Annual Report 2025/Story: Fundraising and the development of the F2F method

Det här är en översatt version av sidan Verksamhetsberättelse 2025/Story: Insamling och utveckling av F2F-metoden. Översättningen är till 100 % färdig och uppdaterad.

In this story, we describe how the association continued to develop its F2F work and how in 2025 we were able, together with partners, to recruit members on site at their venues while highlighting our joint projects. Telemarketing to encourage donors to become members was also tested, with good results.

Throughout 2025, Wikimedia Sverige continued to develop its fundraising and membership recruitment work through the so-called face-to-face method (F2F), in which recruiters are present in places where many people pass by in order to invite them into conversation and present the association's work. The aim of the F2F work was to complement the association's previous experience of direct fundraising (earlier F2F campaigns in streets and public squares) with membership recruitment in physical settings where Wikimedia Sverige is already active. What was new in 2025 was exploring the possibility of organizing fundraising work in collaboration with cultural heritage institutions, especially museums.

This approach proved to be an interesting way of deepening conversations while also clearly illustrating the association's method for increasing the amount of free knowledge on the platforms we support. By being present in museum environments, Wikimedia Sverige was able to both raise the visibility of its own work and to highlight material and projects developed together with the institutions; something that both the association and the museums can benefit from.

However, the work of establishing this type of activities proved to be more complex than had initially been estimated. This, combined with the fact that recruiting fundraisers was challenging, contributed to the planned F2F campaign being delayed and ultimately carried out on a smaller scale than intended. For this reason, during the final part of the campaign, we also tested phoning existing donors directly, with the aim of strengthening our relationships with them by telling them more about the association and the possibility of becoming a member. The calls were also used to collect e-mail addresses, which will facilitate future communication.

The experiences from the campaign show that conversations and membership recruitment at cultural heritage institutions can be a valuable way of reaching new members. This helps strengthen the association's image among members who join after meeting us at museums, and can at the same time deepen our collaborative bonds with the institutions that host us.

At the same time, this experience shows that dialog with partners needs to take place well in advance, and that schedules and expectations placed on recruiters, such as e.g. the number of hours they will be working, need to be clarified earlier in the process. The possibility of combining activities with partners with member recruitment in places such as streets, public squares, or fairs could also make the assignment more attractive and flexible.

This work has also highlighted challenges linked to volunteer engagement. When work requires presence at a specific place and time, it becomes more difficult to define clear volunteer roles, especially when the association also needs to ensure staffing when we are engaged with partner organizations.

Looking ahead to the coming year, the focus will therefore be on developing clearer volunteer roles, developing strategies for how volunteers can be integrated into the association's projects, and establishing more long-term, well-organized collaborations with partners well in advance of planned campaigns. These steps are considered important for strengthening the association's ability to work in a more systematic and sustainable way with fundraising going forward.