8 October 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Whether we understand and acknowledge it or not, we all have an interesting relationship with neuro-psychology – and especially neurolinguistics, and neurolinguistic programming. These terms describe the possibility that human beings react to certain decision-making triggers that can...
1 October 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Think about this: You are trying to set up a meeting with a donor you’ve never met. Or you are trying to reconnect with someone whom you met at an event where they expressed interest in seeing one of...
20 August 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Have you ever been to the LL Bean flagship store in Freeport Maine? It’s enormous. And the factory store itself isn’t even the only building. LL Bean occupies an entire campus of buildings. There’s an auxiliary building for...
25 June 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation When I get challenged on the advice I provide in this blog and in various seminars and workshops, it’s usually related to not being able to cite studies and peer-reviewed papers that prove the opinion I espouse. For the...
30 April 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation I fielded a question about premiums again last week. I get these periodically, because it seems intuitive that if someone is going to join, or give, or upgrade, or renew, they need to get “something” in return. In fact,...
23 April 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Since 2017, about this time every year, I have posted about a metric I’ve wanted to collect data on – the 5-year-value of new members. I’ve been asking everyone to look back at the donors who made first gifts...
19 March 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation I read a lot of land trust appeal mail. You should, too. I recommend it. Some of it is really good. A lot of it is not. But what I notice more often than not is that the letters...
2 January 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Happy New Year! Time to start again. January of another year. This is a blog that I post every year right after New Year’s Day. I modify it slightly, and I add to it from time to time, but basically,...
24 October 2023 By David Allen, Development for Conservation A question I often ask clients preparing for an individual donor visit is: “Why will this person say Yes to the request?” It can be helpful to ask the same question when writing appeal letters and emails. Why will...
26 September 2023 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Nonprofits have been running capital fundraising campaigns for as long as there have been nonprofits. And (thank goodness!) the land trust community has become increasingly bold and sophisticated in their approach to campaign fundraising. Indeed, campaigns with goals...