Ready to start your own envelope fundraiser? Let's go! There are only a few simple steps involved.
Sign up to become a vendor
A vendor is an organization that is creating the fundraiser to raise money. To become a vendor you will need only a few key pieces of information.
- A secure email address
- A valid business mailing address
- An EIN number registered with the U.S. IRS indicating 501(c) status
- A bank account (note this is provided directly and securely to Stripe.com)
Once you have this information assembled, please visit Account Signup where on the right side of the screen you can fill in the information requested (Note: the EIN and bank account information will be requested later). Once you've signed up you can visit this page to obtain status and to log in.
Vendor Approval
Envelopefundraiser.com will review the vendor application request, and usually approve or request clarification within 1 business day. Once approved you will receive an email with account login and password information so that you can begin setting up your own campaign. At this point you will be able to many campaigns, either sequentially or even concurrently.
Once approved click here to sign in
During the final setup process your banking account information and EIN will be independently verified by Stripe.com using links provided. Deposits resulting from sales of envelopes are usually made within 24 hours. You will be able to monitor all transactions, and to provide for refunds if you wish using the Stripe system directly.
Decide on the Envelope Denominations
A lot of Envelope Challenges start with just 100 envelopes numbered $1-$100. If all envelopes are donated, then $5050 total is raised (minus fees for credit card, banking, and processing that fees that usually total around 9%).
Up to four categories of envelopes are available:
- Donor
- Silver
- Gold
- Sponsor
You can use any one, more, or even all four categories. You will name the categories yourself in your web description (click here for an example). The only rule is that the category amounts cannot overlap and must be in increasing monetary amounts. For example, Donor can be $1-$50 in increments of $1 and Gold can be $200-$1000 in increments of $5. All amounts and increments must be in whole dollar amounts (sorry no international support yet).
Once you've decided on the categories, start, end, and increment amounts, Provide that information to your EnvelopeFundraiser.com support contact for implementation. It only takes a few minutes. (Note: Website support for this step coming soon).
You can change the start, end, and increment amounts anytime while the fundraising event is active. However, envelopes that are already sold remain sold and cannot be resold. They will remain marked as sold during the campaign. We strongly suggest that you not change the definition of the categories to keep confusion down. Once a campaign has started, a Gold (Charlie) donor doesn't want to find out that they suddenly become a Silver (Nurturer in the demo) donor because somebody decided to re-align the category amounts.
Design your Campaign Web Page
This is the most important part of your fundraising campaign. Each webpage is unique to your campaign and has its own URL. You can have any content you wish, and will have embedded short-codes at certain spots to show the envelopes available (and sold!).
Don't worry about the editing step... it's easy and we'll help you get setup You can embed sponsor logos, messages from special people, pictures or videos, and dozens of other elements, all using a simple WYSIWYG editor in your browser. We usually recommend starting in Word and then transitioning to a web page for ease of editing, but many people start directly on the web page itself.
Announce the Campaign
EnvelopeFundraiser.com provides for email campaigns using the lists you provide. We have MailChimp integrated, or can easily create custom campaigns as needed. Best to reach out to us for help here.
Monitor the Campaign
Once the campaign is up and running, you'll receive immediate email notification on donations, including the amount and donor info. The donor will also immediately receive a confirmation, including your EIN information if you wish to provide it to them.
In addition, real-time reports are available for download from our website.