Thank You for becoming a Santa for the hospital!

Signing up for this years Santa Slide means that any donations you raise will help continue to bring moments of happiness and comfort to patients, especially children, for this Christmas and beyond. 

We know it takes time and commitment to fundraise sponsorship, so we've come up with some idea that might help:

1. Make sure your first donation on your online giving page is from the donor who is most likely to sponsor you the most.
   If your first donor gives £2, expect a flurry of £1, £2 and £5 donations. However, if your first donation is £20, then expect the next donations to be more in the £5, £10 and £20 league. Make sure that before you post your online giving page onto your social media, that you get your best donor to sponsor you first.  
   
   
2. Post your online fundraising page on you social media and do it multiple times!
   Your online giving page is your number one tool when it comes to fundraising. You can copy and paste that link and post it on Facebook, Instagram, X, in a WhatsApp group and LinkedIn. But don’t just post it once – post it multiple times. Social media firms use complex algorithms, and sometimes your post gets buried. Posting multiple times will reduce the chance of that happening. Plus seeing your post again will often jog people’s memory to sponsor you. 
   
   Try to post your online giving page at least three times between now and the zip-wire. Ask your friends and family to share it on their pages too. 
   
   
3. You will definitely get more sponsorship if you ask people directly
   A post on social media is a reactive ask - you put your page online and hope that people decide to sponsor you. However, it’s easy to scroll past a post or for it to be lost in the algorithms. But a direct question of “will you sponsor me?” means people must make a choice – Yes or No. This is a proactive ask and can be done: 
   • By email – not a blanket email to multiple people, but a direct email to an individual. “Hi X, not sure if you saw on Facebook, but I’m doing a zip-wire at the Eden Project. I was wondering if you’d sponsor me? It’s for a really good cause, my fundraising page is… ”
   • In person – give them the QR code and / or web link to your fundraising page;
   • By Message: use Facebook messenger, text message or whatsapp, and don’t forget to include the link!  
4. Use a poster with a QR code
   If you work (or socialise) in a high visibility environment (e.g. ward, office, pub or club) hang a poster with a QR code that leads straight to your fundraising page. You can also use them as fliers to hand out. This gives people the opportunity to sponsor you straight away, rather than committing (and forgetting) to do it later. We can provide you with one of these. 
   
   
5. Let people know WHY you're doing it
   When you are fundraising, people will donate to you for one of two main reasons – either they want to support you personally or they want to support the cause. If you’re raising money for a specific ward or department, let people know the great work that happens on there. If you’re doing it for the hospital in general, there are some wonderful stories on our website about what we’ve spent charity donations on, including:   
   • MRI Play Rocket, to enable children to practice being in an MRI machine. 
   • A day at the zoo: for young cancer patients and their families
   • Eye Gaze Communication Device in the ICU, to open new ways of communication for patients who have been intubated or are unable to speak or move.

We're interested!

Connect with us on social media, follow our pages, and tag us in any of your posts. We'll share your news! 
Facebook: @PlymouthHospCharity 
Instagram: @Plymouthhospitalscharity

To contact our team for support or if you’d like to share your story with us, please reach out to us at phcharityteam@nhs.net or call 01752 430 332.