Posts Tagged ‘nonprofit fundraising’
Posted by Gayle Gifford on December 1, 2011 in Fundraising
At the AFP Massachusetts 2011 Fundraising Conference on November 30th, Margaret McKenna, former CEO and now senior advisor to the Walmart Foundation, shared some tips for appealing to corporate grant makers that I’d like to pass along to you.
- Use your “heart and instincts.” Think about what would move you to give money, and write accordingly.
- Make your case succinctly right up front. Be very “crisp” right from the start by defining the problem and how you are planning to address it. Show why your organization has the credibility to address this problem. Don’t lead with a boilerplate mission and history.
- “Use bullet points.” Explain the need, why the need is important and how it is not being met, whether anyone else is addressing this, and why the money should go to you.
- In writing about your mission, explain why it is important. Would some other group have to come along to address this if you went away? Would anyone care?
- Show your passion.
- Explain your expertise, the commitment you’ve already demonstrated to this issue, and how it fits in with what you do.
- Explain how many lives will be affected and the impact you seek to have, not just how many people you plan to “touch.”
Good advice for making your case to any donor, don’t you think?
Have any success stories of corporate grant seeking you’d like to share? I’d love to hear them.
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P.S. Of course, if the funder has a specific format they want you to use, remember to follow that.
P.P.S. Formerly the President of Lesley University, Ms. McKenna talked about the lack of understanding about nonprofits she encountered when she moved into the corporate sector. She noted that of the foundation heads of the Fortune 100 companies, only 3% had nonprofit experience. And, that most had spent a good portion of their working lives within the corporation whose foundation they were now leading.
Overall, she felt our sector had a lot of work to do teaching the corporate sector about the nonprofit sector. (I agree. And government too.). Joking, she mentioned that PowerPoint presentations with lots of graphs and charts were very influential tools in corporate culture.
But never just assume lack of knowledge about your issues or the sector… make sure that you know who you are talking to. Remember to do your research on the background of your grants officer.
Related posts:
How we got the grant Part 1
How we got the grant Part 2
You can hear a lot by listening
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on October 12, 2010 in Fundraising
My rules encounter
A few months ago, I ran a training session for the board and staff of a local nonprofit on evaluating outcomes. Because I like the organization and its leadership a whole lot but it isn’t in the inner circle of charities I support with cash donations, I didn’t charge for my services.
A few days later, I received a email notice from the microlending nonprofit Kiva that a gift certificate was given in my name from the board chair. I was touched.
Kiva told me the amount of the gift certificate and that I could use it to make a microloan. Because there was some effort involved, I put the action into my pending basket of not urgent items and promptly forgot to “redeem” the gift certificate.
In a few weeks, Kiva sent me an email reminding me that I hadn’t redeemed my gift certificate. All good. But then the reminder told me that I could 1) redeem my gift certificate (by making a micro loan) or 2) do nothing and the gift would convert to a donation to Kiva.
Because I wasn’t really terribly interested in making a micro-loan and because I know how much nonprofits can use the unrestricted funds, I wanted option 2.
Unfortunately, there was a catch. I had to wait ONE YEAR from the time the gift certificate was purchased until Kiva could convert the gift certificate into a donation.
Well, I thought, I’ll just email Kiva’s customer support and tell them that they didn’t have to wait a year. I’d just donate the gift certificate right now so they could put the money immediately to work.
I promptly got an email back explaining the following to me:
Kiva tries to encourage people to make loans with their gift certificates because if they enjoy the experience and continue to lend, we can have a greater impact on global poverty. This is why we don’t encourage people to donate their gift certificates, but we do process them as a donation after one year so the money doesn’t get wasted. (Emphasis added) Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on October 4, 2010 in Better Boards, Fundraising
Last week I found myself in a very interesting conversation about the “profession” of fundraising.
A colleague was sharing ideas from a workshop she attended. The presenter had described a common situation that many directors of development experience.
You know the one. The development director has just laid out a carefully crafted strategy based on best practices and research. Immediately a board member or other leadership volunteer challenges the elements of the plan.
I’ve found that this scenario is very common when planning events or personal solicitation campaigns.
Usually, the challenge reflects the anxiety of the volunteer at being asked to step outside of his or her comfort zone. The volunteer/board member, fearful of the task ahead, comes up with dozens of reasons why the carefully developed strategy won’t work. Why, another organization he volunteered at just sent out a glossy letter instead of asking him to make phone calls.
So my colleague noted that the workshop presenter made the case that fundraising is a profession. One of the ways to tell a true profession is whether or not it has a body of knowledge that is “unique and specific to its practice and function.” (AFP). She made the case that fundraising does in fact have an established and growing body of knowledge.
The presenter then described a few scenarios of other professions with established bodies of knowledge where it would be unimaginable to find the amateur telling the professional how to do that job. Here are two that came to mind:
- Could you imagine a board member telling the chief of surgery at a nonprofit hospital a better way to perform an upcoming operation?
- Or a committee chair telling the head coach at an independent school a better way to train his basketball players? (Well, maybe you could imagine that, but you get the picture.)
So why do board members feel they can tell fundraising “professionals” how to do their job?
But here was my counterpoint.
Before we get a little self-righteous about all that profession stuff, maybe we need to look into the mirror.
Perhaps our board members don’t treat us as the professionals we are because we act like amateurs can do our jobs.
Case in point:
Why do development directors and executive directors act like their board members rose from the primordial ooze as trained fundraisers?
I find way too much agony and even anger in this profession at board members about fundraising. I’ve written about this time and again (see Banishing your expectation of board fundraising). How, if we believe that fund development is a profession, can we expect good-hearted people with no fund development background to spontaneously do our jobs for us?
We can’t both complain that we aren’t respected for the professionals we are and then simultaneously gripe and moan when the amateurs on our boards don’t act like professional fundraisers.
Find the willing, equip them with compelling cases for support, train them, and hold their hands all the way through the process. In essence, put those professional skills to work.
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on September 10, 2010 in Fundraising
This Tweet caught my eye this week:
The link took me to a SFGate San Francisco Chronicle story about a serendipitous $1.3 million gift that the online charity DonorsChoose.org received last Tuesday.
In case you don’t know, DonorsChoose.org is an online nonprofit where individual classroom teachers from across the U.S. can list projects that they need funded. The site includes a comprehensive description of the project with a complete budget. For example, I searched the site for the charter school on whose board I sit and found this request for $903 from a teacher at Blackstone Academy Charter School in Pawtucket, RI. (The request includes an option for a donation to DonorsChoose.org).
To get back to the SFGate story, the CEO of DonorsChoose.org related how he had received a phone call where he was asked how much it would take to fund all the requests from California teachers. You can read the story for all the details, but it turned out the phone call was from the ED of a local foundation. Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on August 10, 2010 in Fundraising
Below the fold in Monday morning’s Providence Journal was a lovely story about Ram and Nishi Nehra, a retired couple from Middletown, Rhode Island, who have been supporting an educational NGO in their native India since 2001.
I know that their story is not unique, that each day there are millions, probably billions, of philanthropic acts across the globe.
But what made me smile over my morning tea was the way that Ram described his philanthropy:
“I get so much satisfaction, so much pleasure out of this — I can’t tell you in words. You have to experience this. This is full of life.”
Demonstrating again the principle of “giving till you feel good” that my departed colleague, Herb Kaplan, always espoused.
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Posted by Jon Howard on June 17, 2010 in Communicating, Fundraising
At first glance, I don’t welcome the email from Christina Wellington Traister. The body reminds me that I haven’t sent in my pledge to Bates. Not a word about what amount I had pledged, which I’ve long forgotten. Righteous annoyance almost cancels appropriate guilt.
But the PS grabbed me. (And yes, I read the PS first. I quickly see that the main message holds bad news for me).
“P.S. Have you heard the Bates parking meter story? It’s two minutes and guaranteed to make you smile…this was sent to alumni (who hadn’t made a Bates Fund gift or pledge) two weeks ago.”
I can’t imagine a parking meter on the leafy Bates quad of my memory, nor even on the surrounding streets of sleepy Lewiston, Maine, so “the parking meter story” monicker raises a question I can’t answer without clicking on the link, a classic teaser trope. Christina promises to answer the question in two minutes or less and amuse me in the process.
I like the quick and indirect way Christina clues me in that this is not just a funny story. She tells me this story was sent to non-contributing alums a couple of weeks ago. That truth-in-advertising builds vital trust and gently reminds me that I’m a delinquent, too. I click on the link. Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on February 23, 2010 in Fundraising
Dear Gayle and Jon,
I just wanted to take a moment to thank you for the Workshop “Getting the Most from your Annual Appeal” that you gave on Oct. 8th for the Land and Water Partnership at the Audubon Society of RI. I think that our letter was not as good as what you had presented, but it was a big improvement from previous ventures.
But the proof is in the pudding, right?!
So, the bottom line, proof of the pudding is that last year we raised $31,365 through 88 gifts with our single page, tear off and send back approach.
This year, we received 173 gifts for a total of $62,570 for our two page, bulleted, story telling approach to support stewardship with the envelope provided!
So, we are giving you a ’soft’ credit (as they say in our business!) for doubling our gifts! We are so grateful!
I think Jon got me when he said he knew there were some people who just threw these letters in the trash, but for those who really care and want to know, give them something worth reading. I know many of our members in the land trust are the latter types, and I appreciate so much that you brought this to my attention.
I truly appreciate a good teacher, and this deserves recognition all its own. Many heartfelt thanks from the South Kingstown Land Trust!
Ever,
Claudia E. Swain
Director of Development
South Kingstown Land Trust
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Claudia, We’re blushing! But how could anyone resist those gorgeous Scottish Highlander cattle!
Thank you so for sharing this with us and letting us share your letter with our readers. You can read the full letter here.
And continued good fundraising for the South Kingstown Land Trust. Local land trusts like yours absolutely prove the Margaret Mead quote:
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on February 10, 2010 in 100 Things We've Learned, Fundraising
In How we got the grant – Part I, I started telling you the story of how one organization overcame a long history of rejections to finally receive a grant from a very desired funder.
To quickly summarize:
The international child sponsorshop and development organization I worked for had tried and failed many times to receive a development education grant from the US Agency for International Development.
We learned that one of the reasons for this was that our donor-to-sponsored child and family communications were not taken seriously by the funder and undercut our credibility.
We initiated a process to explain the theory and practice behind our communications program to USAID. As a result of that, the door opened a crack.
Our first three lessons learned:
- Get involved with your colleagues
- Find out what funders think about you
- You have to have and discuss a theory of change
That’s were I left off. On to the next set of lessons.
So, I now had the task of designing a development education program that would win funding and achieve our desired mission impact.
Lesson Four: Build your new program on your existing assets
Because our experience showed that people-to-people contact helped North Americans care about other parts of the world, we knew our development education program could take advantage of our 50 year history of direct communications. Our office was rich with the stories, photos, drawings and reports from sponsored children, their families, our international staff and town or village leaders. Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on February 3, 2010 in 100 Things We've Learned, Fundraising
Back in the 80s, I was director of development and communications for the US affiliate of an international child sponsorship organization.
Keeping the advertising, invoicing, fundraising, and donor stewardship running was an expensive investment for an organization that relied primarily on monthly giving from tens of thousands of donors.
While that funding model was clearly our strength, it also lost us donors who determined which organization they chose to support solely on the basis of overhead ratios. Overhead costs were lower at colleague agencies that had lots of low-fundraising-cost government grants and commodities passing through their books.
(Note: Why overhead ratios tell only a tiny part of the story).
Which is one reason why we were interested in increasing our revenue from grants (in addition to the good work that we could do with more money.)
In particular, we had our eye on “development education” grants awarded by the US Agency for International Development (USAID). Those funds supported programs that taught US audiences about global issues, especially issues facing the world’s most poor and vulnerable people.
We also knew that those agencies that received USAID development education grants seemed to have a “more favored” status within the development community than those who didn’t. AID funding was like a seal of approval that our development education would be recognized by our peers.
Yes, we wanted to be in the “in crowd.” Being “in” often led to more media exposure, more opportunity for partnerships with our colleagues, and, ultimately, more donors and more funding to support our programs overseas.
But year after year (before I arrived), our proposals kept getting rejected. And we couldn’t understand why.
And to put the frosting on the cake, we kept hearing funders and our non-sponsorship colleagues advocate for personalizing international development to US citizens by sharing the stories of real people, families and communities overseas.
But but but… each and every day, we were sending very real and personalized stories about those very same communities and families to tens of thousands of donors in the US.
What were we doing wrong?
Lesson One: Get involved with your colleagues
Luckily, my boss was determined to shift the perception of our agency in the eyes of his international colleagues. So he became very active in the US international development community. He joined committees in strategic networks. He lobbied our international program staff to participate in the US as well. He brought onto our Board of Directors individuals with international development expertise and got them involved in those networks as well.
Through those activities, he also got to work with and come to know the staff in the development education division at USAID. And that’s how we learned what was wrong with us.
Lesson Two: Find out what funders think about you.
Without getting into too much detail, suffice it to say that child sponsorship organizations like ours — the ones that invested in active communications between donors here in the US and their sponsored families overseas — were not seen by many of their colleagues as serious international development organizations. Read More >>
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Posted by Gayle Gifford on January 11, 2010 in Fundraising
I was just re-reading the report released last January this time “Call to Service Assessment 2008: Community Volunteer Service Needs and Opportunities; July – September 2008″ of Serve Rhode Island (the RI Commission on National and Community Service). 
Among other things, I was struck by the data on where volunteers spend their time. According to statistics gathered by the US Census Bureau for the Bureau of Labor Statistics and reported here:
Main Activities of Volunteers (2005-2007)
Fundraise 29.7% (RI) 27.9% (US)
Collect/Distribute Food 19.5% (RI) 24.5% (US)
Professional/Management 16.6% (RI) 17.4% (US)
Tutor/Teach 15.7% (RI) 20.5% (US)
At first glance I was somewhat surprised that fundraising was at the top of the volunteer activity list given the number of complaints I hear from organizations about their inability to recruit volunteers to help them raise funds. (Don’t the choices of volunteer activities seem pretty limited.)
But when activities are matched against the top places where volunteers serve — overwhelmingly education and religious groups — the numbers made much more sense.
If you think about the legions of parents who raise money for their kids’ schools, or run events and raise money for their religious congregations, it’s not too surprising that fundraising might come out on top.
Unfortunately, what the study doesn’t tell us is the relationship of the volunteering to the amount of funds raised. Now that would be a number worth gathering.
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