Wikimania 2014 bids/London/Logistics/Fundraising


WikiMania 2014 Logo


When a man is tired of London, he is tired of life;
for there is in London all that life can afford.
Samuel Johnson

Introduction The City Your Journey The Team Logistics Legacy


Logistics

Project Management Press & Partnerships Fundraising Financials


Fundraising Strategy

edit

Fundraising Website

edit

In February 2013 we will launch www.wikimanialondon.org, a specialised website specifically targeting potential sponsors. Brand use has already been cleared with WMF, and they retain control of the root domain.

Fundraiser at Level 39

edit

A primary criticism of London’s 2013 bid for Wikimania was the concern that the sponsorship target was too ambitious. With the expanded scope of this year’s bid to include a public festival, we aim to secure soft sponsorship commitments before the bid deadline in late March. As such, we propose to hold a fundraising event over the February / March period.

One Canada Square - Canary Wharf, London

The event will be held at Level 39, Europe’s largest financial technology incubator located on the 39th floor of One Canada Square. After a brief presentation from Jimmy Wales, senior representatives of the finance and technology industries will interact with the bid committee, WMUK staff and board over drinks and canapés. We are currently exploring the opportunity of having Boris Johnson attend the event to voice his support for the project.

The objective would be to introduce firms with significant marketing budgets to how Wikimania is a credible PR opportunity both for tech firms looking to establish themselves within London’s “Tech City”, and those looking for a more general charity/education/innovation outcome.

Attendees:

  • Wikimania London bid committee
  • Select staff members from WMUK and WMUK Board
  • Existing partners in the Bid (London First, TCIO, City of London Corp etc.)
  • Senior representatives of the financial services and technology industries

Should London fail to win the bidding process, the relationships formed at the event, built upon the optimism and excitement surrounding Wikimania and the personal involvement of Jimmy, can be carried over by the staff and board of WMUK into other WMUK projects.

Detailed Strategy

edit

Wikimedia 2014 London Fundraising Strategy: The "Why"

edit

Wikimedia 2014 London team are well-equipped to deliver an event that would set the bar in the Wikipedia community and meet the strategic priorities of the Wikimedia Foundation:

  • Proven ability of corporate fundraising and track record of effectively managing corporate relationships post-fundraising
  • Knowledge of appropriate sources of information
  • Understanding of the core legal and tax issues relevant to corporate fundraising

Strategic priorities of the Wikimedia Foundation are:

  • Increased participation: increase the total number of people served to 1 billion and the number of Wikipedia articles we offer to 50 million
  • Improved quality : increasing the percentage of material reviewed to be of high or very high quality by 25%
  • Increased reach: encourage readers to become contributors by increasing the number of total editors who make at least 5 edits per month to 200,000
  • Increased diversity: support healthy diversity in the editing community by doubling the percentage of female editors to 25% and increase the percentage of Global South editors to 37%
  • Greater innovation

The fundraising strategy is designed to meet the strategic priorities of the Wikimedia 2014 in the most cost-efficient manner:

  • Provide an annual forum for the Wikipedia community
  • Broaden public appeal and increase outreach to a high-quality pool of potential editors
  • Increase public awareness of Wikipedia

Wikimedia 2014 London Fundraising Strategy: The "How"

edit

The Wikimania 2014 London bid's fundraising strategy was developed with the objective of giving the Wikipedia community the best possible chance of bringing its members together in a high-quality, stimulating environment, whilst creating strong engagement with the public and increasing Wikipedia's outreach.

Importantly, the long-term benefits to Wikimedia Foundation go beyond the Wikimania:

  • Re-balancing of the revenue streams from pledges to strategic long-term sponsor relationships
  • Cultivated donor relationships facilitate meeting of the non-economic/long-term strategic objectives of the Foundation


To this end, the fundraising campaign will comprise these eight core components:

  1. Creating a strong editorial control and consistent messaging to potential sponsors:
    Focus on the project's educational potential and international scope
    Targeted and programmatic approach to speaker selection
  2. Maintaining a balanced event programming: public engagement and internal Wikipedia forum
  3. Identifying roles and responsibilities of the campaign board
  4. Setting the timeline and phasing of the campaign:
    Community expectations
    Employing appropriate solicitation tactics
    Sticking to the budgets and keeping the costs down
    Implementing communication and marketing plan
  5. Producing clear corporate sponsorship documentation and compelling/attractive fundraising documentation:
    Producing detailed sponsor research and classification by type of funds/contribution that can be generated
    Appraising opportunities for long-standing sponsor relationships through involvement with the Wikipedia community
  6. Devising tailored marketing techniques for specific sponsor categories
  7. Closing the campaign:
    Converting pledges to donations
    Developing post-campaign relationships
    Evaluating campaign’s performance
    Implementing lessons for the next generation of the Wikimedia organisers and for the Wiki community
  8. Post-closing performance management:
    Implementing data analytics to measure the success of the fundraising
    Enabling learning from the event for future Wikimedia event planning
    Analysing past fundraising performance to inform the future direction of the Wikimedia fundraising activities

Wikimedia 2014 London Fundraising Strategy: The "Who"

edit
OTM Sponsorship

The fundraising focuses on three core groups: media/telecom/tech companies, charitable foundations, and financial services companies. The Wikimedia sponsor offering will be tailored specifically to each group in order to maximise sponsorship opportunities for Wikipedia community. London Wikimania team has embarked on the preliminary conversations with the initial investor list. A list of candidates is detailed below.

  1. Media, telecommunications and technology companies, seeking to widen their charitable outreach and address new demographic:
    PayPal
    eBay
    Google
    Electronic Frontier Foundation
    Mozilla
    BT
    Orange
    Telefonica
    JESTA Digital
    Silverlake Partners
    Megafon
  2. Charitable Foundations, sympathetic to the Wikipedia cause of free knowledge for all:
    Wellcome Trust
    Edmond J. Safra Philantropic Foundation
    Big Society Capital
  3. Financial services companies, seeking to widen their public/charitable outreach:
    Morgan Stanley
    Credit Suisse
    Hoegh Capital Partners
    Merifin Capital
    Ashmore
    St.James Group
    Pictet&Cie
    Societe Generale

Wikimedia 2014 London Fundraising Strategy: The Team

edit
  • Anastasia Andrianova: Professional financial background (6 years in Investment Banking, Asset Management and Private Equity, latterly at Lehman Brothers), experience includes institutional fundraising. Successful fundraising track record at a start-up level. Wide network of potential sponsor relationships.
  • Ed Saperia: Professional financial background (4 years in Investment Banking at Barclays Capital), Investment Programme Manager at TechHub.
  • James Knight: Finance background (GCA Savvian, Silicon Bank Valley, Westpac Banking Corp, EP Capital), Successfully raised financing for a startup company, Well connected with large technology corporates i.e Google & Cisco
  • Andrew Tibbitts: Significant sponsorship background from working with London First. London First is a business membership organisation mandated to promote London as a global hub. Coordinated successful bid for 2012 Olympics. 2011 progress report.

In addition to the primary fundraising team we also have several advocates / supporting organisations which have pledged their assistance in raising capital.

  • Eric Van Der Kleij: Former head of the Tech City Investment Organisation and now Cheif Executive of Level 39, the largest financial tech incubator in Europe.
  • Elizabeth Varley: CEO and Co-Founder of TechHub, a world leading collaboration space for Technology Entrepreneurs, she is a professional sponsorship raiser and has strong links with government, tech and education industries.
  • Tech City Investment Organisation (Joanna Sheilds & Ben Southworth): Joanna is former MD of Facebook in Europe and now heads up the Tech City investment organisation, whose mandate is to make London the digital capital of Europe, They have pledged significant support from their staff and are actively recruiting sponsors for the event.
  • FMCM (Fiona McMorrough): (engaged by AA) UK's leading PR and Communications consultancy, specialising in literature, the arts, cultural events and campaigning. FMCM expertise spans publishing, international festivals, non-governmental organisations and leading charities. FMCM will be assisting with Wikimedia conference programming, speaker engagement and fundraising effort. [1]
  • Adoreum Partners (Annika Naidoo): (engaged by AA) UK's leading business development consultancy, focusing on enhancing their clients outreach and accelerating their sales process. In the case of Wikimedia, Adoreum Partners will be assisting with development of the sponsor offering, co-running the fundraising campaign and establishing long-standing relationships with brands and corporates. [http://www.adoreumpartners.com/

What if fundraising is unsuccessful

edit

Section coming soon.

Show your support!

{{User Wikimania London 2014}}
Follow us on Twitter! @wikimanialondon
Visit our website