Whenever I bring up the subject of boards, so many fundraisers roll their eyes. Why are our boards such a huge pain point and what can we do about it?

I say we have to face reality about some sensitive topics: people, motivation, volunteers and commitment rather than chasing after some myth of the ideal board.

Let’s be realistic and see what we really can expect from our board – particularly in the area of fundraising.

Let’s remember that most board members are afraid of fundraising because they are embarrassed and fear rejection.  And they generally are not sure what your expectations are of them.

Get your expectations in the right order and you’ll have a happy relationship – and a productive one – with your board.

Here’s what you can count on – and what you can’t  – with your board members.

WHAT YOU CAN COUNT ON

1.  Most board members really do want to help. They just don’t know how. It’s really up to you to make it easy for them. You’ll need to motivate, guide and support them.

If you do make this investment of your time and energy, then you’ll have a gold mine of great board members on your hands.

2.  Most board members are open to and even enjoy education. They don’t like “training” but they do like “education.” June Bradham, author of “What Nonprofit Boards Want” says that the word “training” makes them feel like seals.

Most board members are eager to do a good job and want to know what their job is. The clearer your job expectations are for board members, the more you’ll get out of your board.

3. Most board members are capable of being terrific friendmakers if they know the right thing to say and they are pumped up.  But you need to teach them what friendmaking is all about or they may go in the wrong direction.

4. Most board members are happy to help thank donors. In fact, they love it!  And you can increase donors’ future gifts if your board members make thank you calls quickly to donors.

5. Most board members can be terrific “sneezers” spreading the viral message around your community. Just make sure they can practice what do say in a comfortable, natural fashion.

HERE’S WHAT YOU CAN’T COUNT ON

1.  You can’t expect them to be good at soliciting. That’s a special skill and personality type. Frankly I don’t even want all my board members out there soliciting because some of them would not be very good at it.

Treasure the board members who are good at soliciting and find other productive jobs for those who are better at other things.

2.  You can’t expect them to show up at every event. You need to tell them what your priorities are – what’s essential and what’s optional.  Then, when they have a clear idea of what you need from them, they can give it to you.

3.  You can’t expect them to know exactly what to say. You might think they know the mission, vision and case for support, but they need practice, practice, practice putting it into their own words.

4.  You can’t expect them to maintain their passion on their own. It’s your job to keep them pumped up and excited about the cause. If you do, you’ll have an enthusiastic, fired-up team helping you spread the word and make connections!

5.   You can’t expect them to keep coming to boring meetings. Busy people will flee if they feel their time is not well used. If you liven up your meetings, then you’ll also liven up your board!

So set your own expectations correctly,  provide the leadership and support your board needs, and you’ll be rewarded with a high-performing team!

NO ASK fundraising strategies? What can I possibly mean?

If  your board members flee when they are asked to help in fundraising, you need a new approach and some new ideas.

So here is a wildly different approach to try:

Tell them they DON’T have to ASK if they don’t want to.

Let’s find some practical, easy ways your board members can help in fundraising, without soliciting.

They can open doors, and help you find new friends and donors – without having to solicit.

Here are my favorite six ways to use board members in fundraising, without soliciting. It’s just the start of a long list of productive jobs they can to to raise friends, thank donors and help create a sustainable fundraising effort.

In my webinar on Thursday May 13, I’ll lay out the critical success factors for employing each of these strategies.

And I’ll share a step-by-step plan to help your board members implement them.

If your board members are uncomfortable in fundraising, bring them to listen in so they can find out new ways they can support you without having to solicit.

1. MAKE FRIENDS FOR THE CAUSE

We need to capitalize on our board members’ personal social networks to further our organization’s urgent work solving community problems. So the job is clear: we have to ask our board members to introduce our organization to everybody they know.

Your board members need to be roaring advocates for your organization; they need to talk about it wherever they go.

They should be all over their friends, telling them why it matters and urging them to get involved.

Actually, you want your board members to start an epidemic—of good news about your cause that will spread through your community.

Make Your Board Members into “Sneezers“

I teach board members how to be sneezers – spreading the idea virus and conveying excitement about our cause everywhere.

2. IDENTIFY YOUR ORGANIZATION’S VIP PROSPECTS

Who are the important people who could catapult your organization’s future? I call them VIPs–for Very Important Prospects.

These individuals may be civic, political, philanthropic, religious, corporate, or social leaders in your community. They may also be among your current donors or on your prospect list.

Let’s start our board members on a strategy that I call “The VIP Prospect Game.”

It’s a seamless, easy, polite way to get your board members talking about WHO THEY KNOW and HOW THEY CAN GET THE DOOR OPEN. And this can be a tough conversation to pull off with them, as we all know.

Here’s how to start them working on major donor strategies – where they SHOULD be focused. We’ll talk more about the VIP Prospect Game in my webinar on Thursday.

3. GATHER FRIENDS WITH SMALL SOCIALS

You can expand your community relationships and make friends fast through gatherings such as Small Socials. This job is perfect for social board members who have many friends and like to socialize.

A Small Social can take several formats. It can be a coffee, a tea, dinner, a porch party, a cookout, or cocktails. It can be breakfast meetings or luncheons. It can include 3 people or 100.

When in doubt, throw a party!

Follow these rules for a successful Small Social:

1. A board member or volunteer invites people and hosts it.

2. There is no charge.

3. It is a cultivation event designed to fire up people about your cause.

4. A plan is in place for following up after the event.

If you don’t have a follow-up plan, don’t do the event at all.

Small Socials always have a short presentation in the midst of the socializing. The board volunteer host should welcome everyone, and the CEO gives a short high-impact message with a clear call to action at the end.

4. BECOME A TOUR GUIDE – AND SHOW HOW WE CHANGE THE WORLD

Board members can host tours to bring prospective friends closer to your organization.

A carefully scripted tour can be a powerful way to demonstrate your organization’s good work and to illustrate unmet needs in the community.

The tour lets your work speak for itself.

Your guests will hear staff members or even clients/students/stakeholders express in their own words their personal first-hand experiences with your organization’s mission— and the good it does—in the community.

A well-planned tour also has the board volunteer’s welcome, the CEO’s visionary message, and the same followup plan.

5. OPEN THE DOOR WITH ADVICE VISITS

We all know that within our board members’ social networks there is a gold mine of potential friends and donors. But they usually are not sure how to open the door to their contacts without seeming pushy.

But they can ask their friends for advice, guidance and counsel about their favorite project. And they can do it in person.

“If you want money, ask for advice. If you want advice, then ask for money.”

You’re really having a treasure hunt, because when you get together personally with someone for an exploratory conversation, you are not certain what you will find. But you always end up making a friend for your cause.

People are usually flattered when someone approaches them just to ask for advice. You would be surprised at the number of doors that would open if you just ask for advice.

You can read more about Advice Visits in my blog posts from April:

• How Advice Visits Can Open Any Door in Town
• Why Board Members Love Advice Visits
• Questions to Ask in an Advice Visit
• The Four Golden Words that Will Open Any Donors Heart to Your Cause

6.  THANK YOU CALLS TO DONORS

One of the most powerful actions a board member can take is to phone to thank a donor soon after his or her gift is received.

When board members call to thank donors, the donors receive a very powerful message. They think: “This organization appreciates me,” “I am a real person to this organization, not just a checkbook,” “This organization is well run.”

Donors who receive phone calls from board members invariably tend to give larger gifts the next time and tend to stay on board as donors longer.

Some studies have shown that donors who were called by board members within 24 hours of making a gift later made subsequent gifts that were 39 percent higher than donors who did not receive a call.

This means that board members can directly improve your organization’s bottom line without having to solicit!

Read more about Thank You Calls to Donors:

• How to Increase Your Organization’s Gifts by 39%

YOUR TAKE HOME:

Every board member can support your organization’s fundraising!   There is a fundraising role for each person on your board – whether they ask or not.

And if you are enjoying these posts, do forward them along to a colleague or board member who might find them helpful.

Leave a comment and share YOUR favorite ways to put your board members to work. Let’s create a long list!

Here’s a killer strategy for increasing your gifts by up to 39%.

And what is the magic ingredient? It’s your board members, who else?

Can you possibly employ ONE FUNDRAISING STRATEGY and have it return up to a 39% increase in gifts?

Yes, it may sound impossible  – but it’s true.

Here’s your chance to put your board members to work where they won’t have to ask – all they have to do is thank.

This is one of my NO ASK fundraising strategies for board members. It’s a perfect place to put your board members who are nervous about soliciting to work.

I’ll be talking about this and several other NO ASK fundraising strategies for board members in my next webinar on Thursday May 13 “NO ASK Fundraising Strategies for Board Members.“

Be sure to join me when I’ll discuss lots of ways board members can support fundraising without ASKING. And bring your board members – it’s tailor-made for them! You can find out more and register here.

Here’s one of my favorite ways for board members to directly impact the bottom line: without soliciting:

THANK YOU CALLS TO DONORS

Try this test, and track your results. You’ll be amazed:

The next time you send out an appeal, employ your standard thank you processes – letters, personal notes, etc.

But select out a random group of donors for a special thank you treatment:

• Organize your board members to make thank you phone calls to these donors within 24 hours of the gift being received. It’s really important that they make the call within 24 hours of when your organization receives the gift.

• Have your board members talk to a real person if at all possible.

• After several tries, they can just leave a message that simply thanks the donor.

• The phone calls are NOT about asking for another gift. They are for stewardship only.

If your board members are adventurous, they can ask the donor why they chose to make this gift. They can pull out the donor’s story  – and the donor will be even more pleased and honored.

THEN, a few months later, send another solicitation out to all your donors – both the ones who received the extra thank you phone call and those who just received your regular thank yous.

And when repeat gifts come in, compare the results of both groups.

You’ll find, when all other things are equal, that the donors who received a prompt, personal thank you from a board member within 24 hours of the gift being received will give up to 37% more than the other group.

THE ORIGINAL RESEARCH FINDINGS

Fundraising pioneer Penelope Burk performed the original research that found these amazing results. She’s the originator of “Donor Centered Fundraising” a fundamental paradigm shift that changes the emphasis away from the organization’s needs and instead focuses on what the donor wants.

Penelope Burk shared these statistics on board member thank you calls at the AFP International Conference in Seattle back in 2004:

• Donors received a thank you phone call from a board member within 24 hours of receiving the gift.

• The next time they were solicited, they gave 39% more than the other donors who did not receive a call.

PITFALLS

I know several organizations who have tried to implement Thank You Calls to Donors but could not achieve board member buy-in for the project. They found that board members would say “sure, I’ll make some thank you phone calls.” But they failed.

Many of the board members were not prompt. They were lackadaisical.  They took assignments but didn’t follow through.

HERE’S HOW TO MAKE IT HAPPEN

1. Share the statistics with your board members about the amazing results that happen when they make prompt, personal thank you calls to donors. Be sure they understand the “why” of the project and the upside positive potential from making these calls promptly.

2. Have one board member take charge of the project and create a small committee to work with them. (Board members respond better to a request from a peer than they do to a request from a staffer.)

3. Make sure the committee members are all focused, committed, understand that prompt timing is essential, and are ready/willing to do this. (Don’t ask ALL board members to do this- only those who are willing to commit seriously.)

4. Make specific phone call assignments to each committee member. Don’t send out a whole list to the entire committee and hope that someone will make the calls.

5. Have each board member report back weekly on the results of their calls.

One organization I know had all the board members post their thank you call results on a shared Google document. That way each board member could see who was making their calls. Word had it that a competition took hold and each board member tried to outdo the others. The busiest person on the board – a busy lawyer – made sure his calls were as up to date – or more up to date – as all the others.

A TRUE SUCCESS STORY

I have to close with a story of my own:

When I was consulting with the Orange County Rape Crisis Center a few years ago, I dragged my boyfriend to their annual Fundraising Auction. It was on a Sunday night and wasn’t a big social event, but it was a nice, happy gathering.

I told my boyfriend, who had plenty of money, to bring his wallet because these were good people. I dragged him around deliberately, and pointed out items that I liked.

Well, bless his heart, he bought all this stuff that night.

Then the next day I was sitting in my office – it was about 1pm in the afternoon. And I got a call from my friend.

“Gail,” he said, “you won’t believe what has just happened!” He was clearly wrought up.

“What??” I replied anxiously.

“I’m speechless,” he said. “I just that minute got a phone call from a board member of the Rape Crisis Center thanking me for . . . for   . . .  for being the largest donor at the auction last night!!”

“I just can’t believe it!,” he gushed. “I’ve given money all over the country and I’ve NEVER gotten a call from a BOARD MEMBER!”

I could just feel him beaming all the way over the phone line. He was absolutely thrilled.

And the Rape Crisis Center had him forever at that point.

The next year, he was asking me, “Is the Rape Crisis Center having their auction this fall? I haven’t gotten an invitation yet?”

That year, he bought an entire table and hosted the president of the largest foundation in North Carolina at his table. I think the Rape Crisis Center has him for life now!

Try this tactic and see what your results are! And join me for my webinar next week: NO ASK Fundraising Strategies for Board Members.

Tell me what you think or what your experiences have been with Board Member Thank You Calls to Donors.

Advice Visits are one of my golden tools to help open doors to prospective donors – and to find out what’s on a donor’s mind.

Advice Visits are based on the old adage:

“If you want someone to give you advice, just ask for money.

If you want money, then ask for advice.”

Asking prospective donors for their opinion and guidance always helps to create a closer relationship between the donor and your organization.

And we all know that good fundraising is all about INVOLVING the donor — not just ASKING for money.

So Advice Visits are part of any good sustainable fundraising program.

Advice Visits practice one of my favorite fundraising rules:

“Treat donors like real people, not like pocketbooks. Ask them for MORE than just money.”

What is an Advice Visit?

It’s a personal one-on-one meeting between you and a potential or current donor to your organization.

This meeting is called the Advice Visit, because that is truly what you are after — advice.

This visit is emphatically not about money.

Your ONLY goal for visiting this person is to ask them what they think of your project and ask for some serious guidance.

It is always beneficial to get other people’s thoughts about your cause, especially if the thinking comes from important potential donors with deep pockets.

Can I Pick Your Brain? Advice Visits Can Open Important Doors

The best way to open any door in town is to ask the person for their advice. Try calling them up and saying,

“I have an interesting project up my sleeve. Can I take you out for coffee and pick your brain about it?”

Or,

“My organization is trying to do xxxxx, and I am not sure how we can accomplish this. Can I come ask your advice and get the benefit of your perspective?”

Advice Visits are easy; in fact, there is not a better door-opener and cultivation tool.

You can do more in a half an hour with one important prospect than you can do in an entire evening of small talk at an event.

This is a perfect opportunity to promote your cause and cultivate a potential donor in a direct, personal way.

Like an “Informational Interview.”

If you have ever read What Color Is Your Parachute?, the book describes a meeting called the Informational Interview.

The idea is that anybody will be willing to talk to you if you are seeking their advice and counsel.

Of course they’ll see you — because guess what — they get to talk about themselves .

They get to do all the talking. Who wouldn’t agree to a meeting where they got to do all the talking — and better yet, dispense advice.

People are usually complimented when someone approaches them just to ask for advice and you will be surprised at the   number of doors that will open if you just ask for advice.

If you have never tried an Advice Visit, then a world of possibility and connection awaits you.

People want to help nonprofit causes, because they care about their communities, regions, country, and world.

You will find help where you seek it, and you will be particularly successful because you are not asking directly for money.

WHAT DO YOU GET FROM AN ADVICE VISIT?

• FEEDBACK on your case. They’ll tell you what they think. They’ll shoot holes in your case – and you need the feedback.
• YES OR NO? They’ll tell you whether they personally may be a potential supporter or not.
• LEADS. The person being visited will invariably give you an important lead or suggestion that will help you further your cause.
• HELP. Best of all, the person almost always offers to do something to help you. That means they are joining the cause and becoming invested in your success.

How have you used Advice Visits in your fundraising work? Tell your story with a comment here:

I’m about to reveal my Golden Formula for opening a donor’s heart to my cause.

I also use this to find out what a donor is thinking about my presentation.

I use these 4 words all the time – and I get terrific benefits and feedback!  I can’t tell you how valuable they have been to me.

It’s a very simple, single question. And it is guaranteed to evoke a response from your donor that tells you where he stands.

But more importantly, it generates the donor’s own thinking about your issue.

It encourages him to ponder your presentation, to digest your material, to think about it, to react to it. It encourages him to embrace what you have just said.

Here is my key to success.

I ask this Golden Question:

“What are your impressions? . . . .

And then I shut up and listen carefully.

This question encourages the donor to think more deeply about what you’ve presented. She is not going to get hot and bothered about your cause just by listening to YOU do all the talking.

She needs time to mull over what you’ve said.  She needs to “stew” in the urgent need or bold vision that you’ve just presented to her.

So you ask the Golden Question and you sit tight.

What will you find out?

You’ll find out where your donor stands! : )

You’ll get her to really react to you and what you’ve said.

You’ll get something much deeper – and more informative – from her. Much deeper than if you had just presented, thanked her and then left.

Remember it’s always all about the donor. We forget this. We think we have to be great salespeople and make a great pitch. NO!

What we have to do is FOCUS on the donor – and listen to him or her. We have to draw out the donor, and get her engaged with us about our cause. And you won’t do that if you do all the talking!

Here are some real-world situations where “What are your impressions?” has served my colleagues and me very well:

1.  I just conducted an Advice Visit with a potential donor to my favorite cause. At the end of our visit, I asked him “What are your impressions of these ideas? And he told me what his reservations were about our project. I was able to address these issues and he became a substantial donor.

2. I  was walking out of a facility tour with a major, major gift prospect. He was actually a candidate for the leadership gift in this campaign.  So I asked him: what were your impressions of the tour?” Well after 5 minutes of conversation – with some very careful maneuvering from me – he invited me to bring a $5ook proposal to his family foundation meeting the next week!

3.  I just made a presentation for a capital campaign consulting project that I would love to do.  I presented against one other firm.  As I was chatting with the President of the College afterwards, I asked him his impressions. He told me that he liked me a lot better than the other firm. : )

4. I train boards a lot in fundraising and friendmaking. But I can’t make it just a one-way presentation – I have to get them to ponder and digest the material we are discussing.

So I model the Golden Question all the time, frequently asking them “what are your impressions of these ideas” – it gets them to mull over the discussion and really embrace it.

5.  My friend, a Vice Chancellor at a major university recently made a big presentation to the Board of Visitors. She wanted to gauge the Chancellor’s reaction to her ideas.  She asked him, “What were your impressions of my presentation?’ And she got some terrific positive feedback!

What are your impressions of my post?  Leave a comment and tell me how you would use this idea.