About
Bayshore Christian Ministries is a youth development organization. They strive to serve youth holistically by equipping them to grow spiritually, gain life skills and develop as leaders so they have hope in the future.
Bayshore’s Bible Club program gives youth the opportunity to meet in various sites across the community as an after school activity. Kids can engage in a Bible lesson, play games, receive free tutoring, and a meal. They also provide opportunities to equip youth with skills and technological training they wouldn’t otherwise receive.
The Challenge
In order to continue the vital work of serving their community’s youth, they needed additional funding. Previously, all funding for the organization had been raised through events of various sizes.
Heather Biscoe, the development officer of Bayshore Christian Ministries, wanted to try and vary their fundraising tactics and try online fundraising for the first time. Additionally, they knew they had a committed supporter group that would help them fundraise if only given the tools to fundraise on Bayshore’s behalf.
For its 30th anniversary, Bayshore wanted to ask its audience to give $30 to support their programs this year.
How CauseVox Helped
The CauseVox platform helped Bayshore communicate with supporters and gave individual fundraisers the tools they needed to spread the word. By branding their CauseVox campaign with their $30 for 30 Years theme and their colors and logo, the site supported not only the campaign but the overall mission. Adding photos and videos made the story even more compelling.
Through the personal and team fundraising feature, they gained 17 supporters who built their own personal fundraising pages. By building their own pages they were able to tell their own stories about Bayshore, and since most of these fundraisers were comfortable with social media, they could share these stories and spread the word quickly about the campaign.
Their Results
As a result of good planning and through the use of the CauseVox tools, they were able to exceed their initial goal of $10,000 by 42% ultimately raising $14,230. This allows Bayshore Christian Ministries to continue to provide much needed after school programs to the children of East Palo Alto.
They were extremely happy with their first online fundraising experience, noting that it’s a lot easier to plan a crowdfunding campaign than a big fundraising event!
