This BLOG is intended to help conservation organizations and land trusts pursue excellence in all aspects of their conservation endeavors. I welcome your comments and feedback to these posts.
7 May 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation The secret to successful fundraising is asking. The secret to effective asking is follow-up. And the secret to effective follow-up is timing. Take a look at your 12-month renewal rate. How many households made a gift in any 365-day...
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...
16 April 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation In my practice, I have come to make several nomenclature distinctions. These are oversimplified, to be sure, but they serve to help ensure my clients and I are talking about the same things when we use the same...
9 April 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation Last year in December, I wrote a blog post about how land trusts might be able to get younger. The post seemed to resonate and was even picked up in the most recent issue of the Alliance’s Saving...
2 April 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation In a perfect world we would know – really know – every single donor who gives money. We would know how they found the land trust in the first place. We would know how old they are and...
26 March 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation How did you come to be on the Board? Well, I’ve known _______ for years, and when she asked me to be on the Board, it sounded like fun. Think back on that conversation. Did she ask you to fill...
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...
12 March 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation My formative years in conservation were all with The Nature Conservancy. I learned how to raise money, and why raising money for land conservation was important, from some of the best practitioners available. That imprinting came in many...
5 March 2024 By David Allen, Development for Conservation One of the more common entry points for me when working with new organizations is a Development Audit (or Assessment). The audit looks critically at everything an organization is doing to raise money. One of the standard features of...