Celebrate EDU, a nonprofit organization in Boulder, Colorado, “encourages and empowers young adults with developmental disabilities by providing innovative entrepreneurial education that builds on interests and strengths so that they can create happier and more productive lives.”

Jenny Anderson, Co-founder and CEO of Celebrate EDU, shared her campaign success story using GiveGab’s giving platform. Having used an alternative online fundraising platform in the past, Jenny also provided us with insights on how GiveGab compared to her past experience in this Case Study.

Campaign Success:

“Our most successful campaign was our Holiday Fundraising campaign where we raised $15,000.”

Celebrate EDU’s Holiday Fundraiser campaign aimed to raise funds and awareness for student scholarships and program sponsorships.  Included on their fundraising page was an informative video, compelling images to help tell their story, a detailed description, as well as donation tiers – all the components of a great online fundraising campaign!

Celebrate EDU raised 101% of their $15,000 goal with the support of 69 generous donors.

Success Factors:

Jenny attributed the success of this particular campaign to the following factors:

“Easy to use website, social media posts, newsletter blasts, and correspondence.”

GiveGab is an easy-to-use giving platform with a state of the art customer success team that make it easy to succeed at online fundraising.  Campaigns are also easy to share with integrated social media buttons and email functionality. Separate outreach conducted by Celebrate EDU’s staff also proved helpful in getting the word out and garnering added support.

Plan of Action:

For this fundraiser, they had planned approximately one month in advance and followed a timeline for outreach that included both when and how to reach out most effectively.

“We sent mailers about the fundraiser which were a great tool as well as e-newsletters.”

Donor Data and Engagement:

For this campaign, 70% of their donors were repeat and 30% were brand new.

Jenny shared that their regular supporter engagement involves quarterly newsletters and personal thank you notes following every donation.

The Outcome:

Having surpassed their fundraising goal with this campaign, Jenny shared with us that having described where donations were going more clearly than in the past (through the campaign story and donation tiers) helped bring in more donations.

For future fundraising efforts, she highlighted that she’d definitely send out more newsletters leading to the site to increase engagement.

Advice for Other Nonprofits:

Jenny shared that her best piece of advice for a successful fundraising campaign is planning.

“The most successful fundraisers we have executed were the most planned out.”

Congratulations, Celebrate EDU, on Your Success!

 You are truly Nonprofit Champions 

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