16 August 2022 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Every so often I get significant pushback from readers either questioning or taking exception to something I have written. I love it when it happens. It causes me to re-examine something I may believe so matter-of-factly that I...
26 July 2022 By David Allen, Development for Conservation It’s a little hard to believe, but there are very few things that can go completely wrong when asking for money. Assuming that the person you are asking has heard about the organization. Assuming that the organization is...
2 No0vember 2021 By David Allen, Development for Conservation I’ve heard from many land trusts around the country that 2020 was a banner year in several respects, at least from a fundraising perspective. In fact this is true for many other land conservation / Nature-related organizations, too. ...
28 September 2021 By David Allen, Development for Conservation There are two case arguments that have never been particularly successful in raising money. The first is the Field of Dreams argument: If we build it, they will come. In this argument, the idea is that people will...
24 August 2021 By David Allen, Development for Conservation It’s been years since I last tested different ask amounts, and I’m not in a position this year to test them now. Maybe this post will inspire someone to do so this year and share their results. What is...
27 April 2021 By David Allen, Development for Conservation I started raising money as a canvasser in Eugene Oregon. It was to be a summer job in 1983, and it turned into a career. It’s safe to say I had no idea what I was getting myself...
1 December 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Just about everyone I know is sending out an appeal letter this week or next. You too? It’s that time of year. This has already been a surprisingly good year for fundraising, and we are pinning hopes of keeping it...
1 September 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Numbers are just numbers. Five, 23, 478. Meaningless. We use numbers all the time, expecting them to convey importance. Four species, 42 acres, 55 years old, 300 members. But they don’t. Or at least they don’t convey any more importance than...
4 August 2020 By David Allen, Development for Conservation A few years ago in mid-November, a client asked me whether they could just use the same appeal letter they used last year. That appeal letter had done reasonably well and had surpassed the fundraising results from previous...
By David Allen, Development for Conservation I’ve had the opportunity to review several appeal letters in recent weeks - comes with the job. And I’m still surprised that so many fail to ask for money. The request is implied, to be sure, but it is not explicit. Somewhere...