This year’s CBAA Conference in Nipaluna/Hobart featured three sessions on fundraising and sponsorship:
- Opening Keynote – Adrian Sargeant
- Easy Station Sponsorship Strategies – Anthony Graham (Binjang Radio), Sue McLennan (MainFM), Steph Riddel (MainFM)
- The Next Step in Station Fundraising: Identifying and Engaging with Donors – Stephen Pyk (3MBS)
Here are 6 key takeaways from these sessions.
Opening KeynoteEmpty heading
1. Use identity-based social proof to lift giving now and later
When donors hear what someone else has given – for example, “another listener has just contributed $X” – their own gift size increases, even for renewing donors. The most effective amount to mention is around the 90–95th percentile of recent gifts for that segment. The experiments that Adrian’s team conducted show donations increase by a minimum of 10%.
2. Shape your language around how supporters see themselves
Donors give through their identity – as local community members, listeners, music lovers, carers, people of faith, etc. When fundraising messages use the same words donors use to describe themselves (e.g. caring, generous, kind) and remind them they’re part of a network of friends and family who also listen, people tend to give more. The job is to understand those identities (by actually asking supporters) and reflect them back in on-air scripts, emails and direct mail, rather than relying on generic language.
Easy Station Sponsorship StrategiesEmpty heading
3. Dedicated sponsorship roles and simple, flexible packages drive growth
Main FM’s experience shows that having a staff member focused on sponsorship, even part-time, can transform station revenue. When their Fundraising and Sponsorship Officer commenced (Supported by a CBF grant) this helped the station grow from 12 sponsors to around 60, with most being solid supporters. Most recently have streamlined ten packages down to five clear options, kept pricing accessible, and allowed room for tailoring, which has encouraged even more growth.
4. Understand your local market and build products to suit what businesses can afford
Tony from Binjang Radio demonstrated that sponsorship products work best when they’re built around a potent survey-based hyper-local broadcasting platform meeting your specific community’s needs and budgets with high listenership. It involved engineering a consistent formatic program to deliver the goods to listeners. Marketing affordable products for different budgets (30, 15, 7.5sec) were designed to fit every market segment, particularly small business and large corporates (Corporate Citizen) and locking them in for 12 months increased reliable cash flows with low marketing costs.
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The Next Step in Station Fundraising: Identifying and Engaging with Donors Empty heading
5. Philanthropy is relationship-based, not transaction-based
Stephen emphasised that philanthropy is not just fundraising. It’s about building trust, connection and a culture of generosity across your whole station community. Donors respond when communication is personal and relates to the impact of their donations.
6. Stewardship and consistent communication are key to retention
Identifying donors is only the first step. Retaining them depends on ongoing, thoughtful stewardship. Stephen highlighted the importance of thank-you processes, progress updates, personalised touches, and regular but not overwhelming contact. Donors stay when they feel valued, informed and connected. Avoiding donor fatigue, acknowledging delays honestly, and tailoring communication to donor motivations are all part of sustaining long-term giving and building a reliable donor community.
CBAA ResourcesEmpty heading
- Take a look at our radio website service, which has embedded fundraising features as well as being a cost-effective, feature-rich website solution designed specifically for community radio stations
- Generate revenue from your station’s streams, podcasts, and on-demand content via the Triton Advertising Platform
- Partner with Spots & Space for potential packages
- Visit the Sponsorship section of our Resource Library for more information
Next year’s CBAA Conference will be held in Geelong/Djilang 22-24 October 2026. Sign up to receive our communications to make sure you’re first to know when we release tickets.
This article has been prepared with the assistance of AI for transcription of presentation audio and summarising functions. The article has been reviewed by CBAA staff.