Where your mission meets its match.
My final post on Reynold Levy’s book Yours For The Asking is about the importance of taking time to review your annual fundraising performance.
This year I’ve provided a number of Purposeful Planning trainings and webinars to help organizations of all sizes create annual fund development plans. The simple framework I use is posted in the Resources section of my website. It’s an Excel document to help map out your annual plan and donor communication calendar.
What may help is to be clear WHAT you are assessing. In Yours For The Asking, (p. 102) Levy offers these four powerful questions to help assess progress and maintain an active fundraising scorecard:
1. Did our fundraising in the last fiscal year overall, by market segment (corporations, small businesses, large foundations, family foundations, individual major gifts, and modest gifts) and by method (face to face solicitations, written proposal, special event, direct mail..) meet, beat, or fall short of budgeted expectations?
2. Was our fundraising in the last fiscal year a measurable improvement over the prior year’s results?
3. How does our fundraising track record compare with other admired institutions, overall, by market segment and method?
4. Are we successfully bridging the gap between our fundraising promise and performance, year over year?
Be sure to add: “Why or why not” as you answer each of these questions.
What I love about the questions is they bring attention to gaps. They may also encourage teamwork and partnership at a new level in order to fully answer each of the questions.
Since the biggest barrier for NOT creating a plan is time — staff and board simply not scheduling time to review last year’s efforts — I recommend putting it on the calendar at the start of each fiscal year. The amount of time doesn’t have to be overwhelming but it must provide meaningful information.
Why do this? Fundraising from individual donors is higher this year for the organizations I work with who have taken time to review their fundraising measures and make changes to meet or beat last year’s efforts.
I read a post from Seth Godin on Monday that got me thinking about how donors are treated and why they leave. Here’s the post:
No new customers
What if a rift in the time-space continuum changed the universe and it was suddenly impossible to get new customers, new readers, new donors, or new viewers?
How would that [...]
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Comment by Lydia — June 29, 2010
Getting sufficient funds is always difficult for nonprofits. These questions are great first steps towards getting the necessary funding. How do you see nonprofits raising more funds even during the recession?
Comment by Lori Jacobwith — June 29, 2010
Lydia,
Thanks for reading this post and for your comment.
I’m seeing that many of the organizations that I’m providing coaching & consulting support for are being much more clear in their communication which is causing them to raise more via direct mail and in person visits.
Here’s an interesting take on if you don’t startle & grab attention, you’ll fail at fundraising. The article is a fun comparison to Lady Gaga & fundraising. Think: Direct mail, newsletters, event invites. http://ow.ly/24D0P
Good luck!