The Participation Strategy: A London Business School Giving Day Story

Where their story begins

When London Business School (LBS) launched its first Giving Day in 2016, it achieved excellent results. Three years on, after three more Giving Days, they’ve increased both donations and participation through continuous evaluation. Every giving day provides learning opportunities as the team tests different approaches, keeping the appeal fresh for returning audiences.

The team discussed their experience running one of the UK’s longest-running giving day programmes, sharing insights on proper resourcing, how the programme enhanced their overall giving strategy, and how their alumni community came to understand what “giving day” means.

A different approach

Hubbub: What’s the attraction of a Giving Day for LBS?

LBS: It’s a different way of encouraging participation. Because it’s digital, younger donors respond better than to traditional methods. Our alumni base is relatively young, so it’s a fun engagement approach that creates community and strengthens our global network. Videos, social media, and email make it more inclusive and help us reach wider. As a virtual event, it lets our global community reflect on their LBS experience and how they can invest in the community.

After three Giving Days, we see it plays a vital role in raising donor participation levels. We originally viewed it as attracting new donors, but it’s become an important fundraising tool and brings in useful annual revenue.

Our approach continues evolving. We’ve held it at different times and tried new approaches, in 2019, we introduced Hubbub’s Ambassador platform, so it’s continuing to develop.

An education

H: After three Giving Days, what’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned?

LBS: Our first Giving Day was very manual, we even had a manual totaliser, making real-time updates challenging. We underestimated the planning and workload. With donors worldwide but our updating team based in London needing sleep, coordination was difficult.

We also tried doing too much in a short timeframe. Running over 36 hours with only 6-8 weeks planning meant many ad hoc decisions on the day. Results were good, but we didn’t enjoy it. Working with Hubbub in year two automated processes, enabling real-time updates and letting us focus on creative alumni, staff, and student engagement.

A fresh challenge

H: What’s been your biggest challenge?

LBS: Making each Giving Day feel fresh and exciting is our biggest challenge. The first was obviously new for our alumni, they wanted to learn and participate. But many have joined three times now, so we must examine our communications and explore different engagement and motivation approaches.

Each Giving Day is a bigger task because we increase our goal annually. We’re realistic about targets and achieving them. The challenge is making this meaningful to donors each time.

A big hit

H: What’s been successful over the years?

LBS: One major success is how Giving Days engaged staff. Initially, just select people participated. Now everyone wants involvement and to give, encouraging others. It feels like a community event.

Another success is smoother operations yearly. This comes from experience and process automation, but also shows we’re getting messaging right and alumni are more engaged.

A date in the diary

H: How have your different audiences responded to the Giving Days?

LBS: We realized early that educating audiences about Giving Days takes time. It’s not radical annual shifts, but gradual progress.

Alumni respond more positively yearly. Our Ambassadors expect it annually, it’s a calendar date. Results show increasing reach yearly, indicating higher engagement. Because alumni see gifts of different sizes, they realize everything counts, encouraging their own donations regardless of size.

We focus on alumni, but we’ve started involving students more by using Giving Day to complement existing structures. This has been well-received, and engaging them on campus starts them on a giving path.

A global presence

H: How has your Ambassadors’ role developed?

LBS: For 2019, we’re using Hubbub’s Ambassadors platform to expand global reach further. We have great ambassadors worldwide, wanting to move beyond European focus and show LBS’s global nature.

We’re increasing post and share creativity. Planning ahead and collecting content early lets us drip-feed it when needed.

We’re also using ambassadors as message signatories for peer-to-peer approaches, using their voice. People respond better to these messages, so we’ve done more yearly.

A planned strategy

H: What advice do you have for anyone thinking about running a Giving Day?

LBS: Take the leap if it fits your strategy. It’s not a fix-all, but it’s exciting, appeals widely, and drives participation. You don’t need everything year one, start small and develop yearly.

Planning thoroughly is most important. First, plan how the day runs: right technology and tools, anticipating possible scenarios. It’s a hectic 24 hours with unexpected things. If everyone adapts and prepares well, it’s fun.

Second, plan your team’s roles and set expectations. Engaging volunteers to reach their networks and involve others is crucial.

Finally, while most activity happens in those 24-36 hours, it’s enabled by hard work before the day.

A few helpful tips

H: What are your top planning tips?

LBS: Think about different scenarios. What should you achieve halfway through? If you haven’t, what’s your response? Work through situations so you don’t panic. Have a contingency plan identifying who decides when to use it and who’s informed, do Directors or the Dean need knowing? More scenario thinking makes the day more enjoyable.

Get people involved early. Once aboard, use their knowledge and experience. Different perspectives and ideas keep the day fresh and relevant yearly.

Have a strong communications plan knowing exactly when messages go out. Have everything signed off in advance. Even if you change a message on the day, everything still goes out on time.

Establish proper accounting processes. Ours is automated now, but some manual processes remain after. Knowing what data’s needed and who does what makes post-event banking easier.

Finally, have fun! Right planning makes the day enjoyable for everyone.

Until Next Time

H: What’s next for LBS and Global Give?

LBS: After running four giving days over four years, we’re evaluating how Global Give fits into our overall giving and engagement strategy. We know giving days work and our community embraces them, but we want a more programmatic future approach. We have university-wide events where Global Give fits nicely. Taking time now to integrate these activities together could gain more traction with our community. Watch this space!