tothepoint: Online Fundraising Changes to Make Now
7. CHANGE TO MAKE:
Be generous and lazy
I can hear your thoughts. How the heck am I supposed to find the time to do this?
My first answer is, you will spend more time on all of your work if you don't have to spend as much time on these things. They'll make you far better at engaging people, building a base and raising money — so you'll save time and effort in the end.
My second answer is, you should not think in terms of shortages of time and scarcity of resources. You should approach your donor — and your life — from a place of abundance.
When you do your online outreach, give credit to your supporters instead of yourself. Listen and follow more than you talk and recruit. When people retweet your content or spread the word, profusely thank and highlight them.
Spend more time pointing to the work of others and celebrating what they say than you do talking about yourself. Rather than pontificating on a topic, share the thoughts of others and praise their insights.
The more you do this, the more popular you become. It sounds paradoxical, but it works. Which brings me to laziness. The more you choose to highlight the work of others — and point to their content — the less you have to produce yourself. This is a lovely benefit of being generous — it saves you time.
8. CHANGE TO MAKE:
Overhaul your acknowledgment system
In fundraising, we tend to focus on what we can extract from our donors. Instead, we should focus on what we can give our donors: gratitude, social impact, good feelings. The money will follow.
It is far easier to keep and cultivate a donor than to go find new ones and persuade them to care about your cause. That's one reason to give thanks early and often in your online outreach. Another is that your gratitude bonds the donor to your cause.
