When donors make a year-end philanthropic gift they feel joyful. Seriously, MRI-based research has found when people give, or even contemplate giving, to others their brains light up. In a super good way. They receive a ‘feel good’ shot of dopamine that goes straight to the brain’s pleasure center – [...]
In Part 1 of this two-part series on handling donor resistance we covered some of the reasons hesitations and objections are normal, and nothing to be feared. Rather, they present an opportunity to get to know your donor prospect better and potentially forge an even stronger relationship. There is one [...]
Sometimes when working with major donor prospects they say “yes” right away. More often, they don’t. You may not get an outright “no” (in fact, usually you won’t), yet you’ll get a hesitation or what we call major donor resistance. As in: No, not now. No, not you. No, not [...]
You do good work. You help the illiterate to read. You put paintbrushes into frail seniors’ hands. You organize programs to solve pressing public problems. You do a myriad of things to make lives better. Moreover, you often do this work under serious constraints. Too often, you operate in a [...]
Managing a board of directors can be hard. I know, I’ve been in your shoes as both an Executive Director and as a volunteer board member. Trying to change your board can feel hopeless. Like pushing a huge boulder up a hill. I meet burned out Executive Directors all the [...]
Year-end giving presents an extraordinary time for nonprofits to raise more money from individual donors than any other point in the year. It is also a time when fundraisers get too creative arguably, on the wrong things – and consequently spend too little time on the right things. A quick [...]
December is around the corner and we want to share best tips for your year-end fundraising. Sit back with your eggnog, put your feet up and review our list of what you need to know so you can have the best giving season ever: 1. Share your metrics for your [...]
Here’s one little ‘trick’ to vastly improve your fundraising this year. You’re going to think I’m kidding, but I’m not. I could give you lots of tips and tools to improve your year-end fundraising success (and feel free to grab some here), but if you do nothing else but this [...]
Ready to have your mind blown? There’s a super simple thing you can do to dramatically increase your contributions. You can easily put this in place before the end of the calendar year — when most donors make their gifts. Trust me. You’re going to want to read the rest of this [...]
Email solicitations continue to be effective, accounting for 28% of all online revenue (Nonprofits Source). However, the average office worker receives over 120 emails per day (The Radicadi Group), so how do you cut through the clutter? As a former development team member myself, I’m much more critical of solicitations [...]
Exercise and fundraising. What do these activities have in common? At first glance, very little. But they take on a special meaning for a client of mine named Thea Wood, founder and President of Backstage Chats Foundation, a wonderful organization doing transformative work around music and gender equality. She groups [...]
“What’s keeping you from growing your nonprofit’s funding?” That was the first question on a survey I conducted before I spoke at a workshop for nonprofit Executive Directors earlier this year. I wasn’t surprised by the answers -- they were the same things I hear from leaders all over the [...]