We're at $42,726 toward our $67,500 team goal, with three months until we line up in Staten Island on November 1. That's 63 percent of the way there. It's a good place to be in early August and it is not a finished place to be.
The math, so nobody has to guess
There's $24,774 left to raise. We have 17 runners and about 13 weeks. Split evenly, that's $1,457 per runner, or roughly $115 a week between now and race day.
Nobody actually raises it evenly. It comes in lumps: a $500 gift from an aunt in week one, then three quiet weeks, then $1,200 in a single afternoon because somebody finally sent the email they'd been drafting in their head since May. The point of the weekly number isn't to hit it every week. It's so that when you check in mid-September you know whether you're ahead or behind without doing math at midnight.
The second ask is where the money is
Most of us sent one announcement when we got our acceptance and then went quiet, because a second ask feels like nagging. It isn't. People who meant to give in June genuinely forgot. Your email arrived on a Tuesday during a work crisis, they thought "I'll do that tonight," and then they didn't. Or they thought I will give in November or when it gets closer.
A follow-up isn't asking twice. It's asking once, to someone who never really got asked the first time. The runners on this team who finish above their goal are almost always the ones who sent three messages instead of one.
Three messages you can send this week
1. The personal ask, to someone who has never gotten one. Not a blast. One person, by name, with a reason it's them.
Hi Dana — I'm running the New York City Marathon on November 1 for Fred's Team, which raises money for cancer research at Memorial Sloan Kettering. I'm at about $2,500 of my goal and I've got three months left. Would you be up for $100? My page is here: [link]. Either way I'll send you a photo from the finish line.
Name a number. "Anything helps" gets you $25 from people who would have given $100 if you'd asked for $100.
2. The follow-up, to people who didn't respond. Short, no guilt, new information.
Following up on this, I hit 18 miles on Saturday, which is the farthest I've ever run. Still $1,400 short of my goal. If you've been meaning to and it slipped, here's the link: [link]
The new information is what makes it a fresh message instead of a repeat. Give them a mile number, a long run, a bad weather run, a training week.
3. The one to people who already gave. Your existing donors are your best fundraisers, and most of us never ask them for anything but money.
Thank you again for donating back in June, it genuinely got me out the door on some hot mornings. One favor: if you know anyone who'd want to support MSK, would you forward this? [link]
Small things that keep working
- Put the link in your email signature. It costs nothing and it works for three months while you do nothing.
- Text one person a day. Fifteen seconds each. That's 90 asks between now and race day.
- Post the run, not the plea. A photo from mile 16 with the link at the bottom outperforms a graphic that just says "donate."
- Ask about employer matching. A lot of companies match dollar for dollar, and most donors never check. We'll go deeper on this in a few weeks, but if you do nothing else, add one line to your ask: "If your employer matches gifts, it doubles automatically."
- Ask for a specific amount. $50, $100, $250. Specific requests get answered. Vague ones get postponed.
Three months. $24,774. Send the second email.
