Sarah Lynn

Assistant Director of Development and Marketing


Mental Health Association of Frederick County

fcmha.org/

I’m the Assistant Director of Development and Marketing at the Mental Health Association of Frederick County (MHA) with my main focus on development. MHA builds a strong foundation of emotional wellness for the whole community by preparing resilient children, securing vulnerable families, and standing with people to face crises together. 

We’ve had a fantastic experience with Qgiv’s auction platform. Every year, we host a gala and live auction with over 500 attendees (this year is the 26th year). Having everything in one platform makes tracking and follow-up so simple. Our last gala was incredibly successful—we raised a net of approximately $200,000 between sponsorships, a live appeal, and a live auction, all run through Qgiv. We exceeded our goal AND raised more than we ever have when compared to previous years!  

Qgiv keeps us organized with registration, checkout, detailing the auction packages, and more. Being able to enter different packages and share the links directly is super helpful not only for me, but also for our attendees and sponsors. This was our first year using Givi, but it’s already been a great experience too, and our attendees are excited about the event and auction packages. 

Ogiv has also improved our cultivation and stewardship of event attendees because we know if they gave during the event. Additionally, the integration with Bloomerang, which is SO SIMPLE and effective, helped us capture more attendee details, which makes it easy to convert them into donors that night or in the months following. It’s such a win for our organization! We’ve been able to effectively mine data between the two platforms, and that’s enabled us to better segment our fundraising appeals and strategize future fundraising goals. Both platforms are user-friendly, and I recommend Qgiv and Bloomerang to all my fundraising pals! 

In addition to Qgiv’s auction platform, being able to create a special giving form for third-party events and fundraisers is one of my favorite Qgiv features. It’s so easy to do, and donors love it. For example, we had donors who were getting married, and instead of a registry, they asked friends and family to give to a few of their favorite nonprofits. We were able to create a special landing page and giving form just for them!   

Qgiv’s support and resources—including the monthly newsletter, various email communications, and webinars—have also been so helpful. I love that Qgiv offers webinars at all levels of knowledge. There are some bits and pieces of the platform I only use once a year, so having videos and articles about how to do those things that are easily searchable in the Help Desk is extremely helpful. I’ve also had amazing experiences with the Customer Experience team.  

The support staff are always so kind and really take their time walking through an issue or question with me, and I know I can call back if I haven’t quite gotten the hang of something. 

Qgiv has truly exceeded my expectations.  Between Qgiv’s capabilities, data collection, and support staff, it’s been wonderful! I’ve worked in fundraising/development for 10 years now, and Qgiv may be the most user-friendly platform I’ve ever used.  

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