Facilitator Guide
Relay Online Training
FY2012
Relay Online Training
FY2012
Module Overview
Audience:
Relay For Life Event Managers
Recommended group size: 10-30
Objectives: To give Relay Online event managers the tools and knowledge to utilize
Relay Online to develop their event fundraising, recruitment, recognition, and
communication.
Time Required: 6 Hours
Preparation:
Email beforehand the directions to access the online event manager manual on
midsouthrfl.org. Click on Resources-Leadership Development-Online Fundraising
Resources-Full Event Manager Manual.
Also, ask participants if they’ve already signed up as a current year participant to
come prepared with their username/password. If they need help identifying
beforehand, please have them work with their staff partner/power user or
msonlinefundraising to cut down on spending time looking it up for them during
the training or having to reset passwords.
If they’d like to upload a mailing list, ask them to bring as excel spreadsheet.
Room Set-Up:
U-shape with participants sitting on the outside or classroom style with all
attendees facing front
Table in front of the room for facilitator materials, handouts, etc.
Projector and screen at the front of the room
Decorations
Flip Chart and Easel.
If you are going to allow beverages, make sure to serve bottled drinks that
have lids to prevent spills on equipment.
Website Preparation:
Have a registration already set up on one of your event sites to use when
training about the participant experience.
For training about the “back end” of the site, use one of the events that you
already manage. If possible, select an event that already has data in it, or
create data in it for training.
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Allow sufficient time to:
Set up all attendee computers and access the internet
Create flipcharts.
Copy and distribute handouts.
Decorate the room.
Welcome participants.
All preparation should be completed at least 30 minutes before the session.
Materials:(insert all additional materials needed for your breakout)
Quotes to decorate the walls
Balloons or other decorations
Icons
Facilitator creates a flip chart.
Facilitator asks a question of participants.
Indicates a very important point that needs to be addressed
Handout*
*Note—anytime you see this icon it indicates there should be a
corresponding document listed^ as a handout.
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Prepared Flip Charts:
(Insert the actual text needed for each flip chart page below. This is the resource
that the facilitator will use to prepare his/her flip charts that will be utilized during
the session.)
Welcome
Agenda
Welcome/Introductions, Agenda review, Objectives
Where to Find Resources
Relay Online Front End/Event Management Center
Break
Participant Center-Signing Up & Getting Started
Participant Center-Sending Emails
Best Practice Sharing/Lunch
Event Manager E-mail Campaigns
Break
Promoting Online Fundraising
Wrap Up
Objectives
1. Understand the Participant Experience
2. Learn how to send email messages to your participants
3. Learn how to promote the site and online fundraising and what tools
are available to you
Ground Rules
1. Please use the parking lot
2. Cell phones on “stun” (aka, silent)
3. Feel free to use the restrooms at anytime
4. Always consider “How can I make this work for my event?”
Parking Lot
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Call to Action
1. Become familiar with the online fundraising resources on
midsouthrfl.org
2. Be an active participant on an event page to know more about what
your event participants are experiencing.
3. Stay in touch with other attendees from today to continue to share best
practices.
4. Become a pro at sending email campaigns.
5. Become familiar with how social media can help promote online
fundraising for your event.
Mid-South Online Resource Center
www.midsouthrfl.org-->Resources-->Leadership Development
Online Fundraising Resources
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Facilitator Agenda:
________________________________________________________________
Welcome/Introductions, Agenda review, Objectives 15 minutes
Review of Online Resources 20 minutes
Relay Online Front End/Event Manager Center Overview 35 minutes
Break 10 minutes
Participant Center- Signing Up & Getting Started 20 minutes
Participant Center- Sending Emails 20 minutes
Best Practice Sharing/Lunch 45 minutes
Event Manager Email Campaigns 60 minutes
Break 15 minutes
Promoting Online Fundraising/Social Media 45 minutes
Wrap Up 15 minutes
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FY2012
Welcome/Introductions, Agenda review, Objectives
(15 minutes)
________________________________________________________________
Welcome / Introductions
Facilitators will introduce themselves.
Agenda Review
Facilitator will review the agenda items listed on the agenda flipchart.
Agenda
Welcome/Introductions, Agenda review, Objectives
Where to Find Resources
Relay Online Front End/Event Management Center
Break
Participant Center: Signing Up & Getting Started
Participant Center: Sending Emails
Best Practice Sharing/Lunch
Event Manager E-mail Campaigns
Break
Promoting Online Fundraising
Wrap Up
Ground Rules
Facilitator will review the ground rules listed on the ground rules flipchart.
Ground Rules
1. Please use the parking lot
2. Cell phones on “stun” (aka, silent)
3. Feel free to use the restrooms at anytime
4. Always consider “How can I make this work for my area/event?”
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Objectives
Facilitator will review the objectives listed on the objectives flipchart.
Objectives
1. Understand the Participant Experience
2. Learn how to send email messages to your participants
3. Learn how to promote the site and online fundraising and what tools
are available to you
Icebreaker:
Go around the room, ask everyone to say their name, event or events, and ask them
what’s a strategy or action they have found to be successful in raising money online.
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Agenda Topic #1: Front End Walkthrough/Event Management Center
(45 minutes)
________________________________________________________________
Let’s begin by quickly discussing online fundraising. The sites are available as a
fundraising resource. Participants can register but need to have an active email address
to register. It’s also important to be sure you are taking time at your team captain
meetings and other opportunities to educate your participants on sending emails and
collecting online donations.
The first thing we are going to do is walk you through the front site of the website, or
what we call the “participant experience”. As we work through the day, note that when
we talk about the “front end” of the site, we are talking about the public page that all of
your participants and donors will see. When we mention the “back end” of the site, we
are talking about the administrative side of the site that only you and your staff partner
have access to as online event managers.
A. Front End Walkthrough 20 Min
a. Let them know that there have been changes made to the front end of site
and personal participant center. A powerpoint detailing these changes is
available on the Online Fundraising Resources page of midsouthrfl.org.
You will see that the farther left on the event page is the more national
content, the farther right is more event information.
b. During the Front End Walkthrough, make sure to mention/give examples
of the following tasks:
i. Registering as A Team
ii. Registering as A Survivor
iii. Making a Donation
iv. Making a Luminaria Purchase
v. Logging in to the Participant Center
vi. Editing your personal page
vii. Overview of things to do in the participant center
B. Event Management Center - “The Back End” 15 Min
a. Access the Event Management Center
i. The Event Management Center is where all of your back work
begins.
b. Event Center- where you do most of the basic customization for the site;
can add team captain questions here
Mention the Basic Customization Guide that can be found on the Online
Resources page of midsouthrfl.org-those will help any event manager set
up at a minimum local customizations for a page.
c. Event Website- let them know this is where they can edit and add pages.
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d. Event Emails- will spend more time on this topic later in the day- let them
know that is where they will set up email campaigns, need to customize
autoresponders and can upload mailing lists.
e. Customer Service- can manage participants, teams, gifts, etc. Can reset
passwords, obtain usernames, change team captains, etc.
f. Reports- can pull reports on registration, performance, volunteer interest,
survivorship, etc. Will want to share performance reports with accounting
volunteers at least before every team captain meeting, Bank Day/Night
and Relay. Accounting chairs can request access and pull as well.
Break #1: (10 minutes)- Let group know what time will be starting back.
________________________________________________________________
Agenda Topic #2: Participant Center Signing Up & Getting Started
(20 minutes)
________________________________________________________________
We are now going to experience the signing up process that any participant would have
if they were signing up and getting started in their personal participant center. If you
have already signed up for this year, great! We will have you log in so you can follow
along in just a few minutes learning more about the resources available to all
participants.
a. Have attendees not yet registered to sign up. You can either show them
the steps and let them follow along as you do it or you can show them the
steps to get started and then help around the room as needed.
b. Once everyone is signed up, review the participant center. Show them the
basics-how to track fundraising progress, where to customize personal
page, how to customize personal URL, how to manage team if team
captain, mention fundraising tools like Facebook app, iPhone app &
fundraising video, how to enter offline donations.
Agenda Topic #3: Participant Center: Sending Emails
(20 minutes)
______________________________________________________________________
One of the most important things a participant can do is send emails to their contacts to
encourage donations to their online site. Now, we are going to walk through the steps of
setting up and sending an email to contacts.
a. Show them the email tab, discuss templates and other features as
needed.
b. Discuss how to import or add contacts.
c. Have attendees set up an email message and send- even if only to
themselves
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Agenda Topic #4: Lunch and Best Practice Sharing
(45 minutes)
________________________________________________________________
We are now going to break for lunch. When you get your food, please come back to
this room. We are going to chat and share some best practices while we eat.
Sample questions to ask to begin conversations:
1. When do you usually send out coaching e-mails?
2. What kind of online challenges do you have for your participants?
3. What types of things do you list on your greeting page?
4. How do you reward top online fundraisers?
5. How do you train your team captains and participants on using online
fundraising?
6. What resources do you offer to encourage participants to sign up, set up their
page and fundraise?
7. How do you as an online chair or your online chair work with other committee
members to encourage fundraising on the site or updating the site?
8. How do you involve survivors in Relay Online?
Agenda Topic #5: Event Manager Email Campaigns
(60 minutes)
________________________________________________________________
As an event manager, one of your most important responsibilities is to ensure that email
communication is not only being sent by participants but by yourself or other online
event managers. It’s been proven that the more email messages you send from your
event manager center, the more likely you are to have success in online fundraising. Of
all the topics we cover today, we are spending the most time on email campaigns sent
by event managers because of how important it is to send the messages. During this
time, you will follow along on your computer and set up an email message that will be
sent out to the participants of one of your events. So please be sure to select a
message and include information that is valid and appropriate to be sent to event
participants.
At this time, it is so important to note that there are strategically developed emails in the
event manager center provided to you for your use. Please ensure that you are using
these emails to communicate with your participants. You can make edits to these emails
and customize for your local event. It is important to note that these emails are highly
preferable to use as opposed to original emails for several reasons. These include:
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Each message has strategic fundraising information included.
Each message has built in links to online resources such as the participant
center and event page
The subject line of each message is strategically written to avoid spam filters.
Each message has been carefully edited to avoid typos and other
grammatical errors.
There are recruitment, engagement and holiday messages available
A great tool to be familiar with so that you can plan your email campaigns accordingly
and in a timely manner is the event email communication calendar that can be found on
midsouthrfl.org on the Online Resources page.
a. To begin with, discuss with attendees how to upload a list if needed
through the manage mailing list option.
b. Walk attendees through the steps of choosing an email to edit and making
changes to the email. Talk about having the sender name and email being
a local, real person. Be sure to cover uploading a document into the event
library and then inserting it into the email using the link list. Discuss local
event customizations needed in the emails. Discuss the difference in
HTML vs plain text emails and how a test email can be sent. Finally,
discuss approving the email.
c. Once the email is created and approved, walk the attendees through the
steps of sending out the email. Show attendees how to choose audience,
use filters for team captains and schedule the campaign as needed. Be
sure to have the attendees send the email as well.
d. Finally, discuss how to go back to a sent email and review the report to
see details like open rate, click rate, etc.
Break #2: (10 minutes) Let group know what time will be starting back.
________________________________________________________________
Agenda Topic #6: Promoting Online Fundraising/Social Media
(45 minutes)
Now, we are going to take some time and turn our focus from the event manager center
and hands on application and discuss best practices on promoting the online sites and
fundraising. We will also in this discussion cover some information on using social
media to promote online fundraising.
We’d like to get started by opening the floor and giving all attendees the opportunity to
share on how they promote the site and specifically fundraising on the site.
While attendees are sharing their best practices, flip chart the responses and add
to as needed/as desired.
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Be sure the following ideas are shared:
1. Ensure Event Committee buy-in. They will be key in promoting the online tool to
participants.
2. Get Participants Online---Make a Relay Online presentation at Kick Off, Committee &
Team Captain Meetings
3. Talk about it all the time! Become the face of Relay Online
4. Talk about Relay Online at every opportunity and include the friendly URL on all
materials
5. Get participants involved with online to share at meetings, in emails, etc.
6. Promote the site by taking a “commercial break” at all Relay meetings … “the next thirty
seconds are brought to you by your Online Chair for the Relay For Life of ______.”
7. Send out Relay Online Emails
8. Gather as many new Email addresses as possible and upload them
9. Make clear and concise “online” calls to action
10. Hold a Relay Online Email-a-thon! At meetings or day-of event and if your facilities allow
it, hold a one or two hour Relay Online Email session where participants can get in a last
minute donation request. If you are giving awards, be sure to communicate how you will
calculate the online winner by announcing a cut-off time
11. Issue challenges to teams and your community
12. Publicize your online event alongside everything with your actual event. Place URL on
everything- agendas, press releases, flyers, posters, etc. Discuss URL when doing all media
interviews.
13. Host online challenges that are timely and ones that include good incentive items for
your participants. See if local vendors will donate items such as gift cards, electronics, etc.
to include as incentive items for online challenges. Identify a volunteer or individual who
has a place to stay at the beach, lake or the mountains who would be willing to donate time
at location for a challenge.
14. Ensure that you are rewarding and recognizing participants throughout the year, at
Relay and during post event fundraising.
15. Set a certain level and form an online fundraising club for your event. For example,
everyone who raises $250 or more online at your event would get special recognition at the
event.
Of course, social media is essential in using to promote your online fundraising. We are
fortunate that there has been a focus on the division level to develop strategies and
some basic best practices to share with you to get started or strategically examine what
you’re currently doing for social media strategies.
One of the first steps you could take to promote your online fundraising through social
media is using Facebook. There’s two main ways to promote online fundraising through
Facebook. One is to create a fan page for your event and the other is to encourage your
participants to “donate” their status and profile picture for Relay For Life.
First, let’s talk about the Facebook fan page.
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a. Show an example of a RFL Facebook event page. Please be sure it follows
division guidelines. Discuss an overview of what’s needed in terms of
branding for a RFL Facebook page.
Once available, add Division one pager on Facebook pages here.
Share with attendees these questions/guidelines about Facebook/Twitter pages:
Facebook/Twitter, etc.
Who will manage the page? At least one ACS staff needs admin access.
How often will updates be posted? (The nature of these sites dictates that new content be
published frequently.)
What does the proposed page offer that the existing site(s) do not?
Is the page informational only or does it include fulfillment functions? Please note that if it
includes fulfillment functions, you need to show that all aspects of fulfillment have been
considered (tracking of users back to constituent relationship management database,
distribution, consumer questions, etc.) NOTE: The page cannot involve e-commerce.
Websites and social networking pages cannot provide medical content or advice about medical
practices, products or services. All inquiries of a medical nature must be
re-directed to 1-800-227-2345 or cancer.org.
All websites and social networking pages must include the following disclaimer: “This is not the
official American Cancer Society website and it is not maintained by the Society. To contact the
American Cancer Society, call 1-800-227-2345 or visit cancer.org.”
Permission to use American Cancer Society brandmarks must be submitted via the staff partner
through the Logo Licensure database.
The website/page must not involve e-commerce. Donations or purchases of American Cancer
Society materials must be made through Convio sites, 1-800-227-2345 or cancer.org only. This
is to minimize the risk of taxation issues that might be unknown to you, but that could have
ramifications for the Society as a tax-exempt organization.
For participants, you can encourage them to “donate” their status and profile picture.
Our own Mid-South College Advisory Team created some really great profile pictures
you can access on their Facebook fan page and share with participants for their use.
Also on the Online Fundraising Resources page, you will find two documents that you
can use to promote Facebook- document links are Facebook Fridays and Facebook
Status Updates.
While we won’t be able to focus specifically on others today but encourage your
participants to use all their social networks to promote online fundraising and Relay
such as Twitter, LinkedIn, Foursquare, personal blogs, YouTube, etc.
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Review, Wrap-Up, Call to Action
(15 minutes)
________________________________________________________________
Address any questions in the parking lot. If there is time, feel free to ask for
Questions. Review the call to action
Additionally, the Mid-South Online Resource Center is a great resource for you if you
have any questions or want to learn more about Relay Online. You can visit the
Online Resource center at midsouthrfl.org-Resources-Leadership Development-
Online Fundraising Resources. This is where you can find guidebooks, email
calendars and much more about online fundraising. You can also find great tips, best
practices, and how-to documents.
Call to Action
1. Become familiar with the online fundraising resources on
midsouthrfl.org
2. Be an active participant on an event page to know more about what
your event participants are experiencing.
3. Stay in touch with other attendees from today to continue to share
best practices.
4. Become a pro at sending email campaigns.
5. Become familiar with how social media can help promote online
fundraising for your event.
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