10+ Ideas to Encourage Employee Donations on #GivingTuesday

#GivingTuesday is an international day of giving which encourages everyone to give back to their communities through the power of social media. Following the consumeristic binging of Black Friday and Cyber Monday, #GivingTuesday kicks off the charitable season and inspires many to give back during the holidays. To learn more about the event, visit the Giving Tuesday website.

In our workplace giving overview, we mentioned how effective special days of giving can be to boost engagement. In this list, we looked at other successful giving campaigns to create a list of ideas to help you strategize for this year’s #GivingTuesday.

Set a Company Goal for #GivingTuesday

• Look at past performance to set an achievable donation goal, and broadcast it to the whole company.

• The holiday season can be tight on the budget for many employees, so an attainable #GivingTuesday goal is a great opportunity to encourage one final push before the end of the year.

• Give your #GivingTuesday a ‘focus area’ for the holiday. Employees may feel more willing to participate if they know the whole company is rallying behind the children, the troops, sustainability, etc.

Encourage Employees to get involved , and do it early!

• Utilize internal communication tools to publicize goals. Vehicles like emails, signs, and platform notifications help remind people that #GivingTuesday is approaching quickly.

• Create a donation drive or volunteer event so employees can see and participate in philanthropic deeds around the office.

• Amplify existing initiatives in place for the company and get employees re-excited about campaigns that were started earlier in the year.

Utilize social media to inspire engagement

• Schedule tweets and posts announcing the company’s goals for #GivingTuesday. This public announcement will prompt employees to follow through.

• Create content that gets as many employees involved as possible. Ask different teams for pictures or videos of them volunteering. Use statistics and quotes to bring #GivingTuesday to life!

• Reach out to employees before #GivingTuesday! Ask if any employees are passionate about certain causes and would like to share those on social media or if anyone wants to be an ambassador for the day and ‘take over’ the twitter account. Giving employees a voice will get them more excited about the causes they are promoting.

• Have employees post their donation stories on social media so their friends and family can get in on the day!

  Be ready to respond to people on social media and monitor your channels for opportunities to further the conversation about #GivingTuesday and the causes your company promotes.

• Encourage your employees to follow the company on social media.

Incentivize, Incentivize, Incentivize

• While the holidays are a time of giving, many people have already donated throughout the year. Encourage your employees to go for that final push by offering catching donations, CauseCards (which can be given to any of their favorite charities), or even bonus paid volunteer time off on #GivingTuesday!

• Create a friendly competition out of the day! Have different teams go up against each other; whether it’s the number of donations, volunteer hours, or items donated. The winning team can be rewarded with bragging rights or even with CauseCards. This not only encourages bonding among employees but also helps get more people involved.

Finish off the year strong with your charitable campaigns by encouraging your employees to become a part of #GivingTuesday!