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Walk With Sally

Peer-to-Peer Fundraising Event Rebrand for a Youth Human Services Nonprofit

Walk With Sally's rebranded peer-to-peer event saw a 100% revenue increase, funding 22 new mentoring friendships.

The Challenge

A California-based nonprofit, Walk With Sally (WWS), provides free mentoring and community support for children experiencing trauma through a parent, guardian, or sibling's cancer journey. Like many nonprofits, WWS relied on just a few annual events for the bulk of their funding and to nurture donors for year-round giving.

WWS was frustrated with both the lackluster results of their annual event, a peer-to-peer fundraiser, and the low conversion rate of attendees into year-round supporters.

Multiple factors contributed to the event’s poor showing. There was a huge disconnect between the event’s “Bowl-a-thon” name and the nonprofit’s mission, making it difficult for outreach to connect the event with “mentoring friendships.” Prizes were too easy to earn and failed to motivate attendees to fundraise. There were also unclear fundraising goals, and too many missed opportunities for keeping new supporters engaged.

Adults leading a group of children playing on the beach

Walk With Sally had two primary questions we needed to answer:

  • What steps can we take to make our annual event a greater financial success?
  • How can we leverage event success to increase year-round support?

Our Solutions

Walk With Sally needed a strategy overhaul. We started at the ground floor with the event name and worked our way up.

Event Rebrand

  • To create a more natural link between Walk With Sally’s mission of mentoring friendships and their flagship event, we renamed “Bowl-a-thon” to “The Friendship Bowl”.
  • We then connected the event’s results to their mission, setting a definitive goal of funding a specific number of mentoring friendships.

Peer-to-Peer Fundraiser Engagement

  • Our team launched a multichannel campaign to coach peer-to-peer fundraisers, along with providing impactful Walk With Sally content that fundraisers could share on their social media channels.
  • To better connect with supporters, we positioned these fundraisers as heroes who do good in people’s lives and used strategic incentives like matching challenges to surprise and delight them.

Donor Follow-up and Retention

  • Post-event, we built and deployed a targeted email series for converting new supporters into repeat donors throughout the year.

A mother and daughter bonding on the couch in a cozy living room.

The Results

  • Walk With Sally raised $110,000 at The Friendship Bowl, a 100% year-over-year increase.
  • The organization met their goal, funding 22 new mentoring friendships.

This new revenue stream bolstered our programs and elevated our mindset to aim higher in all areas of our organization. We are extremely proud of our partnership with CauseMic, and I highly recommend working with them if you want to take your ROI to the next level

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