See the Future: AR and VR in Fundraising

Reprinted from Starmark.com

The possibilities for augmented reality and virtual reality in fundraising are huge. After all, allowing donors to see your vision come to life, quite literally, is a powerful way to win allies and big donations.

Put architectural renderings to use
Facilities that are building or expanding will have architectural and design renderings as part of the planning process. Taking this 3D artwork and turning it into 2D marketing is kind of a waste. Allowing donors to explore a new space before it’s built is a perfect application for immersive VR at fundraising events – or for phone-based AR that makes a big impact while being more portable and accessible.

Stand out from the crowd
​When raising money, a big part of the challenge is getting donors to relate to your project. AR and VR are great ways to add impact to you story. Our last eTip covers how AR effectively stands out in social feeds, which are notoriously cluttered environments.

Conversely, most fundraising efforts are, let’s face it, still fairly analog in an increasingly digital world. Because these technologies are not yet widely used in the sector, they provide an effective way to stand apart from other organizations and causes vying for attention from donors.

The economics make sense
We covered the fact that AR and VR aren’t as expensive as you might think in our article about how to sell your first AR project. But we’re happy to discuss it here, too, because it really is a no-brainer. Tools like this absolutely will help you secure extra funding. And when closing just one additional donor equates to six or seven figures of additional fundraising, the investment in a reusable, refreshable AR or VR fundraising platform makes excellent sense.
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For more on this topic, you can also check out our South Florida Business Journal article on how to start small in AR, VR and 360 video.