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13 Dec Agents of Change

Posted at 05:55h in Board Development, Communication, Development Audit, Donor Cultivation, Featured, Plans and Budgets, Staff Development, Uncategorized 0 Comments

At Rally this year, I finally got to present the Development Committee Makeover workshop. The point of the workshop was to show, using before and after scripts, how Development Committees could address their work in a much more productive way by limiting their discussion to...

06 Dec The Importance of Recruiting First Renewals

Posted at 05:56h in Communication, Donor Cultivation, Featured, Membership, Plans and Budgets, Staff Development, Uncategorized 1 Comment

For this reason, the “conversion rate” from first givers to first renewals is one of the more important metrics you will want to pay attention to. It might even be the most significant metric related to membership growth. Several weeks ago, I offered strategies for...

29 Nov Are You Ready for December?

Posted at 05:32h in Communication, Development Audit, Donor Cultivation, Featured, Staff Development, Uncategorized 2 Comments

From your solicitations to your newsletters, to your updates and thank you letters, the importance of communicating warmth, openness, and a sense of momentum is magnified in December. People want to know that their gifts made a difference and were noticed by you....

22 Nov Development Planning from Scratch – Mind the Gap

Posted at 05:49h in Development Audit, Donor Cultivation, Featured, Plans and Budgets, Staff Development, Uncategorized 0 Comments

Back in August I started a series of posts about planning for development entitled“ Development Planning from Scratch.” With this morning’s post, I’ve come to the end of the thread. It assumes that you have started with a clear fundraising goal needed by the program,...

15 Nov Development Planning from Scratch – New Donors

Posted at 03:56h in Development Audit, Donor Cultivation, Featured, Membership, Plans and Budgets, Staff Development, Uncategorized 1 Comment

Every year, about 1/4 of your members are brand new and nearly 1/2 are in their first 3 years of membership. If you want your membership to grow, you need to attract more new members than you're losing every year....

08 Nov Development Planning from Scratch – Current Donors

Posted at 02:16h in Communication, Donor Cultivation, Featured, Membership, Plans and Budgets, Staff Development, Uncategorized 1 Comment

If I was planning a membership program from scratch, I would start with a membership drive in the Spring months and an end-of-the-year appeal letter in the Fall. Everyone would get at least two letters – one asking them to renew their membership and one...

01 Nov Are you Ready for Some Turkey?

Posted at 05:15h in Communication, Development Audit, Donor Cultivation, Featured, Plans and Budgets, Staff Development, Uncategorized 0 Comments

Are you ready for November? Are you getting the most out of the magic three months when 50-70% of all your gifts for the year will be committed? Here’s what I’m thinking about. What are YOU thinking about?...

25 Oct Comes the (Electronic) Revolution

Posted at 06:16h in Communication, Development Audit, Donor Cultivation, Featured, Membership, Plans and Budgets, Staff Development, Uncategorized 6 Comments

Dr. Stan Temple was a board member with whom I worked closely at both The Nature Conservancy and Sand County Foundation. He shared with me that once upon a time, his doctoral students did all their research work in the Library. Today, virtually no one...

18 Oct Development Planning from Scratch – Foundation Funders

Posted at 04:30h in Development Audit, Featured, Foundations, Plans and Budgets, Staff Development, Uncategorized 0 Comments

There are several important things to keep in mind when writing grants proposals to foundations...

11 Oct Development Planning from Scratch – Corporate Funders

Posted at 06:01h in Communication, Development Audit, Donor Cultivation, Featured, Foundations, Membership, Plans and Budgets, Staff Development, Uncategorized 0 Comments

I doubt there is any donor segment more confusing to plan for than corporate/business. It’s confusing because of the stories we make up about why particular companies SHOULD give us money. It’s confusing because of United Way. ...