I hope you are ready to snap into action with new energy for your cause. And I hope you are giving to one of the many nonprofit organizations working to help Haiti in its time of need. Just notice – it’s the nonprofits and NGO’s who are stepping in to help. It helps us remember just how important our sector is to our communities, to all people and to other nations. Our work is very, very important!

FREE AUDIO: “Asking for Major Gifts: How to Never, Ever Get Turned Down”

I have created an audio download of my recent webinar on “Asking.” I’m reviewing everything you need to know about successful solicitations and the secrets to get your donors to say “yes.” We’ll discuss how to get them so involved and excited about your project that they are on board with you even before you ask. And how exactly DO you ask? When do you need to shut up? I hope you’ll take the time to listen to this hour-long session.

Download it now and learn how to secure those most important BIG GIFTS!

My site has lots of ideas and strategies for catapulting your fundraising results, your board and your organization - all to new heights. It is my honor to help you in any way I can – as a trainer, blogger, consultant and coach to nonprofit leaders.

I believe in the enormous power that fired-up board members, nonprofit CEO’s and fundraising staff can have to change the world.

Please feel free to comment on posts and contact me if you have questions or comments. You can also learn more about hiring me to fire up your board for fundraising, present a keynote speech or seminar, or help you as a consultant.

Do check out my calendar of events for my upcoming monthly webinars, and definitely sign up for my newsletter!

Thanks again for visiting!

Gail

PS: Feel free to contact me personally and connect on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn. I personally respond to everyone who writes.

I think we approach our board members ALL WRONG.

We nonprofit folks have this idea that our board members should be devoted to the cause 24/7. And when they place other priorities in front of our to-do list, we are disappointed in the least.

I hear a lot of complaining about board members. “My board members won’t raise money,” the executive director sadly whispers to me. “They won’t even open doors,” another friend confided.

I thought to myself, well do these board members think they are supposed to raise money or not? I could have bet a case of beer that the staff’s notion of what board members were supposed to do was not at all the same as the board members’ idea of what to do.

My nonprofit friends think, “Of course board members are supposed to raise money!”

But the board members are probably thinking secretly to themselves, “I’ll do anything BUT ask for money.”

Is there a conflict here?

And here’s the rub. There is bound to be disappointment on one side or the other unless there is a frank conversation about what you need your board members to do.

If you want your board members to help in fundraising –

And if you do need them to “raise money,” then you have to give them a format for this work. You have to tell them exactly how to do it and make it easy for them. They need a lot of encouragement and hand holding, and that’s fine! They aren’t the “hardened professionals” that we are.

So DO be realistic about your expectations and treat your board members like you’d want to be treated. They are volunteers. Wonderful, well meaning community volunteers. But they are untrained. They are not fundraising professionals. Treat them like the real people they are.

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Let us all be thankful at the outpouring of generosity from donors in response to Haiti’s crisis. The people of Haiti need and deserve our help.

From my standpoint also, I am looking carefully at the fundraising and donation techniques that are being used to raise (or collect) these funds.  What’s particularly amazing is the number and quantity of donations by text.

The Red Cross’s texting campaign is making history.

Apparently they now have over two million donors who have made $10 gifts to the Red Cross Haiti relief effort. Of course the real question is whether these donors will become repeat givers. And that depends on whether the Red Cross is able to establish real communication with them, and convey the…

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The Agitator Blog this morning has a thoughtful and poweful discussion of what “cultivation” really looks like. And they totally nail the key to developing a long term funding relationship with a foundation.

Andrew Kramer, of the Prison Entrepreneurship Program (PEP) in Houston, wrote in a long comment about his strategies for developing deep relationships with his donors. He focuses a lot on foundations because he raises a large amount of his revenue from these types of funders.

He says “I’ve learned that most foundations treat honesty and candid feedback about what happened as their primary form of involvement in our organization. They’ve never come to us and said that we should run our program a certain way, they just ask us to think about what happened and there is tremendous value in that since most individual donors never do that.

“Even with our foundations, the objective is never just to look at them as pools of cash for our benefit–the real value is in the fact that they require us to think about our programs and offerings, and then again that throughout the year they require us–sometimes in very thoughtful ways–to measure and assess what we’re doing.”

Now here’s a fundraiser who knows what he’s doing!

How refreshing to hear that the foundations are not being considered as just “pools of cash” – but they also bring an added benefit to the orgaization.

How refreshing again to hear that he does not consider the reporting back to foundation funders as a drag – but instead as a benefit, because thinking deeply about outcomes, and measuring what they are doing is USEFUL!

How many organizaitons are prepared to offer frank and candid feedback about what happened to their funders? Are you willing to be so transparent? Or do you sugarcoat things when you report back?

It’s really hard to be totally frank with a funder.

Funded projects almost always have breakdowns and challenges – that’s part of trying to change the world! And during a project, sometimes we have to change course because the landscape has changed on us.

But I have found over the years that if you go back with frank and candid feedback about the project, what you learned, what you’d do differently, what worked, what the challenges were – funders love this kind of honesty and realism. And they will trust you when you come back to ask again.

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I hope you are in the full swing of the holiday season! And I do hope you’re pulling in LOTS and LOTS Of year-end gifts!

Here’s some coaching I gave a colleague this morning.  She is working on some last-minute email appeals for her new job. The first draft of the note talks about the great things this group has done in the past year and asks for a gift. She asked me to give her an edit.

“No!” I said, “this won’t work! Here’s what your donors want to hear:”

1. What, specifically, do you want to accomplish this coming year? Tell your donors EXACTLY what you are raising money for.  This means you are NOT making a generic appeal. You are…

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Today’s Chronicle of Philanthropy identified 10 trends that are a bit unnerving. These are outside forces that are making life a challenge to put it lightly for anyone trying to carry out a nonprofit mission.

These trends are worrisome at best. They point out warning signs and potholes on the road to a nonprofit’s success.

I’d much rather see the pundits give us some good news coming down the pike for 2010. Listen, I’m the eternal optimist. There’s got to be a way to find something to be hopeful about! : )

Here are the trends that the Chronicle has pointed out:

10 Trends – Emerging Forces for 2010

1) Governments in Crisis – this means that we won’t be seeing grants and support from the governmental sector come back anytime soon. Let’s just hope that your nonprofit has not over-relied on government support!

2) Strains in the Safety Net – yes, this is troubling. Nonprofits are being asked to fill the gaps in the safety net. Can they do it?

3) A Full-Court Press for Modest Gifts – the mega gifts are really declining. And smart organizations are focusing on smaller gifts from generous donors.

4) Grim Grants Outlook – since foundations’ endowments lost so much in the stock market, the funds available for grantees has shrunk considerably for 2010.

5) A Weakened Charity Work Force – ok, so there have been alot of layoffs in our sector and people are straining to do more with less. We can handle it temporarily until things bounce back.

6) A Sharpened Eye on Charity Pay – oversight, transparency, scruitiny – it’s all there when examining nonprofit perks!

7) Rising Donor-Charity Tensions – donors are asking for more and more. They want to be able to control their gifts in ways we haven’t seen before.

Proving That Charity Works – outcomes, results, impact. That’s what everybody wants from us.

9) Volunteerism Becomes Cool – here’s a bright spot. Helping others is now the new cool. Yes!

10) A Stalled Online Revolution – I don’t agree with this one. The online world offers nonprofits incredible tools. We just need to learn how to use it.

I don’t want to hear words like: grim, stalled, weakened, tensions, strains and crisis, I am currently overdosed on the dark side.

Let’s look at the opportunities for us all – even in the midst of a challenging year. Last year, I published “7 Reasons for Fundraisers to be Optimistic in 09″ in the international AFP newsletter. I promise you that I’ll create an even longer list for 2010!

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A friend and client sent me this email last week:

“I am a development director so am particularly sensitive to these things, but I have to say I was appalled yesterday to received a long typed thank you yesterday for a small donation I gave 10 weeks ago at a fundraising breakfast.

“I went to the breakfast at the behest of two friends who serve on the board of directors.  I also know another board member and the executive director, who gave a fabulous short speech at the event.

“The event was packed with enthusiastic people.  All was done just right, except for the follow-up.

“Why not have thank you envelopes pre-addressed ahead of time so the table captains can quickly jot a note…

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It’s the week of Thanksgiving here in the U.S. and we are counting our blessings. As you consider what you are thankful for, perhaps you might remember your DONORS – the wonderful people who make the work of your organization possible.

I think most of us fundraisers take our donors for granted. And I think many board members and non-development staff members also feel this way.

I am doing a feasibility study for a capital campaign here in North Carolina, and I ran across a blatant example today. I was interviewing a donor who had made a major gift to the organization’s previous capital campaign. And the donor never felt adequately thanked.

He was invited to the groundbreaking with the other major donors. And he saw his name on the donor board in the lobby of the building that he contributed to. And he received a thank you letter.

But he also saw all the whoopla being made over a bank’s gift to the project. The organization made lots of fuss over some donors and none over other donors, including him.

And he felt sorta neglected. Can you imagine that a major donor might feel neglected? In fundraising, we consider this almost a crime. But I bet it happens more often than not.

What happened in this case?

You guessed it: there was turnover among the development office staff. The vital link of knowledge and consistency was broken. And when the staff left, the relationship with the donor walked out the door too. The new staff had other priorities . . . and the donor was left out in the cold.

During this season, please remember your donors – particularly your major donors. Go back to them and thank them for all they have done to make your organization successful.

How about thanking your organization’s founders?

How about all the donors to your last capital campaign?

How about former board members?

Hint: these folks are probably major donor prospects, aren’t they? So it is reasonable to invest some of your time thanking them.

Remember thanking donors is the first step to preparing them for the next solicitation.

When in doubt, love your donors!

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Continuing in my theme of “count your blessings,” I’m encouraging everyone to consider their wonderful donors as great blessings to the cause.

Donor: “How do I thank thee? Let me count the ways.”

When I started in fundraising at Duke University, we had a great saying: “Find seven ways to thank your donors and they will give again!” And another saying was: “Hopefully the first gift is not the last or the largest!”

The Benevon newsletter for this week had a great “how-to” article on donor thankathons:

With Thanksgiving upon us here in the U.S., now is the perfect time to call your donors just to say “thank you.”

Start by making your list of who you will call. Consider how many donors you have…

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Hi, I’ve been on vacation last week on the lovely west coast. My friend Jane Heimerdinger from the `Iolani School in Honolulu, Hawaii invited me to speak at the CASE VII Conference in San Francisco. And I stayed out on the west coast visiting the Napa Valley a few days. Life is good!

The Chronicle of Philanthropy columnist Holly Hall just posted an article on the Chronicle’s Prospecting blog: “Most Americans Intend to Make Holiday Donations This Year.” You know I have been preaching optimism about year-end giving right now – from my perspective, things are looking up.

I am seeing a turning tide of not only hopefullness, but clear indications that donors are starting to loosen the strings on their wallets.

The Chronicle cited a study by the American Red Cross of over 1000 adults in November that showed the same results.

If you can imagine, almost 25% of those polled said that their income had decreased during the recession! But even including those people, 80% of all those surveyed said that their year-end gifts would stay the same (62%) or increase (7%).

And only 20% said their giving would cut back. I think it is so very encouraging that the people in this poll said they would economize in other areas in order to keep up their giving. This agrees with other studies earlier in the year that cited the same opinions.

We need to remember – Amerians are a generous people. And we are accustomed to giving in the fall and particularly during the holiday season.

May your end of year campaign be the best ever! Onward!

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Why do you need a tagline?

It is your best chance to zap someone with a strong, clear, concise comment about your impact in the world. (And remember, of course, we are always taking about our impact, not “what we do.”)

I love taglines. I always tell my clients and nonprofit friends that they need a really great tagline, if they don’t have one already.

There’s been lots of talk lately about Getting Attention blogger Nancy Schwartz, who announced the 2009 winners of her annual “Nonprofit Taglines Awards” competition in late October. She had more than 4,800 nonprofit professionals to vote on sixty finalists from 1,702 entries.

Says Nancy: “The awards program is designed to encourage nonprofits to effectively use taglines, a high-impact, low-cost marketing tactic often…

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