If you have a fundraising goal to meet, the most important thing you can do is to focus your daily schedule around the activities that result in gifts being closed. I was recently reminded of this important truth while talking with a nonprofit leader.
They had a lot going for them. Their organization had a compelling vision and was accomplishing a lot of tangible results with very few resources. It seemed clear that donors would find them to be a good place to invest their money. The leader even had a plan, at least in their head, about how expansion could exponentially increase the impact of their organization. All they needed was an extra $500,000.
As we were talking, they were eager to show me their very professional-looking marketing materials and wondered out loud if they would attract more gifts if they created a sponsorship program, with benefits that would be attractive to sponsors. It was clear to me, very quickly, that this leader was missing the point. So, I asked them one simple question to get to the heart of the matter.
I said to them “When was the last time you sat down with one of your current donors and asked them for a gift to help you fulfill this vision?”
I could tell by the leader’s reaction that they weren’t expecting this question, and they became defensive. They didn’t feel they had the time to solicit major gifts. Their organization was so lean that they had no one to delegate to. Instead of going out and asking current donors for more money, they were going to fundraising workshops and racking their brains trying to figure out how to find more donors.
According to David Lively’s book, Managing Major Gift Fundraisers: A Contrarian’s Guide, the number one metric you can manage if you want to increase fundraising in your organization, is major gift solicitations. I have seen this play out dramatically in my own career and in the performance of the fundraisers I’ve managed with this approach. The more time spent soliciting large gifts, the more money is raised. This will be true for you as well.
So, I told my new friend to quit worrying about sponsorship packages and donor acquisition, to clear some time in their schedule, and start calling donors to talk about major gifts.
Even if it’s just a few hours per week, anything is better than nothing. You must start somewhere if you want to see change. I don’t know if they are going to take my advice, but
I hope you will.
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