It’s no secret that the purpose of each fundraising occasion is to lift as a lot cash as potential. Each attendee counts towards this purpose. The extra individuals who join, the extra you earn by ticket gross sales and donations. Due to this fact, making certain your occasion is accessible to as many individuals as potential isn’t just about inclusivity — it instantly contributes to your fundraising success.
By planning for accessibility, you create a welcoming setting in your entire neighborhood, offering top-notch experiences for all attendees. Begin by designating a member of your occasion staff to be accountable for accessibility. Embody their contact data in your occasion advertising and marketing supplies, so folks focused on attending can attain out with questions.
Let’s discover three accessibility concerns to information your decision-making all through the occasion planning course of.
1. Occasion Supplies
The occasion expertise begins even earlier than attendees join. At present’s nonprofit entrepreneurs want to remain on high of donor expectations and preferences, which incorporates making a seamless on-line expertise with their group’s web site and different digital content material.
Make sure that your occasion registration kinds and advertising and marketing supplies are display reader-friendly and navigable by keyboard solely. The kinds ought to present registrants with the chance to make any accessibility requests by a chat operate or contact data on display.
Throughout your fundraising occasion planning, you’ll wish to produce supporting materials to encourage and instruct your viewers. Think about the way you’ll enhance the accessibility of your:
- Visible content material. Use bigger print, high-contrast colours, and sans serif fonts on textual content supplies. Additionally, embrace descriptive alt textual content for all on-line photographs and diagrams to help folks utilizing display readers.
- Movies and displays. If you’re going to present movies, embrace captions. For each movies and stay displays, contemplate offering signal language interpreters and assistive listening gadgets.
There are many free instruments obtainable to consider the accessibility of your nonprofit’s on-line content material. When you’re at it, think about using these instruments to judge all your internet content material, not simply your occasion supplies.
2. Venue
When selecting a venue in your fundraising occasion, contemplate accessibility by inquiring about:
- Elevators. The place are they positioned, and what number of might be in service in your occasion?
- Entry Ramps. Examine for the provision of entry ramps in any respect entrances to make sure everybody, together with folks utilizing wheelchairs or different mobility aids, can simply enter and navigate the venue.
- Parking. How far is the parking space from the venue entrance? Is valet parking obtainable to help friends? Search for designated accessible parking areas and aisles near the doorway.
- Restrooms. For occasions as much as six hours, intention to have one rest room for each 50 friends. Guarantee all restrooms are totally accessible.
- Seating. Depart ample area round tables for friends who want help to maneuver freely.
- Lighting. To accommodate friends with low imaginative and prescient, contemplate venue choices that enable for some pure mild. Keep away from fluorescent lighting, which will be difficult for folks with autism. If fluorescent lights are unavoidable, ask if the venue can set up filters on them.
It’s also possible to add a digital attendance choice in your fundraising occasion. This format gives extra comfort to friends who could favor to take part from the consolation of their very own houses.
3. Dietary Choices
For those who’re serving food and drinks at your fundraising occasion, be thoughtful of your friends’ dietary wants. Enable registrants to share any dietary restrictions, allergy symptoms or sensitivities once they join.
Additionally, clearly announce the obtainable meals choices in your web site and in communications despatched to friends beforehand, to allow them to plan accordingly.
Think about offering quite a lot of menu choices to fulfill widespread dietary necessities, comparable to:
- Vegetarian.
- Vegan.
- Gluten-free.
- Dairy-free.
- Keto.
- Kosher.
- Halal.
In case your staff opts for buffet service as a substitute of a plated meal, guarantee bodily accessibility by selecting a location with low meals counters and extensive aisles. Moreover, your caterer ought to clearly label meals with potential allergens to accommodate all friends’ wants.
After your fundraising occasion concludes, ship a post-event survey to attendees to gather suggestions on their general expertise. Ask about their satisfaction with the accessibility of your occasion and how one can enhance your efforts going ahead. Use the responses you gather to proceed tailoring your future occasion planning to your particular viewers’s wants and expectations.
The previous submit was offered by a person unaffiliated with NonProfit PRO. The views expressed inside don’t instantly replicate the ideas or opinions of NonProfit PRO.
