Nonprofits are doing well in involving their boards and finding major gifts, but overall there is room for major improvement.
Adrian Sargeant, a professor of fundraising at the Center of Philanthropy at Indiana University says, “There is a whole range of things we’ve done very badly and it’s masked because people in the U.S. are very generous and getting more generous.”
Retaining donors, online giving, securing pledges, and knowing donors are some of charities weaknesses, according to Sargeant. In order to improve fundraising, charities need to focus on their donors and what matters to them rather than being caught up in finding the exact correct technical terms.
Sargeant says, “We’re too hung up on the mechanism. Donors are interested in solving problems and making a difference, and whether you call it an annual fund or a capital campaign is irrelevant. We need to organize around what interests donors.”
To find out what interests donors, you need to develop a marketing perspective. Fundraising essentially should be treated as a type of marketing. You have to know your competition, think about strategies, and draw people in. Too many nonprofits only think about fundraising as the way to more money. There is an entirely different perspective. Ministry needs to be treated like a business often to succeed.
If you develop this mindset, the next step is to understand the mindset of your givers. There is a lot of research on all the statistics of giving, but what about the givers themselves? There actually is a psychology to givers, and you need to understand the people you are working with, what they respond to, etc. This idea is essential to donor retention.
With a plan and people in mind, it is then essential to research how to best carry out this idea. There are so many resources available—online giving tools, social media, etc. Invest time in doing a little extra reading or asking other groups about their best strategies.
The saying goes “knowledge is power.” This statement holds true. Nonprofits need to know their people on more than just a surface level, and they then need to engage those people in a bold way. Fundraising and donor retention rely on this.
Additional information taken from Philanthropy Journal’s blogpost “Fundraising, part 1: Scholar calls for improvement”
-- Jessica High is a Research Assistant at Christian Foundation Grants (www.christianfoundationgrants.com) which is a subscription database of foundations that provide grants to faith based organizations. iDonate.com is a website (www.iDonate.com) that allows ministries to receive non cash gifts online