 Let me start off by saying welcome. Thanks for joining us. It's another episode of the nonprofit show. When you see this bright, bold yellow, you know that you're in for a treat. A.J. Steinberg, CFRE, which stands for Certified Fundraising Executive. She's also CEO, which stands for Chief Executive Officer. So she's really a badass, queen of fundraising. She's gonna talk to us today about seven elements of event success. Before we jump into this, A.J., we of course have a little bit of show. It's not cleanup, but just kind of the standard protocol that we do. We wanna make sure that all of our guests know who you're looking at and listening to. Julia Patrick is here, CEO of the American Nonprofit Academy. She's really vying for my nonprofit nerd status. So if you joined us yesterday, she said, wait, I wanna be the nonprofit nerd. I do. I'm Jaret Ransom, your nonprofit nerd, CEO of the Raven Group. We are so honored to have the continued investment support from these presenting sponsors. Thank you so very much to Bloomerang, American Nonprofit Academy, Fundraising Academy, nonprofit nerd, your part-time controller, staffing boutique, nonprofit thought leader, as well as the nonprofit Atlas. We have over 500 episodes and you can find us on Roku, YouTube, Fire TV, Vimeo, as well as podcasts. So AJ Steinberg, CFRE, Queen Bean Fundraising, this will also be on podcast form. So we are thrilled to have you here and I wanna say welcome back. Well, thank you so much, Julia and Jaret. Yeah, I noticed there was a shift in the nerd glasses here. Everybody but the nonprofit nerd has them on today. They're here, don't worry. They're never far. They are like literally glued to me, so. But do you need them? That's the question I always wanted to. No, I'm sorry, I don't, but I need them for my branding. That's fabulous. When I was in my 20s, I actually went and bought a pair of clear glasses that were totally nerdy and would wear them because I look so young at work that I wanted people to take me more seriously. Now I need them, but. Oh, that is great. Well, today's thought leader episode, AJ, you're gonna share with us about the seven key elements to event success. And again, for those of you that are loyal listeners and viewers, this is really only scratching the surface. So 30 minutes, but please do check out queenbeefunraising.com to learn more from AJ because she's a whiz at this. And you have with us today, really seven key elements. So let's start off. What is your element number one? Element number one is figuring out what you want to accomplish with your event. And you guys know, so many times people just go, we're gonna do a Gala, that's it. And I just had a client say that to me earlier this week. And by the time we were done with it, they will never do a Gala again because it's not a good fit, right? So the five goals, there's really five goals to any event. And the first one is, of course, fundraising. I mean, that is what we do. The second is marketing for your organization because you would be shocked how many people don't even know that you exist. The third is promoting your programs. A lot of people may know you exist, but don't know exactly what you're doing. So every live event or virtual event is an opportunity to market your mission and who you are. The next one is a call to action. How are you going to get these people to stay engaged with you once they leave their seat? And the last one is appreciation and stewardship because there's nothing like a live event for actually building community and starting that stewardship silo. So you have to figure out, and part of the goals is figuring out who you want to see sitting in the seats. If you want to get millennials in the seats, do not do a Gala. If you want to get somebody who doesn't have a deep pocket, do not do a Gala. But I do Gala's all the time. I love them. I think they're great, but you should really choose an event that will attract your support base. You know, I love that. I love this. And I think, I love what you said, and I know we have seven strategies, but to me, I can't imagine that any of them are going to be as good as this first element because- You need all seven of them. You literally have to do all seven. But this, it seems to me, AJ, that if you start off well and you really step back and look at this first element with all of your five points, wow, it's going to do so much of the heavy lifting for you. And I just think it's super powerful. I love that you started with this, especially during a time when everybody has been shut down for now going into year three, everybody's like, we got to do a gala, we got to do a gala. And it's like, let's step back. And part of this, I think it comes from that enthusiastic board, maybe misplaced or maybe, you know, talk to us about that because I think a lot of organizations are getting pushed by their boards. We got to do the gala, we got to do the gala. Right, and then they don't buy tickets to the gala and there's a reason for this. The first, second part is getting your board enthused. And this means a lot of times I call them grumpy cat boards because they do the grumpy cat face when I walk in to talk to them about their events. And part of it is your board was embarrassed by your last event. Your board wasn't happy with the return on investment of your last event. Your board wasn't engaged to be thought leaders at your last event, meaning you didn't ask their opinion on anything. All of those things are super important at the beginning is to get your board to understand that, hey, you may not have loved our last event, but let's talk about what you didn't like and you tell me what you think really would work now. Two things happen. First of all, you get a better event. Secondly, they have skin in the game now. So they actually will want to have this succeed. They feel that it's being built with them and their colleagues and family and friends in mind. And an enthusiastic board doesn't happen without good leadership, which is you, sorry. Leadership from your board is, every time I hear about people complaining about their board, which is constantly, a lot of times you're not really listening to them, asking them questions and engaging them. A.J., I cannot unsee the grumpy cat board. Every moving I attend now, I will just see like meow, meow, all of the grumpy cat board. They do and they're usually men wearing polo shirts like this and it's just that's exactly who they are. That's a fantastic visual. I really also am hearing from this enthusiastic board the quote that people support that in which they help create. And that's exactly what you were saying with bringing in the board members' thoughts, process, at least so that they feel that they've been heard. What about the committee? Do you see that also as having that active committee as a big element? Yes, and that's number thing. Excellent segue, Jared. Thank you. That was fabulous. Yeah, an active committee, if I am approached by an organization who wants to work with me to help build this great event and they tell me they don't use an event committee or they tell me they're just using their board as the event committee, I won't work with them. Interesting. Wow. Okay, what's up? They're already behind in the game. They've already lost the opportunity to have this powerhouse workhorse. And I'm gonna tell you, it is true that every single time I'm with the committee I realize I could do this easier and better if I did it myself. Yes, that's a trap. It's a trap. It's a trap, oh, it's true. It's true. And the thing is, it's not your party. It's not your gala. It is your organizations. And these people who sit on your committee, volunteers are something like 67% more likely to become deeperly, deeperly, new word, and more deeply engaged with your organization financially and the future if they're a volunteer with you now. So that's an amazing, I think 10% is like a hallelujah for direct mail. 67%, treating them with respect, actually giving them real work to do, listening to what they say. And once again, being a great leader, super, super important. So I just can't tell you how much I rely. In fact, Queen Bee, I won't go into it because it's only a half hour. I am not the Queen Bee. The Queen Bee's and Queen Bee fundraising are the, are the committee chairs. And they can be male or female, but it's the committee chairs. How large do you recommend these committees to be? I, my personal here, I'm getting you big. I'm sorry, my computer screen just did something funky. My sweet spot is 12. 12, okay. You can take any, you can take that from anywhere. I just find that once you get up to like 20, it's too many opinions, too many people to deal with. Once you have four, it's not a team. That energy and excitement that you build from being a team is super important to a committee. It should be a high fiving by the end. You're high fiving, having drinks afterwards, making girlfriend plans type thing or friend plans. Girl plans. Yeah, all the good stuff. Yeah. And so talk to us, your element four talks about engaged sponsors. Yeah, you can tell I'm big on engaging and not just letting things slide. This, I love that. Yeah. And that's, that's all part of it. So, so what are your tips and tricks when it comes to our sponsors? Sponsors, I actually teach half day workshops just on how any organization can get sponsors. So if you're a little organization and you're listening to me, you can get sponsors. This is, there is no secret. All you need to know is how and nobody's teaching you how. So that's my job is to teach you how, but engaged sponsors may don't ask for their money and then disappear until they get the tickets and then they still don't hear from you until you ask for money again next year. Yes. Stewardships, stewardship, stewardship, following through with what you promise, giving them something sexy that will appeal to them. They're, it's a business. So this is not, they're not donating money. It's return on investment. It is a marketing investment for them. And if you have four hours, I can tell you about it. But otherwise I can just say, you can get sponsored. That money is there. It's sitting there waiting for you to ask for it. Well, I want to attend this workshop. So I'm going to go to queenbeefundraising.com, go to resources and workshops. I'm telling you, because I do these virtually as well. I love in person best, but I do these virtually as well. And when I say it's a forever game changer for these organizations that attend, it's pretty exciting for them. So do you use that acronym with them? What's in it for me when it comes to our sponsors? You know, it's really like, what is the desire of the company? What is the business marketing goals? So really that whole with them, what's in it for me? I have never heard with them and I'm going to steal it this minute. You have it. I didn't make it up, but yeah. I've never heard it, but I start out when I do this, I spend a good amount of time explaining what the seven things that businesses are looking for when they sponsor and what you have to offer them. Do not think about it as we need your money. You have to think of it as look what an amazing opportunity we're offering you. Right. And I say that and you have to train the people who are approaching for, not training them like seven days of training, just tell them this, you're not asking for money, you're offering these sponsors an opportunity. It's the same thing as when you're asking donors. You are offering an amazing marketing opportunity that they will not get any place else because you are an awesome marketer of their sponsorship. I love that. And we're going to check out this workshop for sure. It's fun. It's really, it's like people are like mind blown and really sophisticated people. I think, oh, they already know this. So like, I never thought of it like this. Wow. It's a mindset shift, but I love element number five, which seems like it tags into that. And that is having a marketing plan because that's what your sponsors want to see, right? So talk to us about how you envision the marketing plan being such an important element. It is an element because you can't just assume that your sponsor's gonna know how you're going to market them and your tickets don't sell themselves. A marketing plan is not this big fancy thing. It's figuring out, this is how many tickets we need to sell. How many are going to be sponsorships? How many are going to be through tables? How are we gonna get the word out? How are we going to make the sound appealing? What kind of verbiage are we going to be using that makes us differentiate from the others? So a marketing plan is nothing but actually figuring out how you're going to sell tickets, how you're going to market your sponsors. And it's every time that you have a poster, a banner, a social media post for this, it's marketing your organization as well. Super important to remember. I don't think I've seen enough marketing plans when it comes to having a successful event. I feel like that is left over and it's kind of like, oh yeah, of course we're gonna market it. Well, what does that look like? We'll put it on social media. We'll send, we'll barrage our email with our, sorry, our board members with like a barrage of invites. And again, really activating that grumpy cat. And so I think this one is left out. Yeah, nobody really just initially thinks, oh, let's put together a marketing plan. But I wanna tell you the one thing your sponsors are looking for are people to walk in the door of their business or to go and click onto their business. If you could include in your marketing plan, things like an activation at one of your sponsors, meaning sending your people to the sponsor for a special something, great for the sponsor, great for you, ties into your event, tons of stuff. Whoa, never heard of that. So you can have some with them. I'm taking that activation. That's great. I love that. I would say that one of the things is that I see is that if you get a committee and they're all good and they're great, a lot of times they just are like, oh yeah, the organization's internal marketing and communications, they'll market this. That's right. And there's like this, you know, this. Disconnect. Yeah. And it's like, wait, no, step back. This has got to be aligned up front moving forward so that it can get into the marcoms. Right. And also your committee is your best marketing tool in the world, because every time they're at a cocktail party talking about what they're doing and they're so excited and they can't wait for this event, that enthusiasm is what sells events. It's that FOMO fear of missing out, you know? You're building that for your event. Yeah, absolutely. You know, it seems to me too that the marketing issue helps you moving forward, especially if you're looking at, this is going to be a repeat thing, or even if you're going to do something maybe later in the year to then tag onto that. If you like this event, you're going to love us at this next event. That's exactly right. So I know we're so short on time. I all, any business that says no to me who should have been sponsoring, who's not, I comp them tickets and I treat them like VIPs. I want them to see how amazing it is. All of those tribute books, those event programs, take them with you, don't leave them and toss them after because those are marketing for next year's event. You give those to potential sponsors. Love that. Okay. So I was just going through a storage closet and I saw a box, you know, half full of these programs. And I thought, why do we have these? You know, we can get rid of all but one of them. But now I know there's more use to that. They can see the quality of your event, what you do and they could see who else sponsored in the past. Yes. So I'm going to take those then to the committee and they're going to be able to use that as fodder, if you will, you're brainstorming. Yeah. A lot of times we brainstorm using to see, there's so many, this is so complicated. We still have two to go. I mean, I literally could sit here and talk to you all day. And I do talk to people all day about this, but it's like teaching you to drive on a jet airplane in one half hour. Right. But... Well, let's get on to the next element and that's the engagement strategy. I'm really interested to hear about this from your perspective, AJ, because so many of the things that you've talked about, I feel like they start off, they are more of an engagement concept. So this is really interesting. And that is the whole overarching idea of Queen B and their strategies for events, because these are not... If you are taking people and putting them on their cell phone, doing all the bidding, you have this live event and then you put people back on their cell phones to do the bidding and to be the thing. And it's sort of engagement is an art. This is, it's a science and it means building community. And there's a reason that successful events have a cadence. That means you should plan in advance of how you're going to welcome people when they come properly, then you're going to build community, then you're gonna sit them down and do the stage program, which is when you do your mission moment and all, and then you're going to engage them afterwards. So that's the engagement strategy. How do we do that? Well, even the pre-event emails, how you welcome them and get the excitement built for that, that's engagement. When they arrive at my events, I have volunteers greeting them at the valet. If it's a theme, thank you. If it's an event that has a theme, if it's an evening in Venice, they have the boat paddles in their dress like Orisman. We walk them to the registration. The registration people have a protocol for welcoming the people. Board members, listen up. You are goodwill ambassadors. You are not there to drink and schmooze with your friends. You are there to greet the people that you are stewarding to hire them. You are a very important element. Same with the staff members. You should not be running back and forth with option items. You should be going table to table, greeting guests, telling them how important it is that they came and it means so much to you. All of this is building community. The cocktail portion builds community when you put them on their cell phones to bid, you're taking them away and then they're checking the babysitter and checking the scores. You can all complain to me afterwards, AJ at queenbefundraising.com. I still use mobile bidding. If you're a school, it's okay. There's certain times it's okay. Once you go into the main room for the meal or the dinner, you close that auction. You do not send people back and forth to seat. And auction is a game. You make a little bit of money from it. They spend hundreds of hours getting these auction items and putting together auctions and they spend 15 minutes putting together the strategy for their stage program or their ask. You are so right. You are so right. I've done this once or twice. I've seen it once or twice. Honestly, you guys, I just, I'm begging everybody, please, it's entertainment. That's basically what your auction is. Your fund need is where you make your money and there's a strategy to that. There's a strategy to how the whole dinner, the dinner and then how you sequence your stage program is key to audience engagement. If your people are standing up and going and getting drinks in the other room or talking to their friends, you have not done your job. Right. And thank you. Yeah, thank you. And thank you. Thank you to this home with this element number seven because now that we have been taken to church and school with all of the engagement, how do we continue that post-event? Yeah, and that's someplace that a lot, most organizations fall down. Once you've spent, I say it takes nine months to make a baby and nine months to make a really great event. So once you've just stated your event and people have been there for three to four hours and fallen in love with you because you've done it right. Are you not going to ask them out on a second date? Are you just not going to follow up with them? I mean, you spent all that time and money doing this. So do the right thing. There is an, in fact, if people want to reach out to me, I have a post-event protocol strategy that I can send to them. It's AJ at queenbfundraising.com. And literally I spell it out of one day after the event, this is what you do. Three days after the event, what you do. Six weeks after the event, this is a long term. Remember to with sponsors. They probably haven't attended your event because a lot of them don't want to go. And once again, don't just let the tables be empty. Ask them if they'd like to gift back the tickets that they're comped so that you can put the VI, you can put the teachers there if you're a school, you can have the honorees there. Be in contact with those sponsors afterwards. Send them the tribute book in the mail with a thank you note so they can see the quality, see how you did it. And that's when you pick up the phone and what do you do? Tell me, Jared, like, no, you know, what do you do? We thank them. We thank them and ask them if they want to come on for next year immediately. Right when they're feeling the glow and that love. It's like, you know what? We'd love to see you at a higher level because we have more that we can give to you. I love that. I feel like that is not, that's not probably anyone's, except for yours, of course, AJ. Go to, because it's, we can't thank them right, or we can't ask them again right after this event. But why not? Because we're all, you know, on cloud nine feeling good. And you want them to know that it's gonna sell out. Just say we sold out most of this year's and we wanna make sure that you're on board for next year. So we're gonna tell you what we have. That doesn't mean that they'll sign on the dotted line and give you the check then. You just need to get their commitment, let them know and stay in touch all year. If they have a golden retriever and you see an ad of a golden retriever and your contact at the sponsor, send them the blog post on golden retrievers. It's like, just thinking about you. That's right. That is absolutely right. Well, these are seven fantastic elements. If you liked what you heard, and I certainly did, because there's a lot for me to learn here, these queen bees, seven elements of event success, you can get your download, everything that AJ just shared with us in these seven key elements. So the well-defined goals, the board enthusiasm, active committee, engaged sponsors, marketing plan, which again, there's another workshop that AJ provides there, engagement strategy and post event, which email queen bee here because that is fantastic. What a generous offer in addition to this download for you to share with us, AJ, this post event protocol, because that is something that I certainly wanna get my hands on, and I hope you will come back on maybe another Thought Leader episode and share with us what that post event protocol really looks like, because we're all itching to get together. Thank you for having me. You know, it's such an interesting thing, AJ, because I feel like in some ways in this post pandemic recovery, we're just itching to get back in and we're not necessarily thinking about some of our lessons or reframing things, we're just gonna do it all over again the same way. This is really an interesting time because there's some new things to be thinking about, new opportunities. And I think a lot of success because exactly what Jared just said, folks are really excited to get back out there and re-engage, but now is the time to do something a little different and be more thoughtful about what that bigger picture is. And intentional, and that's what you brought to this episode, AJ, in this Thought Leader space is there is so much intentionality, so much strategic movement as opposed to let's just splatter this in the community, let's see what works, let's not put together a marketing plan, let's not engage a committee because that's just gonna take more work. And they always say, they go, we've always done it this way. When I hear that, I want to scream. I do scream, yeah. We can hear each other at that same time. So please do come back. And for those of you watching and listening, please do check out queenbfundraising.com, check out the amazing AJ Steinberg. There's a lot in that beautiful head of yours. And so thank you for sharing with us today on these elements, fantastic. Thank you so much. I'll see you in Vegas, baby. Yes, that's right. Yes. It's city, we're gonna be there. Yes, we're AFP icon. For those of you watching, we're gonna be at the AFP icon event and we'll actually be broadcasting there. And so AJ, we're counting on you to come to the Bloomerang booth where we'll be broadcasting from and we'll pop in on one of our episodes. I love it. Listen, you have a good one, you guys. Thank you for having me. Oh my gosh, this has been great. Everybody, thank you for joining Jarrett and I. It's been a wonderful opportunity to reconnect with AJ Steinberg who has so much wisdom to share. And as we all know, a lot of our organizations, these public events or private events where there's ticketed sales, they're really important and something that we really need to be thinking about so that we can achieve our mission, vision and values. Again, we wanna make sure we thank all of our sponsors from Bloomerang American Nonprofit Academy to your part-time controller, Nonprofit Nerd Fundraising Academy, Staffing Boutique, Nonprofit Thought Leader and the Nonprofit Atlas. Without you, we would not be here. AJ, you have totally helped me reframe some great things moving forward. The season is gonna start to ramp up and we have a lot of work to do, my friend. Yeah, thank you. Thank you guys. Thanks for all you guys are doing. Well, it's a lot of fun. Hey, as we like to remind everyone, stay well so you can do well. We'll see you back here tomorrow, everyone.