Communicate!

Helping you win loyal friends through your communications

How Fundraising Systems Can Help Small Non-Profits Do More with Less

by Leave a Comment

We will get back to our series on great appeal letters next Tuesday. Today, think about fundraising systems with guest blogger Joe Garecht.

bandwidthWorking in development for a small non-profit can be tough.  Your organization is doing great work, and you’ve got lots of great ideas for raising more money… but there’s never enough time, staff, or money in the budget to do all of those things.

As a small non-profit, it is important that you honor the bandwidth of your organization.

“Bandwidth” is my term for the limited amount of time, money, and energy that your non-profit has to offer for development.  Every organization has a limited bandwidth… even large, national organizations that have 35 fundraisers on staff can’t focus on a plan that would require 50 fundraisers to implement.

Your non-profit has a limited amount of time and money to spend on fundraising, and that’s okay.  If you consistently try to spend more time, money, and energy on fundraising than what you have available, it will lead to burnout, excessive staff turnover, and a budget that is stretched razor thin.  So, honor your bandwidth.  Know what your resources are and develop a plan that can operate within the constraints of those resources.

There are lots of great ways to get more bang for your buck when it comes to those resources.  It is possible, with the right strategy, to get a higher return on investment for the time and money you spend on your fundraising programs.  In my experience, the best way to be able to do more with your limited resources is by building strong fundraising systems at your non-profit.

What is a Fundraising System?

When I talk about “fundraising systems” for your non-profit, I’m not talking about your donor database or any other technology that you use in fundraising.  Those systems can play a vital role in your fundraising program, but they’re not the type of systems we are talking about here.

Instead, I’m talking about donor fundraising systems: step-by-step processes for interacting with donors, building relationships with them, and asking them for money through things like personal meetings, appeal letters, events, and more.

Fundraising systems will help you do more, with less, because they help you avoid reinventing the wheel every time you deal with a new donor.  Instead of wondering how to cultivate a new prospect or follow-up from a stewardship event, you will have a system in place that you can use, with materials and scripts already prepared in advance.

While there are lots of different types of fundraising systems you can build at your non-profit, the most important are those that related directly to the donor life cycle: prospecting, cultivation, asking, and stewardship.  The systems you build should fit within the constraints of your non-profit’s fundraising bandwidth… meaning that you shouldn’t plan to do more than you really can in terms of budget, staff, time, and energy.

What Does a Good Fundraising System Look Like?

You may be wondering what a good fundraising system looks like.  Simply put, a good fundraising system is a path for your donors, based on where they are in the donor life cycle.  Your systems answer questions like:

  • What 2-4 ways are we going to find new prospects this year?
  • What 2-4 ways are we going to cultivate our prospects this year?
  • How are we going to ask donors for money this year?
  • What 2-4 ways are we going to steward our donors this year?

Notice that in the list above, you keep seeing the numbers “2-4.”  That’s important, because most small non-profits are trying to do too much when it comes to individual donor fundraising… and as a result, they aren’t doing any of those things well.

Instead of constantly adding new strategies for finding donors, cultivating, and asking them for money, focus on 2-4 ways to do each.  Then, commit your organization to executing on those 2-4 strategies to the best of your abilities this coming year.

Different Paths for Different Donors

In developing your fundraising systems, you’ll want to be sure to include different paths for your different donor segments.  For example, in your donor cultivation system, you may say that low-dollar donors will receive an e-mail newsletter once per month, and an invitation to your large summer cultivation picnic every year.

For mid-level donors, you may add a personal call from your staff twice per year and free tickets to annual holiday party.  For major donors, you may decide to add two in-person meetings per year plus a handwritten note during the holiday season.

Whatever systems you design, keep them simple, and then focus on implementing them.  After the year is over, go back and review those systems with your team.  What worked?  What didn’t?

If certain things aren’t working, cut them out of next year’s plan, and replace them with something new.  Keep testing, iterating, and improving, and your systems will get better and better every year.

About the Author

Joe Garecht is the President of Garecht Fundraising Associates, and the Editor of The Non-Profit Fundraising Digest.  He has almost twenty years’ experience in non-profit fundraising, and focuses his consulting work on helping small and mid-sized organizations build sustainable fundraising systems.

How Do You Find Nonprofit Blogs to Follow?

by Leave a Comment

best blogs 2017I’m honored.

Literally.

In the past few weeks, the Communicate! blog–the one you’re reading right now–has been recognized by multiple groups in the nonprofit field.

The Fundraising Digest named it one of The Best Fundraising Blogs of 2017.

Top 75 Nonprofit Blog Feedspot selected Communicate! as one of the Top 75 Nonprofit Blogs on the web.

And it has previously been featured on Bloomerang‘s list of 100+ Fundraising Blogs You Should Be Reading in 2017.

I’m honored. But why should you care?

Nonprofit Blogs Keep You Up to Date

Reading the right blogs is an incomparable way to keep up with what nonprofits need to know. Share on X

What you need to know could be technical advice, like Three Reasons to Require Verified Opt-In for your Email Newsletter by John Haydon.  John explains the best way to ensure that the people getting your newsletter actually want to read it. (And John’s blog is on on these lists.)

Or it could be reading a great idea at just the right time of the year. Giving Tuesday is right around the corner. Mary Cahalane and Claire Axelrad have suggested you use it as Giving Thanks Tuesday, an opportunity to connect with your donors before you ask them for money.

If you subscribed to their blogs, you’d hear about that idea in time to put it into practice. And you’d find both Mary and Claire on these lists, too!

Nonprofit Blogs Share Timeless Wisdom

Not all good ideas are new, and not all of them have a use-by date. Sometimes what you really need is a reminder, and the inspiration to do the best you already know how to do.

One of the most popular posts on the Communicate! blog since I first published it in 2015 is The Golden Rule of Nonprofit Writing. It’s very short, and here’s the key insight in one sentence:

The golden rule of writing is to write unto others the way you wish they wrote unto to you.

The next time you are getting ready to write a newsletter, or a fundraising appeal–or even a tweet–remember this blog post. You can find it on my blog. And you can find other pearls on other blogs, if you read the right ones.

Take a Moment to Look Through The Lists

I’m like you. I have a lot to learn, and a limited amount of time to spend each day learning it. The key for us both is to pay attention where it counts.

May I make a suggestion? Give yourself a gift today. Take the time to look at one of the lists from The Fundraising Digest, Feedspot, or Bloomerang. Mark the blogs you’re most interested in reading, then subscribe to them.

You can get the new blog posts delivered to your email inbox. You can subscribe to them as an RSS feed.  You can even use Feedspot as a tool to see posts from the blogs you like best and easily share those posts on Facebook or Twitter.

Because other people you know have trouble finding the right blogs to follow, too, and you can make it easier for them.

 

TY Thursday: Steal from the Best

by Leave a Comment

steal from the bestAre you trying to come up with an original way of thanking your donors? Don’t worry too much about that. Instead, follow comedian Milton Berle’s advice: “If you’re going to steal, steal from the best.”

(That must be good advice. Kurt Vonnegut stole the quote from him!)

Steal These Top Ten Thank-You Ideas

There are lots of models for saying thank-you out there. Here are my top ten.

  1. Michael Rosen shows you how to thank your most loyal donors. (You should certainly make your supporters feel as appreciated as a big corporation like Marriott does with its guests!)

2. Ann Green tells you to create a thank-you experience that begins with the thank-you landing page on your website and goes on through email, mail, and phone calls.

3. If you’ve ever considered using video for your thank-yous to donors, take a look at these examples presented to you by Bloomerang.

4. Joe Garecht says you can take the classic thank-you letter to a whole new level. Take a look at his sample letter. And Pamela Grow’s thank-you letter template, too!

5. While you’re at it, take a look at my blog The Ideal Thank-You Letter Went Out Today–one of the most popular I’ve ever written–because you want to know the single most important thing about thanking your donors.

6. Gail Perry gives you a checklist of do’s and don’ts if you want to write a killer thank-you letter.

7. It’s a lot easier to say thanks if you develop an “attitude of gratitude” in everyday life. Mary Cahalane shows you how thanking donors can make you happy.

8. A thank-you can win the trust of your donor. Kivi Leroux Miller says your TY can be specific about how the gift is being used and show results: two things donors say they want above all else!

9. Rachel Muir tells us about The Best Thank-You Letter I Never Got, in her guest post on John Haydon’s blog. Do you donate? Can you put yourself in the shoes of the donor? Follow the golden rule of nonprofit writing.

10. Does someone at your nonprofit say, “Let’s just send out the same letter we sent before”? Lisa Sargent suggests you do a thank-you letter audit–and she provides a 17-point checklist to help you show the skeptics where you could be doing better.

Because Your Donor is Worth It

Are you as good at building loyalty as an airline?

pilot thanks you

Thank you for flying our nonprofit!

Every time I’ve flown in recent years, I’ve heard the flight crew say something like this upon landing. “We know you have many choices for your air travel. Thank you for choosing North-South-East-West Airlines.”

Your donors have many choices about what to do with their money. They could give it to another nonprofit in your field. They could give it to a completely different cause. They could blow it on pizza and beer. They could leave it to their grandchildren.

But they chose to make a gift to you. You are better off because of it. And you want them to make that same choice next time.

So, it’s worth sending that donor the best expression of thanks you can. Especially when you have so many good ideas to steal!

Yes, I’d like weekly email from Communicate!

Get more advice

Yes! Please send me tips from Communicate! Consulting.

Subscribe to Blog via Email

Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.