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January 28 Keeping the Silent Auction OpenWhen should I close the silent auction? Should I keep it open during dinner to try to raise more money? What about during the live auction? Good questions. We've spent a lot of time discussing this with clients and auctioneers. Our best advice is:
Close the silent auction before dinner & live auction. You can close it in sections or all at once, but we repeat Close the silent auction before dinner & live auction. Guests should enjoy themselves.In our experience, once dinner is served, bidding diminishes to a trickle. A few stalwarts will continue bidding. The rest of your guests will breathe a sigh of relief--"I'm ready to eat!" A small cadre will make half-hearted attempts to return to bidding occasionally, and more than a few will be annoyed that they still need to protect their bids, and can't simply enjoy dinner and the live auction.
It's exciting!When you count down to closings with all your guests in the silent auction area, it's exciting, and people eagerly bid against each other, raising more money for your cause. When you count down during dinner, perhaps 10-15% of the guests participate, and generally don't need to bid to win. The rest of the guests wonder when the emcee or auctioneer will quit talking on the microphone so they can return to their conversations.
It's friend-raising, not just fundraising.A fundraising auction is about raising money, AND it's also about building community. Your guests should be enjoying dinner and visiting with each other. They should feel free to enjoy the live auction and the auctioneer's performance--this is part of the evening's entertainment. If they're worried about a silent item they want, or trotting back and forth to check the bid, they're not having as good a time as they might, and they're not bidding in the live auction. Maybe they can't afford to bid in the oral auction, but you can't afford to have them distracting others who might.
Won't we lose revenue?In our experience, the incremental money raised by keeping the silent auction open during dinner & live auction is insignificant. But don't take our word for it: at your next event, go around and place a "tickmark" on the silent auction bid sheets just after the last bids, as dinner is being made available. When you pick up the bid sheets later, we believe you'll see that most items don't have higher bids. Once most bidders are done, they're done.
We don't have a live auction.OK, but the real question is "Why not?" All of our clients' and our own experiences shows that a well-run live auction, even with only 12-18 items, plus a pledge/fund-a-need/give from the heart/raise your paddle will raise as much or more as you've already raised in your silent auction. (usually more) If you're going to the trouble of organizing your event, and dinner, and table seating, and a festive theme, you're leaving too much money on the table by skipping a live auction. And yes, you need to hire a professional auctioneer--but that's a topic for another entry.
Data entry is easier.Ah yes, enlightened self-interest... Even with the fastest keypad entry operators and great software, it still takes a finite amount of time to enter winning bids, perhaps 5-10 seconds apiece. Multiply that times 300 items; 25-50 minutes, or more if there are interruptions, illegible bids, etc. You can reduce the time by networking several computers together, but it still takes some time. Then you want to run reports, check your data entry and print invoices for your guests. When you keep the silent auction open late, you reduce time for data entry. If guests try to leave early, you'll feel rushed, and have lines for checkout.
We've always done it this way...Yes, you have. We know this is a big change for some organizations. Don't be afraid to change. Focus on making your guest experience marvelous from start to finish. They'll thank you for it, they'll bid more cheerfully, and they'll be back next year!
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