annual campaign – Page 5 – The Healthy Non-Profit

The Twelve Days of Resource Development: Days 10, 11 and 12

December 22, 2011 DonorDreams Fundraising

We are literally just a few days away from the stockings being hung by the chimney with care in hopes that a big fat man breaks into your home in search of cookies and milk. In an effort to align this blog with the spirit of the season, I thought it might be fun to focus on the following holiday inspired question: “What would be the twelve days of resource development if such a song was written?”

On Monday, we kicked things off with Days 1, 2 and 3. On Tuesday, we looked at Days 4, 5, and 6 with two great reader suggestions from Barb Allen and Susan Rudd. Yesterday, we talked about Days 7, 8, and 9 and were blessed with a suggestion via Twitter from Ann Rosenfield, CFRE. So, I guess today is the grand finale.

I want to thank Dani Robbins (principal at Non Profit Evolution) and Barb Reynolds (Regional Chief Development Officers for the North Texas Region of the American Red Cross) for weighing in with their suggestions on what the tenth and twelfth days of resource development should be. However, before unveiling their suggestions, let’s recap the last few days:

On the first day of resource development, my favorite donor gave to me . . . a signed pledge with a large increase over last year’s gift level.
On the second day of resource development, my favorite group of fundraising volunteers gave to me . . . a commitment to work pledge cards and help put together our special events.
On the third day of resource development, my favorite resource development committee gave to me . . . three key written plans spelling out success in 2012 (e.g. resource development plan, prospect cultivation plan, and a donor stewardship plan.
On the fourth day of resource development, my most engaged and best donors gave to me . . . four fun cultivation parties that helped open the door to a warm group of new (and generous) prospects. (Barb Allen’s suggestion)
On the fifth day of resource development, the kids at the Boys & Girls Club gave to me . . . five truck-loads of holiday goodies and hand-decorated ornaments that will be given to some of the Club’s best donors. (Susan Rudd’s suggestion)
On the sixth day of resource development, my major gifts program gave to me . . . six program staff employees who helped the resource development staff and major gifts volunteers put together a “menu of opportunities” (thus signifying elimination of organizational silos and a healthy partnership between the resource development and program departments)
On the seventh day of resource development, my prospect researcher gave to me . . . 7 new donor prospects with 7 figure gift capacity. (Ann Rosenfield’s suggestion)
On the eighth day of resource development, the board development gave to me . . . eight new board volunteers who have an amazing understanding of resource development, lots of experience with fundraising, and ideas they are dying to share that will re-shape the organization’s RD Plan to reflect “The New Norm” of our economy.
On the ninth day of resource development, resource development thought leaders gave to me inspiration to practice . . . the 9-keys to inspiring and managing your board towards fundraising success (which are 1. Planning, 2. Setting Expectations, 3. Training, 4. Organization, 5. Well run and important meetings, 6. Accountability, 7. Urgency, 8. Celebration & Recognition, and 9. Mission-focus)

Here is what Dani suggested the tenth day of resource development should be:

On the tenth day of resource development my Board of Directors gave to me . . . 10-hours they’ve set aside for training, prospecting and planning.

Since no one weighed in with a suggestion for the eleventh day, here is my thought:

On the eleventh day of resource development my donor database gave to me . . . 11 donors who were willing to participate in a focus group on how my agency can improve its resource development efforts.

And finally, here is what Barb suggested the twelfth day of resource development should be:

On the twelfth day of resource development my annual campaign volunteers (also possible that it was the website’s “donate now button”) gave to me . . . twelve donors who opted for a monthly EFT gift for each of the 12 months of the year.

Great job everyone! I was reminded the other day in an e-newsletter from Marc Pitman — aka The Fundraising Coach — that “30% of all donations come in December.” With this thought in mind, my holiday wish for you is that your December is very active and profitable. Keep pushing all the way to December 31st at 11:59 pm.

Here’s to your health!

Erik Anderson
Founder & President, The Healthy Non-Profit LLC
www.thehealthynonprofit.com
erik@thehealthynonprofit.com
http://twitter.com/#!/eanderson847
http://www.facebook.com/eanderson847
http://www.linkedin.com/in/erikanderson847

The Twelve Days of Resource Development: Days 7, 8 and 9

December 21, 2011 DonorDreams Fundraising

The countdown is on and people are on the look-out for an older gentleman fitting the description of “a jolly older individual dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot . . . his clothes all tarnished with ashes and soot“. In an effort to align this blog with the spirit of the season, I thought it might be fun to focus on the following holiday inspired question: “What would be the twelve days of resource development if such a song was written?”

On Monday, we kicked things off with Days 1, 2 and 3. On Tuesday, we looked at Days 4, 5, and 6 with two great reader suggestions from Barb Allen and Susan Rudd . . . and as I did on Monday I asked readers to weigh-in with what they thought Days 7, 8 and 9 should be.

I want to thank Ann Rosenfield, CFRE, who is a Twitter follower who goes by @GratiaCaritas for weighing in with her suggestion on what the seventh day of resource development should be. However, before unveiling Ann’s suggestion, let’s recap the last few days:

On the first day of resource development, my favorite donor gave to me . . . a signed pledge with a large increase over last year’s gift level.
On the second day of resource development, my favorite group of fundraising volunteers gave to me . . . a commitment to work pledge cards and help put together our special events.
On the third day of resource development, my favorite resource development committee gave to me . . . three key written plans spelling out success in 2012 (e.g. resource development plan, prospect cultivation plan, and a donor stewardship plan.
On the fourth day of resource development, my most engaged and best donors gave to me . . . four fun cultivation parties that helped open the door to a warm group of new (and generous) prospects. (Barb Allen’s suggestion)
On the fifth day of resource development, the kids at the Boys & Girls Club gave to me . . . five truck-loads of holiday goodies and hand-decorated ornaments that will be given to some of the Club’s best donors. (Susan Rudd’s suggestion)
On the sixth day of resource development, my major gifts program gave to me . . . six program staff employees who helped the resource development staff and major gifts volunteers put together a “menu of opportunities” (thus signifying elimination of organizational silos and a healthy partnership between the resource development and program departments)

Here is what Ann (aka @GratiaCaritas) tweeted about the seventh day of resource development:

@eanderson847 On the 7th day of resource development, my prospect researcher gave to me – 7 new donor prospects with 7 figure gift capacity.

Again . . . thanks Ann! I love that suggestion.

Since no one else jumped in with their thoughts, I am once again left to be creative with days 8 and 9 . . . so here goes nothing:

On the eighth day of resource development, the board development gave to me . . . eight new board volunteers who have an amazing understanding of resource development, lots of experience with fundraising, and ideas they are dying to share that will re-shape the organization’s RD Plan to reflect “The New Norm” of our economy.
On the ninth day of resource development, resource development thought leaders gave to me inspiration to practice . . . the 9-keys to inspiring and managing your board towards fundraising success (which are 1. Planning, 2. Setting Expectations, 3. Training, 4. Organization, 5. Well run and important meetings, 6. Accountability, 7. Urgency, 8. Celebration & Recognition, and 9. Mission-focus)

OK . . . there are only three days left in this exercise. Let’s try to “finish strong” . . . I would like to see at least three more people weigh-in with ideas on what the tenth, eleventh, and twelve days of resource development should be. Please use the comment box below to share your suggestion. You can also drop me a note on Twitter, LinkedIn or Facebook.

Here’s to your health!

Donors are friends and NOT food!

December 15, 2011 DonorDreams Fundraising

Welcome to Thursday of individual giving week where we’re looking at different individual giving strategies as a way to replace dwindling pools of government funding. We’re using characters from the movie “Finding Nemo” to look at various individual giving strategies.

“Crush the Turtle” helped us look at special event fundraising on Monday. Tuesday’s post focused on “Marlin” and direct mail. Yesterday, Dory helped us peek at some of the considerations around ePhilanthropy. Today, we’re looking at the granddaddy of all individual giving strategies — an annual campaign driven by personal solicitation approaches.

Let’s turn to the shark characters from “Finding Nemo” to look at this classic individual giving strategy. Why the sharks? Here is the “Fish Friendly Shark Pledge” that Bruce the Shark took when we first met him on the silver screen:

“I am a nice shark. Not a mindless eatin’ machine. If I am to change this image, I must first change myself. Fish are friends. Not food.”

When I read this movie quote, I was transported back in time to a Boys & Girls Clubs of America leadership training in which I participated with my friends Paula, Teri and Tom. The “Fish Friendly Shark Pledge” reminded me of our team’s motto: “Donors are not ATMs.”

Let’s back up and start at the beginning. I’ll circle back to the sharks in just a moment.

Annual campaigns that are powered by personal, face-to-face solicitations are one of the most classic individual giving strategies employed by many of our most successful non-profit organizations:

United Way’s annual campaign utilizes face-to-face group solicitations in the workplace.
Boy Scouts’ “Friends of Scouting” (FOS) campaign utilizes face-to-face solicitations. Some of these approaches are in group settings (e.g. Pack meetings) and others are one-on-one with local business leaders and scouting alumni.
Boys & Girls Clubs’ “It Just Takes One” (IJTO) campaign utilizes one-on-one, face-to-face solicitations with existing donors and qualified prospects from the community-at-large.

These kinds of campaigns are “classic” and ultra succesful because face-to-face solicitations are proven to be the most successful way to raise funds. National statistics demonstrate that 75-percent of prospects/donors who are asked in-person end up making a contribution of at least 50-percent of what the volunteer solicitor asked them to contribute.

Whoa! Compare this 75-percent success rate with direct mail’s response rate of 0.5-percent to 3-percent. Then consider that the response rate for an email campaign can vary wildly — lower than 0.5-percent or upwards of 10-percent from what I’ve seen — depending on how warm the list is.

Of course, nothing comes close to touching 75-percent!

However, there is always a “catch,” and in the case of annual campaigning and personal solicitation strategies “the catch” is that most fundraising volunteers are scared to death of it. Nevertheless, utilization of best practices can lower fear levels to something manageable. Here are just a few things your agency will want to use if it decided to use this classic individual giving strategy:

Develop a great case statement
Provide volunteers with good solicitation materials
Make sure volunteer solicitors have personally made a contribution before asking them to solicit their friends
Don’t overload volunteer solicitors with many more than 5 prospects
Be diligent with your prospect assignment process and only ask volunteer solicitors to visit prospect they know. NO COLD CALL!
Bring in an experienced training professional to teach volunteer solicitors about the 12-step process on how to make an effective face-to-face solicitation.
Develop and use “accountability tools” to help volunteer solicitors stay focused.
Find ways to inject a “sense of positive urgency” into the campaign. (I don’t mean using crisis messages. I am referring to deadlines, challenge gifts, campaign goals, etc)

Thoughtful use of the annual campaign and personal solicitation technique as a tool in your individual giving toolkit can net your agency amazing results in a very short period of time compared to the years-and-years it might take to develop a successful direct mail or ePhilanthropy program.

So, here is where “Bruce the Shark” from Finding Nemo comes into play . . .

Soliciting someone using an annual campaign personal solicitation technique is . . . well . . . very personal. It is relationship-based, which means the relationship needs to be fed in a very different way than you might interact with mail donors or online donors. Donors with whom you visit and ask for a contribution in-person expect updates on how their contribution is being used. They usually want to hear from you . . . newsletters, phone calls, personal follow-up visits, invitations to receptions, etc.

“Know Thy Donor” . . . and figure out how they like to be kept informed
because you’ll pay the price if you use a “cookie cutter approach” for this group of donors!

When an agency doesn’t follow-up and build upon the relationship, that donor feels used. They feel like an ATM, and you look like a shark who is just out there preying upon people’s good nature.

So, my final words today are this . . . 1) add an annual campaign with face-to-face solicitation at the heart of your approach to your agency’s individual giving toolbox and 2) develop a really good stewardship plan that grows the relationship between your agency and the donor. You may want to even develop your own version of the “Fish Friendly Shark Pledge“.

Does your agency run an annual campaign and visit with donors in-person? How is that working for you? What is your success rate? What does your stewardship plan look like? How do you communicate ROI, program outcomes, and community impact information to your donors? If you developed your own version of a “Donor Friendly Pledge,” what would it sound like?

Please use the comment box below to share your thoughts because we can all learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

Online giving: Evolve or else?!?

December 14, 2011 DonorDreams Fundraising

Welcome to Wednesday of individual giving week where we’re looking at different individual giving strategies as a way to replace dwindling pools of government funding. We’re using characters from the movie “Finding Nemo” to look at various individual giving strategies. Monday’s post was all about “Crush the Turtle” and the thrill seeking mentality of special event fundraising. Yesterday’s post focused on direct mail. Today, we’re looking at ePhilanthropy through the eyes of “Dory” (the regal tang fish whose voice you recognize as Ellen DeGeneres):

“Give it up old man, you can’t fight evolution, I was built for speed!”

There is currently a debate raging in fundraising circles between traditionalists and futurists.

Futurists argue that giving trends all point to donors giving via your website, email, social media, text messaging, and e-video campaigns.

Traditionalists sound more like Jeff Brooks who said in his recent blog post titled “The case against innovation“:

“When you get bored with letters and change everything so it’s cool and innovative, you force people to spend energy and time figuring out your new conventions. That’s energy and time they don’t have, or don’t care to spend on such a stupid task. No matter how cool you’ve made it, you’ve put a wall around whatever you’re trying to communicate. You might think it’s a very low, easy-to-climb wall — but it’s still a wall, and that means fewer people are going to get your message.”

I personally find middle ground between these two camps:

Online giving increased by more than 30-percent in 2010 compared to 2009.
It is estimated that approximately 7-percent of all charitable giving was secured online in 2010.
Average size gift statistics for online giving is starting to look remarkably similar to direct mail data.
The trend arrow over the last decade is unmistakable.

(Note: A special thanks to Blackbaud and their analytics division for keeping an eye on these trends. You can find a Blackbaud widget that links to similar kinds of information at the bottom of my website.)

The reality is that it can be somewhat expensive for many non-profits to get into individual giving strategies involving technology. However, the good news is that they don’t need to live on the “bleeding edge of technology”. Agency can and should start to take small steps towards the future. For example, even small organizations can add a “donate now” button to their webpage, set-up a Facebook and Twitter account, and start experimenting with both listening to donors and nudging them toward online giving opportunities.

The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. I recently read somewhere (I honestly can’t remember where or I would cite the source), that there is likely lots and lots of “cross pollution” between different individual giving strategies. Here are a few examples to illustrate this point:

A donor gets a letter in the mail and they are inclined to make a contribution. However, they see your agency’s website address embedded in the letter and go online to make that donation out of convenience.
A donor is solicited using a face-to-face solicitation strategy. They sign the pledge card. When the pledge reminder arrives, they go online to pay their pledge because it might be more convenient.
A donor receives an email (doesn’t matter if it is for solicitation or stewardship purposes). They then receive a visit by a fundraising volunteer who asks them to make a pledge. They sign the pledge card because it is convenient rather than dig through their cluttered email inbox for that donation link.

Everything is getting more and more interconnected. For this reason, I am all for investing a little time and money in ePhilanthropy because the decision isn’t about which tool to use with individuals. The decision involves which tools to use in concert with each other.

Don’t go crazy by focusing exclusively on lots and lots of new technology. Start small. And by all means, don’t use technology to replace your existing solicitation tools (e.g. mail, pledge cards, fundraising volunteers, etc).

Remember, the more tools you have in your toolbox to connect with individuals the more likely it will be that you are able to engage what is clearly the largest slice of the charitable giving pie chart — INDIVIDUAL DONORS.

What is your organization doing right now in the arena of ePhilanthropy? Website? Email? Text? Electronic video? Social media? Do you have a written ePhilanthropy plan in place that delineates which online tools you’re using and which tools are used for cultivation vs solicitation vs stewardship? Please take one minute to share using the comment box below a nugget about where you’re at because we can all learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

Whoa! Special events and individual giving

December 12, 2011 DonorDreams Fundraising, Planning

We ended the last week with a close-up look at what many non-profit organizations are doing to adjust to a restriction in government funding. Click here to read the post titled “Sir Isaac Newton was right about nonprofit organizations“. I ended Friday’s post with a promise that we would look at individual giving strategies from different angles this week. Today, we will look at special events as an individual giving strategy.

I thought it might be fun to look at individual giving through the eyes of those Disney characters from the movie “Finding Nemo”. Why this movie? Because this movie was all about a father who in his search for his lost son learned how to take risks and also discovered his son is capable of taking care of himself. In some ways, I think that individual giving for non-profit agencies kind of follows the same storyline.

Let’s take that scene in the movie where Marlin (the father clown fish) is talking to Crush (the turtle) about Marlin’s experience with jellyfish:

Crush: “Oh, I saw the whole thing, dude! First, you were like, whoa! And then we were like, WHOA! And then you were like, whoa.”

Marlin: “What are you talking about?”

Crush: “You, Mini-Man! Takin’ on the jellies. You got serious thrill issues, dude.”

LOL . . . I think special events are a little bit like this scene from “Finding Nemo”. They are fun. They are not for the faint-of-heart. Too many might actually be dangerous for your organization. However, they are something you probably need to do if you want to “find” donors.

As we talked about on Friday, there are many fundraising volunteers who are fearful about asking friends to make a direct charitable contribution. However, special events feel different from asking for direct contributions because there is a trade involved — you give me $50.00 and I giving you a ticket to a dinner. Quid pro quo.

Unfortunately, there are too many non-profit organizations who just kept adding more and more events to their resource development plan every time there was a shortfall in revenue. Now, they have an unbalanced resource development program, and much like a car with unbalanced tires this can be a recipe for danger.

I won’t go into a long diatribe about how special events aren’t a very efficient way to raise money from individuals. This is a well-worn path, and you can find countless blog posts from me on the subject. However, you may want to click here to read Charity Navigator’s study on special events and how they cost (direct + indirect costs) the average non-profit agency $1.33 to raise $1.00.

All that being said, every non-profit organization needs to have one or two well-run special events built into their annual resource development plan because:

They will bring in some money for your agency (if you factor out indirect costs like staff time),
They are a soft way for new prospective donors to learn more about your agency,
They are a fun way for your agency to engage new volunteers, and
They have a cultivation and stewardship effect for many prospects and donors especially if the event has a “mission-focus”.

However, please keep in mind that too much of a fun thing is never good for anyone. I recent had an opportunity to interview more than 40 donors. I asked the donor if they prefer to make a charitable contribution using an event vehicle or a direct solicitation from a friend armed with a pledge card. In EVERY interview, the donor came back and said without hesitation that they would prefer the friend and the pledge card.

Remember . . . events have their place. Keep them to a minimum, but do those few events very well. Keep the event mission-focused with an eye to introducing new prospects to your agency and demonstrating to existing donors that their contributions are making a difference. Most importantly, keep in mind that special events are only one of many solicitation strategies you will employ in your efforts to secure more individual giving to compensate for the receding tides of government funding.

How does your agency ensure its special event program doesn’t get out of hand? Do you evaluate every event? If so, what metrics do you use?

Here’s to your health!

Lessons from an e-video that will make you cry

December 8, 2011 DonorDreams Fundraising

So, my good friend Marissa sent me this tweet a few days ago:

@eanderson847 Check out this video showing what can be done with just $1. Microphilanthropy at it’s finest. youtu.be/9DXL9vIUbWg

Please grab a tissue and click the link. The YouTube video is about 10-minutes long, but I promise you that it is well worth your investment in time.

As I watched the e-video, lots of different thoughts raced through my head including:

This video demonstrates the intense power of stewardship.
The producers remind us that while major gift donors are incredibly important to our non-profit agencies, we need to remember that charitable contributions that aren’t so major need to be treated as transformational. Why? Because they are!
The video’s point of view is that philanthropy, regardless of how small, is powerful. Not just for the person who receives it, but also for the person who gives it.
This video reminded me that there are differences between “fundraising” and “resource development” and “philanthropy”. In my mind, “fundraising” is the act of soliciting a donor for a charitable contribution. “Resource development” speaks to the overall process — prospect identification & evaluation, introduction, cultivation, solicitation, stewardship, and the continuous feedback loop moving forward. “Philanthropy” is the love of humanity and goes beyond just giving money and includes volunteerism, mentoring, emergency response, etc.
This video points to an often overlooked trend called “microphilanthropy” that all non-profit professionals need to be aware. We need to understand this trend first and then analyze what it means. Is this growing trend something that can affect non-profit resource development and donor trends? Sure it can! . . . How? . . . I’m not sure, but it warrants our attention and time. Click here to check out an interesting blog calling itself the “1DollarClub.org” to read more.
This video also smacked me across the face and was a reminder about another emerging trend — non-profits are using the internet, social media, and e-videos to steward donors in an increasingly digital world where more and more people just don’t have time for traditional stewardship activities and tactics. ePhilanthropy is here to stay and it is evolving every day!!!

Wow! Thank you, Marissa (by the way, she is the blogger at One World One Plate and I think everyone who loves food should go check out her work).

After viewing the e-video, did you have any thoughts that struck you like a lightning bolt? Is your non-profit organization using online videos as part of its resource development plans and efforts? If so, how? Please use the comment box below and share your revelation. We can all learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

Taking a page out of GE’s playbook

November 30, 2011 DonorDreams Uncategorized

Have you ever been watching television, trying to zone out during the commercials, when all of a sudden “WHAM!” a powerful advertisement grabs your attention and almost moves you to tears? Come on! I know it has happened to most of you, and I am no exception.

I was most recently the victim of such an occurance last night. I was in my hotel bed watching television and trying to avoid doing work. Out of nowhere came this General Electric (GE) commercial . . . the ad was about cancer survivors who were given the opportunity to meet the GE employees who built the medical machinery that helped save their lives.

If you haven’t seen it, grab a tissue and click here to view the YouTube video of it.

It wasn’t more than 5-seconds after this commercial ended that I had these two thoughts:

This GE commercial is the same thing as a non-profit organization’s “case for support” for their annual campaign pledge drive. The only difference was that it was in video format instead of a written case statement.
Putting cancer survivors in the same room as GE employees was so powerful. It was almost like GE was stewarding their employees by reminding them of how powerful their gift of labor really is to everyday people who are trying to work through personal crisis.

I think the thing that got me most was when the employee at the end of the commercial says: “[It was] one of the most heartwarming events I’ve ever experienced”.

Earlier this week my Monday blog post titled “What gets measured gets done” spoke to the power of benchmarking. Tuesday’s blog post titled “Taking a page out of NPR’s playbook” highlighted National Public Radio (NPR) as a potential benchmarking opportunity for agencies looking for a successful road map to reduce dependency on government funding.

Today’s post continues on this week’s theme of benchmarking; however, the twist is that non-profits can also learn from and benchmark their for-profit cousins. For example, this GE commercial has me wondering:

Does putting employees together with the people who benefit from their efforts improve employee retention? If so, how significant is the retention? Can the same effect be produced if non-profit donors are given more regular access to the people whose lives they changed (e.g. your customers/clients)?
Does creating this commercial and storyline help GE’s sales force more effectively articulate the case to purchase this particular product? If so, how significant is the improvement in sales? Can the same effect be produced in board members and volunteer solicitors who are reluctant to solicit charitable contributions to the annual campaign?

I’ve been hearing way too often from non-profit professionals that donors don’t have time for personal stewardship visits and touches. I’ve also recently had the opportunity to spend lots of time with a number of donors, and they don’t seem to be saying the same thing. What I am hearing donors say is they are sick and tired of one solicitation after another after another. They look forward to events where they can see, hear, and touch the charity’s mission.

I am going to hold onto the visual imagery of how those cancer survivors and GE employees looked when they met for the first time. Am I wrong or was it powerful? They were moved to tears, right? Heck, I was moved to tears. My “fundraiser’s gut feeling” is telling me that there are many valuable take-aways for non-profit organizations from that commercial. I suspect successful non-profits are tapping into that same raw power and emotion when it comes to donors and those folks you serve everyday.

Yes, we can learn a lot from each other as non-profit professionals, but I suspect we are limiting ourself. If we expand our world, we can learn a lot from everywhere we look everyday. Don’t just benchmark organizations that are just like you . . . expand your horizons and look at for-profits that you can benchmark, too.

While benchmarking multinational corporations might not be realistic for many of you, I bet there are a number of small businesses in most of our backyards that will work equally well.

What did you take away from the GE commercial as it relates to your non-profit work? How do you connect your donors to mission in similarly powerful ways that don’t involve more solicitation (e.g. special events don’t count when answering this question)? How does your organization track the effectiveness of those personal and powerful stewardship touches? Have you ever done any benchmarking? Who? And what was the result of your experience?

Please use the comment box below to weigh-in with an answer to any of these questions. Remember, we can all learn from each other.

Here’s to your health!

Taking a page out of NPR’s playbook

November 29, 2011 DonorDreams Fundraising, Planning

In my hometown of Elgin, Illinois, there have been a number of sleepless nights for non-profit organizations whose revenue model is heavily dependent on government funding. The economy and housing bubble caught up with the city, and now there are projected budget deficits. As you can imagine, non-profit funding is on the proposed chopping block. All of this is compounded by the fact that we live in Illinois, which by most accounts has one of the worst state budget problems in the country. So, state funding has also been on the retreat for years.

I’ve been saying for years to all of my non-profit friends who would listen: “the government funding gravy train is coming to a halt . . . get out and get out NOW.”

Usually this dramatic plea has been met with nods of agreement, then shoulder shrugs, and finally questions around “how to”.

Yesterday’s blog post about non-profit benchmarking titled “What Gets Measured Gets Done” got me thinking and wondering: has anyone ever done this before, and if so, do they have a roadmap that others can duplicate?

It didn’t take long for me to find an answer, and it was there in front of me all along. National Public Radio (NPR) was founded in 1970. It was heavily and almost exclusively government funding supported through much of the 1970s and 1980s. Today it receives less than 10-percent of its revenue from the federal government.

From what I can tell, it didn’t happen overnight but it seems to have occurred quickly after a funding crisis in 1983.

It shouldn’t surprise anyone that NPR turned to individuals as a cornerstone to their strategy. After all, more than three-quarters of all charitable giving in America comes from individuals.

So, there you go . . . it is a roadmap! It might not be an easy road, but it has been done before, and it is possible to transform your revenue model. Here are just a few quick suggestions for those of you who are interested in taking the next few steps:

Tune into NPR and start listening. While tuning in for the programming can be fun and delightful, I especially recommend listening during the pledge drive. Bring your notepad and pencil because there are lots of notes to take. NPR does one of the best jobs I’ve seen with their pledge drive. They employ best practices effortlessly. We can all learn a lot if we just listen and watch.
Consider making a pledge. I made my first pledge to NPR in 1998 during the Clinton impeachment trial. After making that small contribution, the stewardship stuff and communications I received from them was amazing and almost felt like drinking out of a fire hose. They do a nice job with stewardship. It was the best $25 I’ve ever spent in my life, and it was cheaper than most trainings.
Go check-out their cyber presence. Review their website. Follow them on Twitter. Like them on Facebook. Subscribe to a few of their blogs. Then sit back and watch them masterfully use social media and the internet to cross promote content and communicate with their clients who are also their donors.

Obviously, NPR’s plan can’t be exactly duplicated for a number of reasons. However, it is a good place to start. Please note that the aforementioned bullet points can all be done today and only focus on listening, observing and fact gathering. This is, after all, the essence of benchmarking. There will be lots of action and work on the road ahead, but for now it is important to do your homework and engage your volunteers with both the benchmarking and planning efforts.

How does your agency plan on adjusting its revenue model? What is your strategy? Are you benchmarking yet, and if so who are you studying?

Please use the comment box below to answer these questions and share your thoughts with the rest of us. It only takes a minute and you feel good inside when you do so. Why do it . . . because we can all learn from each other!

Here’s to your health!

Don’t put Dorothy on your board of directors

October 27, 2011 DonorDreams Board development, volunteers

September 15, 2008 . . . do you remember where you were and what you were doing? It was the day the world changed. It was what some people have called an “economic 9-11”. Regardless of how you characterize the day that Lehman Brothers filed for bankruptcy and the stock market started its crash, it is hard to argue the following: 1) the economic paradigm we all used to live in shifted and 2) nothing will ever be the same again.

This week I have used characters from “The Wizard of Oz” to talk about current challenges facing the non-profit sector. Today, we will spend a moment talking about Dorothy.

Dorothy is an iconic character who has been described as a “level-headed, plucky, resourceful, determined, all-American, populist”. However, I’ve always seen her as a traditional “conservative”. Don’t believe me? Refresh your memory with this quick YouTube clip. Of course, I don’t mean this in any kind of political way, but more of the traditional meaning of “holding to traditional attitudes and values and cautious about change or innovation”.

You cannot afford to have Dorothy on your board of directors during these tough and turbulent economic times!

Mentally take a look around your board room and see if you can identify how many Dorothy-like volunteers occupy chairs. They are kind folks (dare I say friends) who look and sound like the following:

They are frightened by the economic “tornado” whirling throughout the world. They talk about economic news constantly.
They wish for yesteryear and reminisce about times when your non-profit was facing a different set of circumstances. They fixate on making things better . . . just like they “used to be”. They’re focused on making that formerly kick-butt special event awesome again. They’re insistent that you can hold onto all of your government grants if you just tried a little harder. After all, there is no place like home.
They are visibly closed to new and innovative ideas that have not been tried. They believe ePhilanthropy is a passing fad. They won’t entertain ideas around merger, acquisition, or strategic alliances that share back office functions. After all, that is not the Kansas they so fondly remember.

Don’t get me wrong. I am not suggesting a “witch hunt” to root out these folks and fire them. Dorothy serves an important role on your board. She is that cautious voice that keeps you from getting into trouble. She will stop you from pulling the plug on your annual campaign and direct mail appeals and “going all in” on ePhilanthropy efforts. Valuable? YES! However, what happens when you have too many Dorothy-like board members? Or what if you have those well-intentioned people serving in the wrong roles (e.g. board president, annual campaign chair, strategic planning committee, etc)?

My best two pieces of advice for non-profit staff and board volunteers this morning are:

Be especially strategic and thoughtful about where you ask these people to serve in your organization. This means that you need to: a) identify who these folks are and b) have a clear understanding of which volunteer opportunities are acceptable for conservative personalities.
Focus your board development efforts over the next year on recruiting people in your community who don’t resemble Dorothy to serve on your board. This is not the time to pine for Kansas! This means your board development committee needs to double down on the “prospect identification” and “prospect evaluation” elements of the board recruitment process. Gone are the days when everyone sits around a table and tosses out names of good, kind and resourceful people. BE STRATEGIC!

I suggest that the type of people your board development committee should look for exhibit some of the following characteristics:

They don’t appear to be “personally” economically impacted by the Great Recession
Their business or line of work seems to be doing fine
They are naturally positive and have a decent outlook on the future
They seem to be open to new ideas (as evidenced in their personal and professional lives)
They are “outside-of-the-box thinkers (as evidenced in their personal and professional lives)

Remember, if you want to keep the flying monkeys away from your non-profit agency, STAY AWAY FROM DOROTHY.

OK — if you aren’t buying into my cheesy “Wizard of Oz” analogy, then please go to the library and borrow the book “Who Moved My Cheese“. You’ll thank me later.

How has your agency adapted to the new realities? Have you changed your resource development model or are you still trying to do things the old way? Do you see your board development efforts changing or focusing on different types of prospects? Please use the comment box below and weigh-in. Please remember that we can all learn from each other. In fact, it is probably the most effective way many of us learn.

Here is to your health!

If I only had a heart . . .

October 26, 2011 DonorDreams Board development, Donor-centered fundraising, Fundraising, resource development, volunteers

There are 9-keys to “inspiring and managing yours board for fundraising success”. In fact, the reality is that these 9-keys are the same nine things you need to do to “engage” anyone in anything. However, I believe that these nine concepts are not all equal. While all are important, I have come to realize that the most important and most difficult engagement tool was best summed up by the “Wizard of Oz’s” Tim Man in this YouTube video.

The most important engagement tool in your nonprofit toolbox in my humble opinion is “MISSION-FOCUS”.

I personally learned this lesson more than 7-years ago when one of my more influential board volunteers (I’ll omit his name for privacy purposes, but let’s just say he was really good with other people’s money) resigned from the Boys & Girls Club of Elgin’s board of directors. While he resigned for personal reasons and still supported the Club, I didn’t see the train wreck coming until it was too late.

This board volunteer was infamous for taking 15+ prospects’ pledge cards as part of the annual campaign every year. His reasoning seemed sound: 1) they were clients of his, 2) they were friends of his, and 3) he had always solicited these donors. I’d be lying if I tried to tell you that I ever tried to talk him out of being such an overachiever. However, in hindsight I wish that I had.

The first year this individual wasn’t on our board, we tried to redistribute his annual campaign prospects to other volunteers. I finally understood how big of a fool I had been when my phone rang a few weeks after our annual campaign kickoff meeting. The call came in from one of our more steady donors who had always been solicited by this former board volunteer.

The call started off nice enough. “Hi . . . how are you . . . how are things down at the Club?” However, pleasant conversation quickly turned into a cross-examination: “why is so-and-so calling me for my annual campaign pledge this year . . . what happened to he-who-I-loved-to-get-solicited-by . . . is there something wrong at the Club whereby he just walked away from your board of directors?” And as if that wasn’t enough to cause me to run to the restroom and vomit, most of the calls ended with the donor talking to me like I was a kindergartener and telling me that they didn’t donate to the Club because of our mission but because of who had been asking.

The lesson I painfully learned was that stewardship was very important in the resource development process. Successful stewardship and relationship building meant transitioning a donor-relationship from their the volunteer-solicitor connection to a love affair with the organization’s mission. While it might not happen overnight, working on it symbolized a commitment to sustainability and a donor-centered paradigm. The Tin Man was 100% correct when he sang about the value of his heart.

Being “MISSION-FOCUSED” goes beyond stewardship . . . here are just a few ideas for infusing mission in everything you do at your non-profit organization:

Host your board meetings, committee meetings and fundraising meeting at your service facility as a way of reminding everyone what their volunteer time commitments are all about.
Focus newsletter content on return on investment messaging and all things related to your agency’s mission. Skip the boring advertisements for the next opportunity to make a contribution.
Don’t let your annual campaign volunteer solicitors go on important solicitations by themselves. Staff should do everything possible to get invited on important solicitations and ensure: 1) the ask is not being done in a “quid pro quo” manner and 2) mission-oriented reasons are infused throughout the solicitation call.
Find ways to bring the idea of your clients into important meetings. For example, ask agency clients to participate in an essay contest about what they value most about your organization, its programs and mission. Share those essays with board volunteers, fundraising volunteers and donors.
Incorporate a “mission moment” into ALL MEETINGS as a way to keep the focus on why you’re asking others to do what they do.

Failure to inject “MISSION-FOCUS” into all of your meetings and fundraising campaigns can be disastrous. It can lead to volunteer-fatigue and donor turnover. It can create a sense of disengagement that results in staff doing everything. Do I need to go on? Come on . . . if a Tim Man can get it, then surely we all understand the importance of this concept. Right?

I can go on and on, but I’d rather you share with your fellow DonorDreams blog subscribers what you do to maintain a healthy dose of “MISSION-FOCUS” in everything you do. Please use the comment box below to share your example because we can all learn from each other. There are no right or wrong answers. Please jump in.

Here is to your health!