Many years ago, when I was employed as a development director, I would gather the program staff once a year and ask the following question: “If we had unlimited amounts of money, what work would we do – and how would we do it?” In other words, I gave them explicit permission to go crazy. To dream without limits. To speak those dreams … [Read more...]
Are you prepared for planned gifts?
Note: This guest post from Christine Graham is adapted from her new book, Thinking About Planned Giving: Information for donors and their favorite causes. Thanks, Christine! Planned giving is increasingly popular and often sounds complicated. It need not be. When we talk about planned giving (or legacy giving), we mean a charitable … [Read more...]
Eight tips for building a great donor survey
Note: This guest post is from Laurel McCombs of The Osborne Group. Thanks, Laurel! My colleague Bob Osborne recently shared why now is the time to conduct your next donor survey. Ready to get started? Here are eight tips to consider. 1. Make sure you know WHY I often get asked about which questions should be included in a donor … [Read more...]
Time or money: Which is easier to get?
When leading a fundraising workshop, I often use the following two-minute exercise. “I want to try a thought experiment,” I might say, “and this experiment is about you.” That gets everyone’s attention. “I'm starting with two assumptions: you don’t have enough time and you don’t have enough money. I could be totally wrong – in … [Read more...]
How to build a gift chart: A fundraising exercise
What’s my favorite fundraising tool? That’s easy: show me a gift chart. If you’re like me, you need to understand how many donations, at what amounts, are needed to reach your goal. If the information is presented in a visual, easy-to-understand way, that’s even better. A gift chart can be used to: Test the feasibility of … [Read more...]
A fundraising recipe: Optimism, creativity, persistence
I once chaired a capital campaign that lasted seven years. That’s seven years of planning, designing, strategizing, and adapting. We completely rebuilt our facility in two phases, which required many, many conversations with architects, designers, and contractors. Seven years of fundraising equals a LOT of asks. In fact, some … [Read more...]
Ask for the gift – then be quiet
Do you need to raise more money? For most nonprofits, the most efficient fundraising strategy involves seeking major gifts from individual donors. Don’t be intimidated by the phrase “major gifts.” As we discussed in a recent post, you decide what “major” means. For grassroots groups, that could be $500 per year or $40 per month. … [Read more...]
Boards and Fundraising: Three Tasks Everyone Can Do
If you ask fundraising professionals to describe their deepest and most enduring fantasy, the answer would sound something like this: “Give me a wealthy board filled with wealthy people who will ask their wealthy friends for money.” Sure, those boards exist, but they are very, very rare. Unless you work with a legacy institution – a … [Read more...]