by Doreen Martel

Created on: December 28, 2009   Last Updated: January 23, 2012

Nearly every nonprofit organization depends on volunteers to be successful. Volunteers are needed for disaster relief, to deliver meals or raise funds, and volunteers remain critical to the success of many organizations.  One of the challenges that nonprofit organizations face is how to effectively recruit more volunteers.  In today's busy society, it is even more challenging to find the right method to recruit volunteers. The

US Department of Labor released a study in January of 2009 that showed that more than 26% of the population volunteered during 2008.  Finding these volunteers can be challenging.  Let us review how to recruit more volunteers for nonprofit organizations.

Talk to existing volunteers - Chances are that the people who volunteer for your organization have a network of friends who may be interested in volunteer work.  One way to recruit new volunteers is to have a volunteer recruiting drive and encourage your existing volunteer base to invite their friends to participate.  There is a good chance that your current volunteers will be a great source to help you recruit more volunteers. Invite them to participate in an event to see what you do.  This can spark interest in new volunteers.

Contact donors - If you have a base of donors who are already interested in your nonprofit organization, they may be the ideal source of new volunteers. If someone believes enough in the cause your nonprofit organization is promoting, there is a good chance they will be willing to volunteer their time to strengthen the organization.  Donors can be a great source to recruit new volunteers for your nonprofit organization.

Visibility - While it is critically important to the success of any nonprofit organization to be visible in their community. Today, it is also critical that you be visible online. More and more people depend on the Internet for information, a well thought out website, a blog and even social networking can help you raise awareness of your nonprofit.  The more visibility you have the more likely you are to be able to recruit new volunteers for your nonprofit organization.

Recognition - Do not overlook the value of recognizing your current volunteers and the impact it could have on future volunteers.  While many people do not volunteer for pure recognition, it can certainly be a driving force.  Actively recognizing volunteers in your community through press releases, recognizing contributions of time on your nonprofit blog and highlighting special achievements of volunteers can result in more attention being focused on your nonprofit organization.

Ask - The most under-utilized tool in recruiting volunteers is you!  You will never know if someone is willing to volunteer unless you ask them!  When you are trying to decide how to recruit volunteers for nonprofit organizations keep in mind the first step is asking someone to help you!  This will go a long way to successfully recruiting volunteers.

Once an organization has found the right way to recruit volunteers, the challenges will continue. Most people do not have a lot of free time and therefore the organization must be certain that they are utilizing volunteers effectively and providing them with worthwhile opportunities.

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