Gold Coast Marathon Double Fundraising Despite Covid Cancellation

For this Customer Story, we caught up with the team from the Village Roadshow Theme Parks Gold Coast Marathon to congratulate them on an awesome year of fundraising and to understand what went on behind the scenes to help achieve these results.

Q: How much did you raise this year compared to previous years?

A: We are thrilled to have raised over $450,000 for our charity partners and their causes. This was our first year partnering with Grassrootz and I am happy to share that we doubled our fundraising year on year which is a tremendous effort given fundraising was on the decline for the previous two years.

Q: You doubled fundraising despite the event being cancelled and less participants, what did you do differently compared to previous years?

A: Because of the newly integrated registration and fundraising workflow, which was a unique benefit of working with Grassrootz, we saw a significant increase in the number of people fundraising. Also, because we introduced charity packages this year for the first time, we were able to partner closely with more charities which achieved a far greater result in fundraising.

Q: I understand fundraising was on the decline for your event, do you know why it had been progressively trending down?

A: There's a few things that come to mind that were at play here. Firstly, there was no integration between the registration platform and fundraising platform in previous years - thanks to Grassrootz they made this possible for us this year which had a tremendous impact. Secondly, we didn't receive the same level of support and commitment from our previous fundraising partner as we have done with the Grassrootz team. They have been very proactive and focused on the fundraising opportunities for our event over the immediate and long term. Lastly, we experienced a noticeable difference in the level of charity engagement since working with Grassrootz and they have really helped to build the culture of fundraising around the event. We are excited to continue building on this year's success!

Q: It was great to see over 3,500 participants setting up a fundraising page. What were the key factors that contributed to the fundraising success?

A: I would say the introduction of charity packages for the first time this year meant more charities were getting behind the event, helping to amplify participation and fundraising. As a result, we have learned that the Gold Coast Marathon running community very much wants to support charities and their causes as part of their run. We want to ensure we are there to support our community to raise as much money for charity through this iconic event.

Q: Are you excited about the fundraising potential in the future and why?

A: Of course! We are committed to building the culture of fundraising in the Gold Coast Marathon. We believe we are going to go from strength to strength and will aim to double our fundraising again over the next three years.

Q: How did Grassrootz approach fundraising differently to how it had been done previously?

A: The biggest difference was the integration. Grassrootz led the way in developing a tight integration with our registration platform to create a refreshed registration and fundraising workflow. This was a recommendation from Grassrootz and as a result, we saw a significant increase in the number of people fundraising and therefore a tremendous increase in fundraising.

Q: How did you find working with Grassrootz?

A: It has been an amazing result and the Grassrootz team has been so awesome to work with. We would recommend Grassrootz to anyone!

Q: What feedback did you receive from fundraisers and donors?

A: We had the least amount of enquiries ever in 2021, because we made the move to Grassrootz. This was a massive value add for our team on multiple levels. Not only did it mean our team had more time to focus on the event logistics, but it also meant our fundraisers could get on with raising money for the causes they care about. We have received wonderful feedback from our fundraisers about the ease of using the platform and their overall experience setting up fundraising pages and sharing with their donors. We are thrilled that we have made a positive impact on fundraising overall thanks to Grassrootz.