Happy New Year racers! With just a few days left of 2016, it’s time to start thinking about your resolutions for 2017. Resolutions are all about making yourself better – but why can’t that include your nonprofit? Pick a few resolutions that we have listed down below that resonate with you and incorporate them in your duck race planning for next year.
Here is a list of resolutions related to your rubber duck race:
- Complete and return all of my racer forms by the deadline.
- Create team sales kits to motivate teams to meet their goals. Include duck adoption papers, sample emails, social media posts, sales tips, and duck merchandise.
- Schedule a duck race kick-off party two months prior to your race at a local restaurant.
- Increase online Duck Adoption Sales by 15%.
- Post all year long about your race on social media, not just during race season. Ask trivia questions about your race or nonprofit and award a small prize for the person who answers correctly.
- Create a simple hashtag for your race to use on social media, your duck adoption website and marketing materials (for example: #chicagoduckrace).
- Get the media’s attention by wrapping a press release around a duck call, sending duck shaped cookies or having Quacky help with the weather forecast.
- Tell the story of why you race rubber ducks with a photo book that you show potential sponsors. Chatbooks allows you to create a photo book for just $8 including shipping.
- Implement a “What a Duck Can Do” campaign to let your fans know exactly what their donations do for your nonprofit.
- Make an extra effort to ensure the racing ducks are sparkling clean before they travel to the next race.
- Like GAME Fundraising’s Facebook Page and Twitter Page to keep up to date on racer news and other nonprofit tips.
- Read the GAME Fundraising Blog for ideas on promoting your race and to learn the latest nonprofit news.
- If possible, visit another race and learn about their organization.
- Contact another duck racer to share ideas. GAME can put you in contact with someone.
- After the race, sit down with my duck race committee and discuss ways to improve the race with my nonprofit and with GAME.
Share any of your Duck Race Resolutions with us on Facebook! Wishing everyone a successful 2017 Duck Race Season!
- December 28, 2016
Every one of GAME’s nonprofit partners and rubber duck races are unique and different in their own way. This allows us to learn different perspectives on different ways to host this type of fundraiser. This month our blog features a Duck Racer Spotlight on Kennewick, WA and the Tri-Cities Rotary Club.
Organization Name: The Tri-Cities Rotary Club
Years Racing with GAME: 28
Head Duck: Rick Routh (2016)
Tell us a little bit about your organization and why you are racing Derby Ducks:
Our Race is put on by the combined effort of our six local Rotary Clubs to raise funds to support each Club’s charitable donations, scholarship programs and community projects. All six of our Rotary Clubs sell tickets and are involved in all aspects of planning the Derby Duck Race.
What is your favorite part of planning a Derby Duck Race?
Experiencing the enthusiasm and generosity of our community when we approach them for the various goods and services we need to put on our Race.
Do you have any duck race tips you would share with a first time racer?
Involve the community and make it a spectacle. Launching 40,000 ducks in the water is quite a visual. Otherwise, it’s just a raffle.
How do you keep your race fresh and new year after year?
After 28 years now, our Race has become something of an institution in our community, with people looking forward to it almost like the coming of Spring. The fact that we have a brand new car as our Grand Prize and typically almost 50 other prizes, plus other coupon offers on our tickets for items at local businesses also keeps people buying tickets year after year.
What is something some people might not know about your organization and/or Derby Duck Race?
The money raised by our Race stays in our community to make it a better place to live and to help those individuals who are in need.
What are some organizational goals you are trying to achieve with your Derby Duck Race?
Fundraising and promoting the work of Rotary locally and around the world.
What is your favorite phrase or quote?
Lend a hand, buy a duck (our Race slogan)
What is your favorite Ducktionary Phrase?
Quackerbacker. We have several recognition levels for people/companies purchasing 25, 50, 100 or more tickets.
- December 14, 2016
Search Engine Optimization may seem complicated, but it doesn’t need to be. By shifting your focus to the customer experience and researching your target audience, you can increase your ranking on Google and drive more traffic to website. Below are 3 easy SEO strategies for nonprofits that your staff or website developer can implement to help your online presence.
Keywords
Take the time and research the most popular and relevant keywords that apply to your nonprofit website. Think about your target audience and what they enter in web searches to find your nonprofit website. The Google Adwords Keyword Tool is a free resource that we would recommend. Choose 3 to 5 keywords and assign them to each page on your website. Make sure that they appear as much as possible in your content and headline copy.
Title Tags and Meta Descriptions
Your title tags and meta descriptions are what show up in when a person enters a search query. The title tag is the top heading that appears and is limited to 50-60 characters. The title tag needs to be concise, describe page content accurately, and incorporate a couple of keywords. The meta description appears below the title tag, includes your key words, and summarizes a web page’s content. The description should optimally be between 150-160 characters.
Alt Image Tags
Alt image tags are descriptions of the images you use on your website. They help significantly with traffic to your site because it tells the search engines what the image is about. Search engines can’t read images without text. Not labeling images creates a poor user experience for people who have disabled images in their browsers or for visually impaired people. If you use your keywords as part of your description it helps even more to increase your SEO. A recommended rule of thumb is to keep the alt image tag description under 125 characters excluding spaces.
Implementing these easy SEO strategies will help increase your ranking in Google and make it easier for supporters to find you. Share with us any other easy strategies you use to boost your nonprofits SEO.
- November 30, 2016
Duck Season has come to a close and it certainly has been a busy one! However, just because the ducks are on a well-deserved vacation now doesn’t mean that they can’t still be talked about during non-race season. Here are some duck race promotions for all year that you can implement to keep your duck race in the minds of your donors all year.
Duck Jokes
These are simple and fun to post on slower social media days or Fridays before you head into the weekend. You can create some fun duck joke images in Canva in a matter of minutes.
Funny Duck Images
If you Google image search “funny ducklings” you will find a lot of fun photos of ducks to post.
Inspiring Quotes
People love seeing positive posts so find an inspiring quote and post it. It doesn’t need to be about ducks.
Post media coverage about your organization
Share press coverage your nonprofit has received throughout the year. Fans are interested in what your next projects and events are so share it with them.
Showcase what your duck adoptions did for your community
Include how duck race funds have specifically helped your nonprofit. For example, we were able to expand our animal shelter due to proceeds from the duck race or we were able to feed xx number of people this year at the Food Bank due to duck race proceeds. You can also tell a story of how duck adoptions will benefit your organization.
Post past race photos
These are great to post for #ThrowbackThursday or #FlashbackFridays. It reminds your fans how much fun your first duck race was and how it continues to grow and help the community.
Post trivia about your organization or duck race
Ask questions about your duck race and/or organization and offer a small prize to the winner. You can also tie in “You can find the answer on our website” to help your fans out as well a drive traffic to your website.
Have your Quacky Mascot involved in events throughout the year
Your Quacky Mascot can make appearances at holiday parades, fall events, sporting events, carnivals, and can visit your sponsors throughout the year.
How are some ways that you promote your Duck Race throughout the year? Let us know!
- November 28, 2016
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