As 2023 is looming in your windshield, I am sharing some ways I’ve found to reduce frustration and — most importantly — improve confidence in your skills as a fundraiser. I encourage you to choose at least three of them and make them part of your personal career growth plan for 2023.
Pamela Barden
Year-end is looming and may seem overwhelming. Here are things to work on to impact your income positively before Dec. 31.
Being smaller is no excuse for not making a heroic effort; your mission deserves smart fundraising. And smart fundraising means taking advantage of these big opportunities.
Writing a successful fundraising communication — be it an e-appeal, social media post, direct mail letter, personal letter, program copy or anything else — can feel daunting. Especially given the high rate of failure (since 100% response is rare), having to write the ask can seem like a pathway to failure.
While the concept of fundraising via e-appeals and mail may sound so last century, I assure you it is an important foundational piece for a fundraising program of the 2020s.
Direct response is not as sexy as taking donors to the golf course or hosting the annual major donor cruise, but I’m proud of what I do because I have seen the results of the money I have raised over the years. And if someone says to me, “Oh, you do junk mail?” that’s OK.
After more than a year of work from home — completely or part of the time — many fundraisers were eager to get back to the office.
We can’t do fundraising exactly like we did just over a year ago.
Pandemic. Wildfires. Snowstorms. Killer hornets. Monoliths. The election… And the list goes on.
When nonprofit staff discuss employee retention, the consensus is typically that employee turnover is a problem we need to fix.
As a writer of fundraising copy, one of my frustrations is having to create copy on a regular basis with little material to work with.
Much of what we knew about fundraising before COVID-19 seems to have gone out the window, and “nimble” has been the new No. 1 skill.
You love your nonprofit organization’s mission. You wake up in the middle of the night thinking about how you can raise more money.
The people that supported you before the pandemic still care. They haven’t forgotten you.
Many fundraisers can point to specific successes that are a result of doing research and applying the findings to create a new program or refine an existing strategy. While surveys are still used for many research efforts, I had an opportunity to probe 21st century research for nonprofits with Dave Goetz, president of CZ Strategy, a marketing firm that helps organizations make sense of their data and then implement messaging and communication changes based on the findings...
