Fundraising - Building Your Major Donor Program

REMINDER

MY NEW BOOK IS OUT! 

The Secret to Fundraising; It's NOT About Asking For Money

“We forget when we raise funds for something, say a building, that it isn’t about the building, but the people who will occupy it.  Deb’s book is conversant, chock full of anecdotes, 

and will lead to a winning strategy of success.”

Dr. David Borst, Dean of Business Administration

Concordia University Wisconsin

Click here to purchase on Amazon

Now, on to my topic for this post, 

BUILDING YOUR MAJOR DONOR PROGRAM:

Most of my nonprofit clients have budgets of $1 million or less and fall into two camps when it comes to their funding sources.  Many of them get almost 100% of their resources from foundations, and many of them have more of a balance between foundations and events like an annual dinner.

Almost NONE of my clients have any kind of individual or major donor program.  What's really holding them back is the confidence to approach people and then knowing what to do next.  

When it comes to foundations, I personally think many of them exist on a different planet.  They often require small nonprofits to seek them out, submit very comprehensive proposals (with about a 3% chance of receiving a donation), aren’t willing to invest in operations (which is how services are delivered in most cases) and require the nonprofit to remember to send follow-up reports proving that the donation resulted in measureable outcomes.  They're also fickle, some making donations only once to an organization, others changing their guidelines from time to time and sometimes going out of business (they call it sunsetting).

The good thing about foundation donations is that they tend to be the largest donations for small nonprofits.  The bad thing about foundations is that it’s easy for a small nonprofit to become dependent on their funding and to end up in a very difficult place if one goes out of business. 

Individual Donors - Large and Small - Key to Sustainability - 
3 Steps to Getting Started

What I know for sure is that your long-term sustainability CANNOT be achieved through foundation donations.   Your most loyal supporters are regular folks who are inspired by your mission.  It’s usually personal for your individual donors, and unless you “blow it” with an individual donor, they tend to not only continue to make donations, but if you cultivate them properly, their donations tend to grow over time and often ultimately include a significant bequest through a will. 

CALLING ALL SMALL NONPROFITS!  Creating a major donor program doesn't have to be scary and intimidating, and you don't need to be a large organization to generate a significant portion of your revenue from individual donations.  Forget about all the fancy stuff, and think about building friendships with people.  

Step #1 - Get Your Act Together 

Before you begin talking to people, make sure you know how to tell your story and be clear about what you need and how people can help.  I call this "getting your act together," and you can revisit many of my blog posts to help you do this:

• Professional Case Statements - Click on these links to take you to three separate blog posts about develping your case statement - Part I, Part II, and Part III 

• Plan Document - To receive a sample of my planning template to help you define your priorities, click here to send me an email (put sample plan document in the subject line). 

Step  #2 - Start With Who You Know

What most nonprofits do is make a list of wealthy people that already get asked by everyone else.  Instead, start with people you know and who know and respect you.  You just never know what might happen.  For example, back when I was the President of The Park People Board of Directors, we decided to have a gala, and we wanted to invite Jane Kaczmarek (from Malcolm in the Middle) to be our keynote speaker.  She’s from the Milwaukee Area and she’s passionate about our parks.  While the letter we wrote to Jane was brilliant (I wrote it), that’s not why she accepted our invitation.  The mother of one of our board members played bridge with Jane’s mother who still lived in the area.  The letter was personally delivered from one bridge player to another. 

One of my awesome clients is Eastbrook Academy – recently ranked #1 in WI and in the top 10% in the nation by the High School Challenge Index.  I love this school, for many reasons, but mostly because they are strong on diversity AND rigorous academics.  One hundred percent of high school students graduate, get accepted into college, and are awarded almost $1 million in scholarships each year.  Having started 16 years ago, their first graduating class is graduating from college this year!  To learn more about Eastbrook Academy click here to visit their website. 

Anyway, the school has a basic development program that secures a modest amount amount from foundations and from individual donations mainly through their annual event.  When I sat down with the fund development director (who has never been trained to do development), and we reviewed every foundation and donor, I found a gold mine of possibilities.  They have received donations from foundations without asking.  They’ve received donations that were bigger than the amount they requested.  And they have supporter after supporter than just gives without being asked when they find out what the school needs.  Some of the donors have or had children in the school, and others just are in love with the impact Eastbrook Academy has on students and the surrounding community.  

With a little help from me to build their confidence by teaching them how to share their story, be clearer about what they need and how people can help, as well as understand it's about genuine relationship bulding, they will become a magnet for the support they need to achieve their vision!


Step #3 - Invite People in for a Compelling Experience 

Whether it's a long-time supporter or your neighbor, the first step is to invite people in to experience the essence of your mission.  My advice to Eastbrook Academy:  Reach out to all those people who have already been so generous and simply tell them that you are trying to get better at communicating your priorities and vision, and you would like to invite them to take a formal tour and share your plans.  Let them know you're looking for feedback.

A compelling tour is not a geograhical tour of your organization or school (e.g., here's the computer lab, here's the gym, etc.).  The tour is an opportunity to get to know what's important to the visitor and allow them to guide you when it comes to what to share about your organization.  A lot of thought should be given to how you conduct tours.  THERE SHOULD BE ABSOLUTELY NO EXPECTATION OF AN OUTCOME!

Nonprofits often allow people to just walk out of the building after the tour. If you do this, you have lost a great opportunity.  After spending no more than 20 or 30 minutes talking and touring with your visitor, you should find a quiet place to sit down, present a packet of information and share a little more about your vision and priorities.  But that's just the beginning.  Now, it's time to find out what's inside of your visitor's heart and mind.  The answers to three simple questions could give you enough leads and follow-up work to keep you busy for two months.  Of course, I've got tools to share with you to help on this front.

• Compelling Tour Guidelines - To receive a sample of this tool, click here to go to my website, register to recevie free information and download the Compelling Tour document. 

• alinea's 3 Magic Questions - To learn more about how to make the sit-down portion of your tour super productive, click here to view a blog post about this topic.  

The key to all of this is having NO AGENDA OR EXPECTATION!  This is where the magic comes in.  This approach is about inspiring people, making an emotional connection, providing enough information about what you need and how people can help, so people can decide for themselves if and how they’d like to get involved.  It’s an approach that feels better for everyone involved and results in some surprising and significant donations.

Step #3 – Use the Relationship Tracking Tool to Determine the Best Ways to Cultivate the Relationship

You probably realize that every moment is an opportunity to share your story and cultivate a relationship with someone that could lead to more resources.  Your challenge is usually knowing what to do after you have a great conversation with someone. 

For example, let’s say you go to an event, and you have an amazing conversation with someone who is really inspired with your mission.  You didn’t have any expectations of the conversation, you did a great job of making an emotional connection, and you even asked them alinea’s 3 magic questions.  In fact, they gave you feedback, said they were curious about one of your programs and suggested you contact another person who may be interested.

In most cases, a small nonprofit will fail to follow up on this gold mine of an opportunity, not because they mean to, but because they’re not sure exactly what to do.  Don't think so hard about it.  Send a personally hand-written thank you note, share a success story via an email four weeks later, pick up the phone and invite them to your next event.  It's about just thinking about them and giving them more opportunities to be touched by your mission. 

I’m going to give you a very simple tool to help you take advantage of these opportunities.  You just never know when one conversation could lead to an amazing donation or connection.  Use a simple excel spreadsheet and create these columns:

• Relationship and contact info – name, organization, title, phone, email, website
• Who’s in charge of the relationship – who has this relationship within the organization
• Date next step – this is when an action needs to be taken to cultivate these relationship
• Next Step – this is the actual next step (e.g., send an email sharing a success story, make a phone call to extend a personal invitation to an event)
• Progress – most current date and action on top
• Notes – a little background about the start of the relationship, any past giving, referrals to others, etc.

Every week on the same day during the time that you are going to devote to doing this work you will sort the spreadsheet by date next step so you know what your tasks are for the next week.  This seems simple, but the followup is where small and large nonprofits miss opportunities. 

As always, let me know what happens when you try this approach so others can learn. 

Deb