Raffle-Tickets.us Blog

When planning a raffle intended to be a significant fundraiser, it’s very important to advertise it properly. This is one aspect of running a raffle that many organizers forget or neglect. But if you don’t advertise well, you won’t enjoy the highest level of success. Think about it–if nobody knows about your raffle, how can they buy tickets? Many organizations don’t go beyond word-of-mouth advertising to promote their raffle. This is a great way to get the word out, but you really need to explore some more avenues to earn the most money for your enterprise.

Of course, the methods you use to advertise your raffle will depend on the cause you’re raising money for. For instance, if you’re running a school raffle you’ll probably focus on local channels, whereas for a national non-profit organization, you’d want to use channels that had a much wider audience. So start by thinking of that audience. Who are they, and how do they get their news? Where do they shop? What websites are they likely to visit? By asking yourself these questions, you can get a fairly good idea of where you ought to advertise. Some ideas include:

• School and community message boards
• Grocery stores and other local retailers
• Local radio stations
• Local television channels
• Newspapers, local or national
• Your website
• Enthusiast websites (e.g. environmental websites if you’re an environmental NPO)
• Flyers and bumper stickers
• Email lists

Lately I’ve been seeing a lot of news articles about organizations raffling off homes–everything from Brazilian castles to typical suburban single family homes. Now, in the case of a raffle being run by a huge organization or wealthy personality, I have no problem imagining where they got the funds to do such a thing. But I’ve seen a ton of references popping up to smaller non-profits raffling off houses. This peaked my interest, so I started to look into it.

Apparently, in some states individual home owners can work with non-profit organizations to raffle off their houses. The idea is that, if you can’t sell your house on the regular market (presumably because your buyers can’t get mortgages and not because the house is a disaster), rather than selling it off for way less than market value and not being able to pay off your own mortgage you can sell raffle tickets so that both you and the NPO get a good deal.

If you’re interested, you’ll have to look up the laws in your own state. But in general the way it works is that you draw up an agreement with an NPO under which they agree to buy your home from you at appraised value once they have sold a predetermined number of raffle tickets. If they don’t sell enough tickets, the house stays in your hands. But if they do, they buy the house and get to keep an raffle proceeds that exceed that price to fund their organization.

It sounds like a pretty sweet deal, if you can pull it off. Especially in this real estate market. Do you know anyone who’s done it successfully?

Before you go ahead and start planning your raffle, make sure to look into your state’s gambling laws. I just read an article about a Utah community that was planning to raise money for a new police dog by selling raffle tickets. Unfortunately, they failed to take into account that the state’s strict gambling laws forbade raffles. Now, these folks had the best of intentions. Their county needed a new drug-sniffing dog and this seemed like a harmless way to raise the necessary funds. But the law is the law.

So do a little research before you launch your raffle. In many states, raffles for charities are legally allowed, considered on the same level as state lotteries. In other places, like Utah apparently, they’re a no-go no matter what the cause. The relevant laws are legislated by the state. Simply Google your state and raffle laws. The information is often on the website of the state attorney general, though in some states, like Kentucky, a separate government department may exist to handle charitable gaming laws.

Here’s a new one to me. I just read a news article out of Austin Texas about a political candidate who’s trying to use a raffle to glean information about likely Republican voters. The campaign is offering raffle tickets to supporters who submit contact information for voters who might support the campaign. The idea is an innovative one.

Of course, it’s not far off from all of those raffles for cars you see in malls that are run for the sole purpose of getting consumer contact information. An interesting twist is that the campaign is tailoring the prizes to their constituency, hoping to narrow down the type of information that is submitted and weed out random submissions in that way. The prizes include meals with prominent Republicans, a lesson in marksmanship and a calf-roping lesson with a lieutenant-governor.

This could be turned into a good strategy for many organizations hoping to raise money through a raffle. Take a lead from this campaign and customize your prizes to your audience. Say you’re environmental group trying to get the word out about buying locally. Offer prizes like a membership to a CSA, a personal tour of a local farm or a year’s supply of locally-raised, grass fed beef. Not only could you sell more tickets to those who are already interested in your cause, prize winners who are not as familiar with locally grown food will get a first hand experience.

Believe it or not, football season is soon upon us.  It feels like baseball season just started, doesn’t it?  Anyway, it is time for the early fundraisers for schools.  I just recently heard that one of our local schools is holding a football raffle to benefit the school.  Most fundraisers are just to benefit the team, so this one definitely stands out.

Basically, they built a box seat in the bleachers on the 50 yard line.  They are raffling off the opportunity to watch one of the games in the box seat, which also includes free refreshments from the concession stand.  What a great idea, huh?!  They are selling raffle tickets for $3 a piece or 5 tickets for $10.

Not only is this a great way to raise money for the school before the school year begins, but it is also a great way to fill seats at the football games.  This raffle will benefit them down the road when people are paying to get into the game just to get a look at the box seat and who is in it that week.  I love this idea, and I wanted to pass it on for you all to use!

Have I ever mentioned how much I love new and unique raffle ideas?  Well, I found one that I think is great and would love to share it.  This one comes from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife (WDFW) and they are selling raffle tickets for their big game hunt raffles in the fall.  Basically, if you win one of the raffles they give you a big game permit for hunting.

Included in the raffle are opportunities to hunt black-tailed deer, mule deer, white-tailed deer, westside elk, eastside elk, California big horn sheep, moose, mountain goats, turkey, cougar, black bear, and bull elk.  I don’t know much about hunting, but I’m assuming the opportunity to hunt these animals is a big enough deal to buy raffle tickets to be able to do.  I know a few hunters and I’ve told them about this raffle and their eyes got pretty wide.

The prices of the raffle tickets range from $5.90 to $22.10 a piece depending on the species you want to hunt.  I love this idea of varying the cost of the raffle tickets to match the prize.  I would definitely recommend doing this if you have a raffle coming up anytime soon.  It’s a great way to increase your profits.

I just recently heard of Pennsylvania Lottery’s Millionaire Raffle.  This year was the tenth year in a row that they have held this raffle, and they just made four new people millionaires!  They had a total of $5,089,200 in cash prizes, so there were other cash prizes as well.  I believe that other than the other million dollar prizes that there were also a hundred thousand dollar prizes, a thousand dollar prizes, and hundred dollar prizes.  There is no better raffle prize than money, that’s for sure.

As far as I know or have heard of, Pennsylvania is the only state that holds a raffle like this.  All of their proceeds go to funding programs that benefit older residents of the state.  That is amazing.  I love that all of that money goes to a great cause that feeds back into bettering their state.  This is a fad that should definitely catch on around the country.

Can you imagine if every state in the United States held a raffle like this?  It would not only involve communities in their state’s welfare, but the money given as prizes would better other people’s lives as well.  It is such a progressive and productive idea.  I would definitely spend money on buying  raffle ticket that supports our state.  Now if only I can get them to buy my raffle tickets :).

The is this amazing raffle that goes on every year in the area where I live.  It is thrown by a hospital to raise money for their children cancer ward.  It is amazing how many people participate in this raffle and the prize is incredible.  They buy a dream house in a highly desirable neighborhood and raffle it off for $100 a ticket.  It is quite the hot ticket item around here.

My husband and I enter the raffle every year.  Not only are we happy to do it because it goes to a wonderful cause, it is also a fantastic prize to win.  I mean, who doesn’t want to win a dream house?!  It is much bigger than anyone would ever need, but it is extremely beautiful and desirable.

If any other organizations out there can afford to do a raffle like this, I would highly recommend it.  It will get a lot publicity for your organization and you will have no trouble selling raffle tickets.  People always want to support a good cause, especially when the money they donate is qualifying them to win a prize of a lifetime.

A lot of people aren’t comfortable going door to door to fund raise.  For whatever reason, it intimidates them or they feel like they are intruding on people.  Nevertheless, it is so important to sell your raffle tickets in an proactive manner.  No one is going to come up to you asking you to sell them a raffle ticket.

The idea that most raffle ticket sellers seem to like is going up to a local store or shopping center and setting up a booth to sell tickets at.  This seems less intrusive in a way, and you get a lot of traffic.  You have to be sure to get permission from the store owners or managers to do this though.  The positive to this is that if they like your organization or cause that they may even sell tickets for you.

Another benefit to this type of raffle ticket selling is that you can do it alongside of a bake sale or a cook out.  It’s a great way to bring in some extra money.  Make sure that you have signs up for your organization or cause so people know what you are selling raffle tickets for.  Another good idea would be to have some flyers or pamphlets to hand out that explain your cause a little bit more in depth.  Have fun selling your tickets!

A big prize like a car requires a big raffle.  If you are looking to raise a whole lot of money for your organization, choosing a car as your raffling prize is definitely the way to go.  There are a few things you have to consider though when you are throwing a car raffle.  They are not the easiest raffles to put together.

Most organizations offer a cash prize in place of the car if the winner decides he/she does not want the car.  Also, it’s a good idea to offer a few smaller cash prizes to help you sell more tickets for your organization.  What you don’t want to come across as is one of those car raffles that they hold in almost every mall in America.  You are not out to steal people’s addresses, you are out to raise money for a good cause and you need to make sure people know that.

The car you choose needs to be a desirable car, not just any car.  You will want to work with a dealer to get this car, and offer them lot’s of free advertising to be able to get a good deal on the car.  A plus to going with a dealer is that you can use their client base as possible raffle ticket buyers by mailing them a letter about the raffle and keeping the car your raffling off, along with a sign for your raffle, in their show room where a lot of people will see it.   These are just a few things to consider.