to do and equally at peace with my decision to stop doing it.

My question, “What are you looking for? I really would like to know.” was a final attempt to gain some insight that would dissuade me from doing what I knew I would probably do. There is nothing to indicate I will ever get from this what I wanted and sadly am left with the feeling the kids were, literally, thrown out with the bath water. I’m sure I will grouse about that for awhile, but on the bright side I can cross off one more of life’s little problems that I don’t need to assume ownership for solving, before departing this life.

Tim,
Thank you for those comments.
You have provided me with the insight I needed to make some decisions.

Before leaving with hat in had, I would like to mention a few things.

When at age 60 I set up the site, I decided that community service should be included, if possible. A few things were added, like the real-time reporting, to make it possible. Trust is good, but verify is better.

The site has its own business mission. But, as a member of the community, I also wanted to offer local organizations access to the site for fundraising purposes. Any business they generate is money over the transom and they receive most of the proceeds, less amounts needed to insure that any after sales service is not done out of pocket.

They can participate or not. The site’s business model doesn’t change; just my ego gets hurt a bit.

It’s like having a baby that you nurture and have high hopes for their future; only to overhear someone say ‘God, that is one ugly kid’.

Where do people get off saying stuff like that?

And, where do you get off saying,

…that's the reality of what would happen if schools participated with you.
If it's such a no-brainer, how about you take all the risk instead of the groups?
If your program is such a guaranteed seller, what's the risk?

I have a site which, aside from its regular business, I allow qualified local groups to use for fundraising. I promise to give them one third of any sales their group generates. That is not the last nickel in the till and enough is retained to handle after sale service (our site has a 30 day satisfaction guarantee). They must use a link that I provide them to send people to the site. The link can be used on a webpage, in email, newsletter, etc. If they don’t have a website, like the local field hockey league, they are given a webpage on a sub-domain where they can show their pictures, schedule, etc., and the link. They can stop at that point and hope for the best. If they decide to be more aggressive various things are possible. They can piggy back onto our marketing programs; for example, use the same attractive, 4 color, monthly mailer/brochures we use. They probably should get a stamp to put their website’s address on them. That’ll set them back about 2 bucks, which I’ll see that they get reimbursed for if they don’t recover its cost. If they feel that rubber stamping 500 flyers each month is tooooo much work, skip a month or two. The promotion schedule is published three months in advance, work your program when you feel you need to. Your patrons may still come to the site and check out for themselves what the month’s featured products are and you will still receive credit. You have an event coming up and you want to tie in some item on the website, let us know. We can issue you a coupon for your webpage that only your patrons would know about that gives $ off items you pick, free gift with order $ amount, buy 2 get 1 free, etc. This type of promotion would be at the group’s expense. Or, use the gift certificate program for teacher appreciation or spiffs to the kids or a classroom. Remember, our intention was to offer support to local entities, not some nationwide behemoth.

Let’s see now, I offered to qualified groups for free a third of my sales, links, webpages, wire transfers, 24/7 accountability, 4 color promotional mailer/brochures, coupon spiff programs, and gift certificate programs. The patrons are shown a flyer with products 20% off their normal price, they can take advantage of any sale or promotion active on the site (currently 403 items, about 11%, are on promotions; some closeouts are 50% off) and the groups still get their 1/3, and all customers orders are covered by a 30 day satisfaction guarantee.

After providing all those tools and options, you want me to also guarantee that regardless of the effort the group puts in, they will receive $5,000. I’ll have to think about that.

I thought about it. Nope, the only warrantee given is that they will receive the amounts promised, the results are auditable, and, as a member of the community and living at the same residence for 18 years, they may call me at home (they have my number) should any problems arise.

Tim, now for the decisions that you helped me make:

We will not move forward on the co-branding of the site, based on the customer’s cookie, to show that the group welcomes and appreciates the patron’s support.

We will not move forward on the plan to allow the customers to opt in/out of a group newsletter program. This would have allowed us to provide the group the email and/or address of each person who created an account after using the group’s link and allowing them to market directly to their patrons.

We will not continue to offer our site to the PTO/PTA communities. So far, the psychic return on the time and effort invested has been negative. Completely opposite to the expected situation and in the final analysis has been a waste of time. I leave them to their own devises, the sales representative, and the scam artists.

Here's my perspective on a fundraising offer like this. Background - large school, very active fundraising, large variety of fundraising during the year. We have fairly affluent, tech-savvy parents. We do several big fundraisers during the year and also constantly push our "free money" fundraisers - eScrip (Vons, Safeway), Albertsons, Target, Schoolpop, inkjet and phone recycling, Box Tops, etc. We send out email reminders and paper flyers at least once a month reminding parents of these opportunities.

Results - we have extremely low participation in these programs. The ones where you have to do nothing except sign up your card (like eScrip) do better, the Box Tops and recycling do pretty well, and the ones where you have to physically go to a site first before shopping (like eScrip and Schoolpop) are a bust. No one remembers to go to the site first or they feel it's too much trouble. I know I do a lot of internet shopping and I NEVER remember go through a portal site to do my shopping.

It all sounds so easy in theory, but it's incredibly difficult to change people's patterns in practice.

I would have been completely turned off by your sales pitch if you told me we could make $50,000 a year just by adding a link to your site and promoting it. That tells me you don't have any concept about how the pto fundraising business works.

OK, I'll bite. I come at this from multiple perspectives: 1) parent; 2) former teacher and administrator; 3) former fundraising sales rep. who's sat through roughly 1000 different PTO and PTA meetings; and 4) current publisher of PTO Today, a role that has allowed me to work closely with thousands of parent group leaders and hundreds of fundraising companies.

There's really two types of fundraising sales that typically work in volume:

The first is: "we want to be one of your two or three large fundraisers for the year." Traditionally, this has been a catalog sale or a candy sale or a gift wrap sale. More recently, cookie dough and pizza kits and a couple of other nice volume, wide-appeal items have come in there. In these sales, groups are trying to make $5,000+ in a defined (hopefully short -- like 3 weeks) period of time. I'd also put non-vendor events like auctions (growing fast) in this category.

The second is: "Here's a way you can make some modest, easy bucks. No heavy-lifting, but -- hey -- it's like free money so why not?" This is the labels and boxtops and even inkjet cartridge type of effort. The many online shopping malls that have come (and many have gone) fit this category, too.

Trouble is you're trying to sell like your program fits in the first category, while all the leaders know that it actually fits in the second. I hate to tell you, but your projections and assumptions are extremely off-base.

I imagine you'd go out of business if you had to do a lot of sales and service work for schools that only make you $40 per year. But that's the reality of what would happen if schools participated with you. It's happened with 10 or 40 companies before you. And the leaders know it, either explicitly (from experience) or just because they have good gut-instincts.

If it's such a no-brainer, how about you take all the risk instead of the groups? You're an entrepreneur (risk-taker); they aren't. You pay for the photocopying of all those fliers you want them to send home. How about you take twenty schools and guarantee them $5,000 if they'll run the program as you'd like them to for one year. If your program is such a guaranteed seller, what's the risk? Then you'll have your track record.

Are groups wrong for not taking your word for it? No. Do you know how many programs have popped up with "take our word for it"?

What do groups want in fundraising? They want to get it over with with relatively consistent, predictable results so they can get on with their real work of building community and supporting teachers and promotig parental involvement.

Hope that helps.

Tim

OK, I'll bite. I come at this from multiple perspectives: 1) parent; 2) former teacher and administrator; 3) former fundraising sales rep. who's sat through roughly 1000 different PTO and PTA meetings; and 4) current publisher of PTO Today, a role that has allowed me to work closely with thousands of parent group leaders and hundreds of fundraising companies.

There's really two types of fundraising sales that typically work in volume:

The first is: "we want to be one of your two or three large fundraisers for the year." Traditionally, this has been a catalog sale or a candy sale or a gift wrap sale. More recently, cookie dough and pizza kits and a couple of other nice volume, wide-appeal items have come in there. In these sales, groups are trying to make $5,000+ in a defined (hopefully short -- like 3 weeks) period of time. I'd also put non-vendor events like auctions (growing fast) in this category.

The second is: "Here's a way you can make some modest, easy bucks. No heavy-lifting, but -- hey -- it's like free money so why not?" This is the labels and boxtops and even inkjet cartridge type of effort. The many online shopping malls that have come (and many have gone) fit this category, too.

Trouble is you're trying to sell like your program fits in the first category, while all the leaders know that it actually fits in the second. I hate to tell you, but your projections and assumptions are extremely off-base.

I imagine you'd go out of business if you had to do a lot of sales and service work for schools that only make you $40 per year. But that's the reality of what would happen if schools participated with you. It's happened with 10 or 40 companies before you. And the leaders know it, either explicitly (from experience) or just because they have good gut-instincts.

If it's such a no-brainer, how about you take all the risk instead of the groups? You're an entrepreneur (risk-taker); they aren't. You pay for the photocopying of all those fliers you want them to send home. How about you take twenty schools and guarantee them $5,000 if they'll run the program as you'd like them to for one year. If your program is such a guaranteed seller, what's the risk? Then you'll have your track record.

Are groups wrong for not taking your word for it? No. Do you know how many programs have popped up with "take our word for it"?

What do groups want in fundraising? They want to get it over with with relatively consistent, predictable results so they can get on with their real work of building community and supporting teachers and promotig parental involvement.

Hope that helps.

Tim