Want to hear some of my best ideas for creating a successful fundraising plan?

Then join me for a f ree call next Thursday, February 4 at 3:00 pm eastern as I present my “Simple Success” Fundraising Plan.  Register here for the call.

Here’s some of what you’ll hear:

• Why you need a fundraising plan
• 7 questions your plan must answer
• The optimum number of goals you should set
• How to create goals that you can reach
• My proven tool to keep yourself on track each month

Plus, you’ll hear about a virtual planning retreat I’m hosting in February.  It’s unlike anything I’ve seen before and I think it will be lots of fun!

Sign up now for this free call!

If you want to hear the call, but can’t be there with us, go ahead and sign up.  I’ll send you a link to the recording.

I hope to see you on the call!

Sandy

1. Failure to ask for a gift. Don’t assume that your donors will know what you want them to do. Ask for a gift.  And make sure to include a reply envelope to make it easy for your donors to send their gift to you.

2. Using a dirty list. Keeping your list clean is one of the most important things you can do to ensure the success of your appeal.  Run your entire list through an NCOA update annually (this is required by the USPS for non-profit rates and every six months on first class pre-sort).  Always correct addresses of donors who have moved. Make sure to exclude deceased donors from your list and anyone else who doesn’t need to receive your appeal.

3. “Dear Friend…” Failing to personalize your letter to each donor is detrimental to your appeal and can send the wrong message.  If someone has been donating to your organization for several years, you are insulting them by not using their name.  It could also send the message that you are looking for an easy way out in the letter preparation process. Using a window envelope with the recipient’s name and address showing through can reduce the labor involved in preparing the mailing and keep costs down.

4. Bad timing. Timing is everything in direct mail. Are you mailing at the best times of the year?  Are you coordinating your mailings with your other activities to maximize your media exposure?  Have you planned your mailing so that you have plenty of time to prepare it well or are you rushed for time?  If your mailing has a specific “reply by” date, have you allowed the recipient enough time to respond?

5. Asking for the wrong amount. Are you asking your donors for the right amount?  Base your ask string on the donor’s last gift amount so you aren’t asking for too much or too little. Are you tying the ask amount to something meaningful in your organization? “Your gift of $1.74 will provide a hot meal to a homeless person”.  Uneven amounts are more believable.

6. Ignoring automation benefits. In order to take advantage of the best postage rates, your return envelope must have the appropriate postal markings.  The size, shape, and color of your envelope must be considered for USPS regulations.  Planning your mailing with a knowledgeable mailer can save you money on postage.

7. “Support Our Annual Fund”. Donors don’t want to support your annual fund.  They want to make a difference in the lives of the people you serve.  Tell a story of someone you have helped.  Help the donor see how his/her donation will make an impact.

8. Poor quality letter. An experienced printing shop can help you get the best quality appeal in the mail.  You don’t want to send out something that looks like a copy of a bad copy.

9. Paying too much for postage. Are you taking advantage of pre-sorted nonprofit postage rates?  Did you know that you can use a stamp and still get lower rates?

10. Failure to measure. You should set goals for each appeal and measure its success. Are you measuring your success rates?  Do you know what your response rate was on your last appeal?  What was your average gift size?  Did you have any major donors who self-identified themselves?  What did it cost you to raise a dollar?

About the Author: Sandy Rees has served non profit organizations in Tennessee including Second Harvest Food Bank, and the Joy of Music School. She is an active member of the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) and has achieved the CFRE (Certified Fundraising Executive) certification.  She is a co-author of the book 7 Essential Elements to Raising Money by Mail.

“Relationship” is a key word in fundraising. As part of Fundraising 101 we learn that to be truly successful we must develop relationships with our donors. We learn that a single donation is merely a transaction and that’s not good enough to sustain our organization long term. To set ourselves up for success in the future, we must cultivate relationships with our donors. And foundations are no different.

Most people can envision what a relationship with an individual donor looks like. But what about a foundation where there are multiple people involved? How do you know who to get to know?

The answer to that is pretty simple – get to know everyone you can!

A little research should tell you who the staff person or administrator is. You can check out the organization’s 990 (tax return) and learn an awful lot including who sits on the foundation’s Board. Share a list of the foundation Board with your organization’s board members to see who knows whom and encourage your Board to speak with those they know. Assure them that they don’t need to ask for money. All they need to do is talk about how much they care about your organization and the project you are seeking funds for. And how important it is to the community. This Board-to-Board relationship can be very powerful and can help to build trust in your organization.

To get started with foundation relationships, first get in the right mindset. Think about how you view the process of getting funds from a foundation. Is it grant writing? Most people consider it that. It’s a little selfish of us as fundraisers to think of it that way. “Grant writing” is very impersonal. It’s very transactional. It’s all about us and what we need. If we are truly interested in developing a relationship with a foundation, we must be concerned about their wants and desires.

One great place to start is by not sending the same standard proposal to a laundry list of foundations and expect some to “bite”. This ain’t fishing! Start by carefully researching and reviewing each individual foundation to see what their focus is. Then don’t send a proposal to those that you clearly aren’t a good fit for. For those that are interested in an area that matches your project, call and speak with the foundation administrator to see if it is in fact a fit before you write. This lets the foundation staff know that you don’t want to waste their time by submitting something they won’t be interested in. This call also breaks the ice and sets the stage for future communication.

One of the most important parts of cultivating a relationship with any donor is to build trust. Do everything you can to be trustworthy. Be professional and courteous. Treat individual foundation staff members with respect. Don’t waste their time. And don’t promise anything you know you can’t live up to later.

When you get a grant from a foundation, put care and consideration into acknowledging the gift and recognizing the foundation. Find out how they want to be recognized. Remember that some donors and foundations prefer to remain anonymous! When I worked for a Food Bank several years ago, there was a local foundation that I worked with and after a couple of years of carefully building a relationship, they consistently supported us with funds for trucks. And let me tell you, these trucks were not cheap! To recognize the foundation, we put their logo on the side of those trucks and they were very pleased with the publicity they got as our trucks drove around town every day. It was easy for us to do and it made the foundation staff and board happy. This kind of publicity really works well with corporate foundations!

Make sure to send a personalized thank you letter for a foundation gift. This is no time for a stale letter. Be sincere and get the letter out promptly. Make notes for yourself of any reports or follow-up the foundation requires and be sure to send them. Don’t drop the ball with details! The foundation who sponsored trucks at the Food Bank didn’t ask for any kind of follow up, but I knew it was prudent to do so anyway. After we had put a new truck into service and had used it for a couple of months, I would take a photo of the truck showing the foundation’s logo and send it to the administrator along with a hand-written note telling how the truck was being used. I know the administrator shared these notes with the members of the foundation Board because I heard lots of nice comments back from them. They appreciated that I took the time to let them know that their gift was being used as it was intended. It was an important step in building trust and subsequently setting up the next gift.

Make sure to cultivate foundation donors when you are not actively seeking money from them. Put the administrator and board members on your newsletter list so they can hear about the things you are doing on a regular basis. Visit them when you can to give them personal updates. Take them on a tour of your facility or front line services. Invite them to lunch with you, your executive director and any board members they might know.

The bottom line is that Foundations are first and foremost donors. Treat them with the same love and care that you do with any donor and the relationship should last a nice long time.

This post is part of the Grant Writing article series:

1. 8 Keys to Grant Strategy Success by Robert P. Stewart
2. 20 Free Grant Writing Resources for Non-Profits by Sandra Sims
3. Building Relationships with Foundations by Sandy Rees
4. Secrets From A Grant Reviewer by Katie Krueger

Have you ever heard this saying – “You can’t keep going back to the same well – it will run dry.” You might have heard it from a Board member or Executive Director and usually this comment pops up during a discussion of grant writing or direct mail.

It’s said out of fear – fear that if you ask a donor too many times for support they will stop giving. It’s kind of funny really – we have some self-imposed ceiling on the number of times we can ask a donor for support, and we arbitrarily set this ceiling without input from the donor. Most of the time, we don’t even know exactly how many times we can ask a donor before it becomes annoying. We operate from this vague notion of “too many” to describe it.

Here’s the truth: you can ask a donor for support as many times as you need it, provided certain conditions are met.

1. You are cultivating real donors. A real donor is someone who is invested mentally, emotionally, and financially in your organization. She cares about your organization’s work and the people you serve. She wants to see you be successful in delivering service and fulfilling your mission. Real donors give because they want to and because you asked. They don’t keep a scorecard with marks representing every check they write.
2. You are building relationships with your donors. In order to get real donors, you must build relationships. You spend time getting to know you donors and why they care about your organization. You invite them to tour your facility or to volunteer on the front lines. The more you engage your donor in the work you are doing, the deeper their commitment to your organization will be.
3. You practice donor-centered fundraising. Your fundraising efforts revolve around the donor, not around the organization. You share information with the donor about the impact of her gift and you invite feedback from her. Communication is not just one way. You let the donor tell you how often she wants to hear from you and you honor her wishes. In other words, you allow your donor to opt out of mailings.
4. You have a valid need for support. When you ask your donor for a gift, there is a real need. I’m not talking about being in crisis mode or trying to reduce the debt on your building. A donor will respond to these kinds of needs once in a while, but what they really want to support is continuation or expansion of a program that delivers tangible benefits. You can ask for support for the purchase of a piece of equipment that will help you become more efficient or allow you to serve more people.

If you’ve done a good job of building a relationship with your donors, and you practice donor-centered fundraising, your donor will support you as often as they can and as often as you ask.

If your organization is one of your donor’s favorites (and if you’re doing your job well, it should be), they WANT to support you and see you be successful. They care about your mission and they know it takes resources for you to fulfill it.

And they will be a well that you can visit as often as is needed.

This article is part of the Mythbusters series.

Here’s a list of each of the articles in this series:

1. Fundraising Myth: If You Build It They Will Come by Sandra Sims
2. The Myth of the “Selfless Volunteer” by Tom Welsh
3. Fundraising Myth: It’s Great to Be Cheap by Marc Pitman
4. Advertising and Marketing Are Too Expensive by Jim Berigan
5. The Myth of the Dried Up Well by Sandy Rees
6. Myths About Foundation Funding by Aaron Atwood

The Thank You letter often is created and sent without much thought. It may seem to be the last step in getting a gift from a donor and a routine task that warrants little merit. But it’s actually the first step in securing the next gift!

Purposeful and well-thought out Thank You letters can help you steward your donors, not to mention provide you with another way to communicate with them. Make sure you are getting the most from your Thank You letter efforts with these ideas.

1. Get the letter out quickly!
Everyone has probably heard that the faster you get your Thank You letters out the door, the better. And it’s absolutely true! Donors want to be sure that you received their gift and a Thank You letter is the best way to let them know it arrived safely. Experts say let no more than 48 hours go by from the time you receive a gift until the time you send out a Thank You letter. If it takes you a little longer and that’s the best you can do, work with it. Figure out what will work for your organization and put a priority on getting the letters out the door.

2. Relate your Thank You letter to the ask
Instead of sending out a generic letter, customize your Thank You letter to the specific ask that was used to generate the gift. If a gift comes to you from an appeal you sent out, then make sure your Thank You letter refers back to the story or the text in the appeal. You may need to write several different letters that can be used for whatever you have going on. For instance, you may want to write one letter for a special event you are working on, another one for monthly givers, and another one for donors who respond to your newsletter. Relating the Thank You letter back to the ask is a way to let your donors know you are paying attention.

3. Tell the donor what you will do with their money.
This is critical. Make sure the donor knows how you plan to use the donation he or she just sent you. Text like “Your gift will ensure that 15 children will go to summer camp for one week” makes the process of donating more real and tangible to the donor. They can envision 15 kids going to camp for a week and it helps create a bigger feeling of satisfaction for the donor.

4. Use a real signature
Digital signatures are easy and eliminate hand signing a stack of letters. But technologically-savvy donors know the difference between a digital signature and a live one. Have your President or Executive Director sign the letters, or ask a volunteer to sign them on his or her behalf. And use a blue pen so that donors can clearly tell it is a real signature.

5. Have the ED or President go through the letters and add personal notes.
This can bring big rewards in terms of stewarding donors! Taking a few minutes of a busy day to go through a stack of letters may seem like a chore to your boss, but donors who get a Thank You letter with a personal note will be thrilled that the ED took time to personally acknowledge his or her gift.

6. Add a reply envelope
Don’t be afraid to include a reply envelope in a Thank You letter. Many donors will hang onto these and use them for their next gift. You may receive some negative feedback, but you will likely receive a large number of gifts as well. It’s not uncommon to receive thousands of dollars in gifts from these “bounce-back” envelopes. You may want to code these envelopes so that you can track the number, size, and amount of donations received using this technique.

7. Include year to date or lifetime giving data
For donors who have been giving for several years, this information can be very enlightening to them. A donor who gives a $10 gift regularly to your organization will immediately see how their gifts add up over time. Sometimes donors forget when they last gave. Including year to date information can be a gentle reminder for them if they have pledges or commitments to make.

8. Make it clear that the letter is also a receipt
Don’t you hate getting boring thank you letters that drone on and never clearly spell out the gift you made? (By the way, if you aren’t giving to other organizations, you need to. It’s a great way to put yourself in the donor’s shoes and also let’s you see how other organizations handle the thank you process.) If you have to, draw a line on the page below the thank you text and put “Gift Receipt” about the actual gift information.

9. Include an offer to tour your facility or program site
Always include in your letter an offer for a guided tour of your facility or program site. You may never have anyone take you up on this, but they will remember that you offered. You will probably get a few people who want to visit you. Seeing firsthand the work that you do may make all the difference in the world to a particular donor. It can also mean the difference in an average size gift and a major gift.

10. Include the name and contact info of someone the donor can call with questions. Make sure that person is available.
Donors want to be able to call and talk to a real, live, knowledgeable person when they have questions. So be sure to include the name and phone number in your Thank You letters of someone who can answer questions for them.

The book 7 Essential Steps to Raising Money by Mail, which I co-authored with Sandra Sims, includes several sample thank you letters.  In addition there are also sample phrases specifically for how to word thank you letters included in the 321 sample words and phrases.

Are you reactive or proactive when it comes to recruiting new Board members? Reactive recruiting can leave you with more problems than solutions. Unfortunately, reactive recruiting is the way that many Boards go about bringing new people in. They wait until it’s time to have new members in place and then hastily recruit friends and neighbors just to fill seats or reach the magic Board member number set out in their bylaws. Being proactive and having a plan to recruit the right people with the skills and talent you need can help ensure your Board is successful.

Proactive Board recruiting starts with evaluating the skills needed on your Board. A simple matrix can offer a fresh look at what your organization needs in its top leadership. Do you need someone with banking or finance expertise? How about someone with marketing or communications skill? Do you need an attorney? Someone with human resource experience? How about someone who is comfortable fundraising? Across the top of the matrix, write the skills your organization needs. You’ll probably have some needed skills that are unique to your organization.

Now down the left side of the matrix, list your current Board members. Then, check the boxes so you can see which of the needed skills are already on your Board.

This exercise should show you where your holes are. In the sample matrix, we can see that the organization needs someone who is an attorney. Be careful not to fall into the trap of thinking you can get just any attorney! You need someone who has an interest in the work the organization is doing and who is willing to serve. If that person is already a donor of the organization, all the better! They are already demonstrating their commitment to the cause.

Another useful tool in proactive board recruiting is a Board member agreement. This simple document details the things that you expect your Board members to do, like attend meetings, participate in fundraising events, and making a financial contribution to the organization. Giving a potential Board member a ‘heads up’ about their responsibilities can help them make a better decision about joining your Board and get them off on the right foot to being a great Board member!

About the Author: Sandy Rees has served non profit organizations in Tennessee including Second Harvest Food Bank, and the Joy of Music School. She is an active member of the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP) and has achieved the CFRE (Certified Fundraising Executive) certification.  She is a co-author of the book 7 Essential Elements to Raising Money by Mail.