COVID-19 Response: We’re giving all customers access to Trips & Meetings — the easiest way to manage one-on-one outreach to alumni, donors, and volunteers.
Trips & Meetings — the easiest way to manage one-on-one outreach to alumni, donors, and volunteers
Even though we need to be physically distant from each other to prevent the spread of COVID-19, social distancing doesn’t have to mean that we’re socially distant. It’s more critical than ever to stay connected with major gift prospects, donors, alumni, and volunteers. That’s why we’re pushing teams to do as much one-on-one outreach as possible during this crisis.
With a dozen different video conferencing platforms to choose from, it’s easy to talk anytime with anyone. But with thousands of people to potentially connect with, it’s a challenge to organize those calls and meetings.
We’ve solved the problem for gift officers, giving fundraisers an easy way to plan, organize, and execute trips with Trips & Meetings — normally part of our Relationship Management platform.
Now we’re taking those features and giving them to all teams — for free — by including Trips & Meetings with the core EverTrue platform.
This lets everyone plan Virtual Meetings and start video chats right from EverTrue. You can also schedule Phone Meetings and plan Local Meetings when our social distancing days are behind us.
We’ve got some ideas for how to use these features below, but also check out our help site to see how to use Trips and Meetings.
Trips & Meetings for Gift Officers
We know you’re not traveling right now, but you can still plan virtual trips. Create a list of all your assigned prospects, add them to a “trip” and start scheduling video chats — making sure to catch-up with each one and keep them updated on student support funds.
Don’t forget to use an EverTrue Comment to recap the call or add a contact report!
If you travel regionally and are trying to qualify new prospects, you can use Trips & Meetings to build lists of high-potential donors around anchor visits for when normal travel resumes. We talked last week with Josh Lassiter, a regional development officer for Baylor, on how he uses EverTrue to plan trips and find new prospects.
Trips & Meetings for Annual Giving
Use Meetings to schedule one-off conversations with important donors or volunteers easily and stay organized.
You can also use the Trips function to help your entire team connect with donors, deliver great stewardship opportunities, or qualify new leadership giving prospects, or do one-on-one outreach to LYBUNTs as we head toward the end of the fiscal year.
First, build a list of donors. You can start with long-term, consecutive-year donors you want to thank or everyone who’s given this year at the $500-1,000 level. Then add your teammates to the trip as collaborators. They can pull people from the list, schedule them on the trip calendar, have a conversation, and then record a note about the conversation as an EverTrue Comment or as a contact report.
This is a great way to deliver personal gift stewardship — and spot someone who might be a great candidate for a leadership or major gift officer, too.
You can do the same with your fundraising volunteers. Build a list of all your volunteers, then create a trip to organize check-in and thank-you calls as you connect with each one of them.
And now that you’ve shifted to completely virtual events, it’s easy to upload a .csv of Zoom attendees into EverTrue, create a list, then use the Trips function for follow up to thank donors and make an ask where appropriate.
Trips & Meetings for Alumni Relations
As you reach out to key regional volunteers, trustees, or social ambassadors, you can schedule Virtual Meetings or phone calls in EverTrue and stay organized. Make sure you add an EverTrue Comment or log a contact report after you chat!
You can also create a list of all your volunteers, add that list to a Trip, and then use the calendar to schedule your conversations. Invite your team members as trip-collaborators and divide up the work as you thank volunteers for their support and update them on campus news.
As you host webinars or virtual events, you can upload lists of attendees into EverTrue, add that list to a trip, and schedule follow-up with attendees. Connect with graduates in hard-hit industries to offer support or see if there are people who might be willing to lead a future broadcast
These are just a handful of the possibilities for using Trips and Meetings to organize one-on-one connections with your donors, volunteers, and alumni. We’d love to hear how you and your team use these new features. Let us know so we can share with other customers.