At the beginning of each season, you have to set your fundraising goals for the year. Your fundraisers are important because they help offset costs for parents for expensive items that are required to play the sport.
Here are a few things you need to remember as a league admin or coach setting goals for your youth sports fundraiser so they can be realistic.
- What do you want to accomplish: With this new goal, are you just looking to maintain, or raise additional funds on top of what was raised the previous year? Before you finalize that number for the year, determine your overall goals whether big or small. Such as:
- Do I want to grow my donor base?
- Are there projects that cost more this year than last? Are these completely necessary?
- Is there anything additional I’m trying to raise money for this year? (New uniforms, practice field maintenance, etc.)
- Review past experiences: Look back at your previous goal. If you set a fundraising goal of $20,000 and you raised half of that, then you probably shouldn’t increase your goal by another $5,000. Use past experiences to set modest expectations, but be clear in what you want to accomplish and let people know why this money helps do that.
- Are these goals attainable: The SMART method is a standard methodology to follow for setting fundraising criteria. Your goals should be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic, and Time-bound.
Have you set a specific, measurable goal that is clearly attainable in the given time frame before, or during, a sports season? If not, then you should go back to the first point and look again at what it is you are looking to accomplish with this fundraiser.
Narrow your focus and get a clear picture of what you need in order to accomplish it.
By taking these tips into account, you can confidently start to set your fundraising goals for the season while also managing realistic expectations for parents, athletes and coaches to help meet them.