It is midway through 2016. In a few short months we will enter the holiday season. Most of us are either halfway through a fiscal year or just beginning a new one. In either case, it is time to take professional stock of where you are and where you are going. Last week, we discussed steps for a midyear personal checkup. This time, let's talk about the 10 steps for a professional nonprofit fundraising checkup...
Social media is one of the powerful tools that fundraisers have sitting in their back pockets. At no cost to the nonprofit or to the participant, powerful fundraising messages can be communicated to the participant’s personal network. This includes many potential supporters that the fundraiser may not have been comfortable contacting directly. Additionally, this is an effective method for increasing the visibility of both the nonprofit and the participant’s upcoming event...
If your job title falls under the category of “one-person development department,” it’s very likely that, sometimes, you feel like a chicken running around with its head cut off. Ah, the pressure. How on earth is a smart development director to do it all? Brace yourself for the big news, folks: You shouldn’t want to focus on all of that stuff, because you don’t have to focus on all of that stuff. Just look at Trader Joe's...
Recently, my hubster Otis Fulton, Turnkey’s psychological expert, read Tom Ahern’s book, “Seeing Through a Donor’s Eyes: How to Make a Persuasive Case for Everything From Your Annual Drive to Your Planned Giving Program to Your Capital Campaign.” As promised, Otis said, the book covers a lot of ground. Ahern focuses on writing a “case for support” directed at various types of donors...
We’ll dig deeper into when innovation makes sense. When does it really have value? I’ll be suggesting three additional questions for you to consider prior to adopting a new idea. And I’ll offer you a whole new set of tools to help you arrive at answers...
I had a light bulb moment that made me do one of the smartest things I’ve ever done and something that I continue to do 16 years later. You see, I knew that the heart and soul of my fundraising plan would be to learn what our donors’ motivations were. So, after querying our database for 20 loyal donors who had given more than $250 a year during the past five years, I wrote a letter of introduction asking why they had supported the organization...
We often are asked our opinions on the ideal relationship between the leader of the development department and the major gift officer (MGO). Here is what we think, organized by category of work on the left and the two roles to the right...
Recently, I attended an activity for volunteers. The purpose of the event was for our volunteers to help stuff backpacks for needy children. The smiles and response following this hands-on event proved to me that this type of activity is vitally important. It is all about building relationships...
Donor loyalty. Sometimes it seems as if it has gone the way of the dinosaurs. We talk about it, write about it, hold meetings about it and strategize for it, but it’s still missing from many nonprofit supporter lists. Donors are acquired and then they attrite. It’s just the reality we live with...
The post-digital revolution has indeed made change inevitable. "Business as usual" is no longer even possible. That’s a given, and charities must adapt. Much has to do with the fact that our would-be supporters today are all part of "Generation C"—they are connected and networked in ways that were previously (and not so long ago) unimaginable...
