How to Raise More Money with Your Nonprofit Sweepstakes, Year After Year

Want to raise big dollars with your fundraising sweepstakes — like, really big dollars? 

Here at TapKat we know that the nonprofits who have the most success with sweepstakes, raising in the hundreds of thousands or millions of dollars, are the ones who run sweepstakes on an annual basis. 

Every year, they learn more about what really speaks to their donor base. Every year, their team gets better at marketing, and the logistics of a sweepstakes get easier. Every year, the people on their donor list are more excited to enter — especially when they see winners taking home great prizes!

When a sweepstakes is incorporated into your annual fundraising strategy, your organization has an opportunity to maximize the potential of raising significant funds for your nonprofit. 

So what steps can you take to put your sweepstakes fundraiser in a position to make money each year?

Build an Engaged Base of Donors with Your TapKat Sweepstakes 

To put it simply, a sweepstakes will be successful when an appealing prize is marketed to the right audience on a consistent basis.

The nonprofits we see having the most success send dedicated emails to their current list of donors, and also attract new donors by running paid ads. These ads are targeted specifically to people who will be interested in the prize. 

“A sweepstakes will be successful when an appealing prize is marketed to the right audience on a consistent basis.”

For instance, if the prize is a new Corvette, the nonprofit would do well to market to a Corvette-loving audience through Facebook and Instagram ads, targeted blogs, and maybe even magazine ads. 

Because of this kind of outreach, 99% of TapKat sweepstakes bring in new donors who are interested in winning the prize and interested in supporting the nonprofit. 

One of our nonprofits, The Shelby American Collection, grew their donor base from 800 names to 40,000 names over the course of five sweepstakes. Inevitably, once a sweepstakes ends and the winner is drawn, The Shelby American Collection receives emails, phone calls, and messages on social media enquiring as to when the next sweepstakes will begin. Now that’s a dedicated audience!

Imagine if The Shelby American Collection were to stop doing sweepstakes. That list of 40,000 interested donors would grow stale, and it would be a missed opportunity for the organization to raise funds. By planning a sweepstakes every year, they take full advantage of their fundraising potential, and in 2021, the museum raised $1,529,424.

Another amazing aspect of the donor list is that in many cases, donors will contribute more than once over the course of a campaign. Say they enter once at the beginning of the sweepstakes. They’ll continue to receive your dedicated emails, and are very likely to donate again later in the campaign. Repeat donations are common with TapKat sweepstakes. 

It’s very beneficial to look at TapKat sweepstakes as a long-term fundraising strategy if you want to maximize the impact you can have on your nonprofit’s bottom line. 

Become a Master of Sweepstakes Marketing 

Learning to effectively market a TapKat sweepstakes to your donor base isn’t difficult, but it does require a little bit of effort. The more you learn about your donor base’s preferences, the more efficient you’ll become at creating and executing marketing collateral.

We’ve simplified this process for our nonprofits by putting together how-to guides for marketing via email, social media, and throughout the holidays. 

A nonprofit will do well the first time they run a sweepstakes, provided they promote the sweepstakes. Sometimes one-off sweepstakes are inevitable, like when The Morgan Adams Foundation received a donation of two tickets to Hamilton and needed to run their one-time sweepstakes right away (they raised $4,000 with those two tickets).

But a nonprofit will do really well the second year… and the third year… and so on. In fact, year two will actually be easier than year one! By the time you’re ready to run your second sweepstakes, your nonprofit has built the necessary relationships, a donor base, and you’ve found the right marketing channels and prize providers. Much of the heavy lifting has been done already.

The bottom line is this: When you think long term, your organization will raise more every year.

With a TapKat Sweepstakes, You Call the Shots

We should mention that some nonprofits prefer to run a sweepstakes twice per year, while others like to run with bigger prizes on an annual basis. The New Jersey Audubon has become masterful at running two sweepstakes per year for bird-watching trips that their donor base loves. 

The frequency and duration of your sweepstakes isn’t set in stone and can be customized to your nonprofit’s needs. 

If you’re ready to start thinking big for your nonprofit’s fundraising strategy, apply for a TapKat account today. We can’t wait to see what you do with your sweepstakes!