The Annual Giving Exchange

Next month (November 4-6), I’ll be serving as a faculty member at the 2009 CASE Online Strategies Conference in New Orleans.

Attendees will learn about the most progressive tactics and important issues in online fundraising today including social media, e-mail marketing, user experience design, strategy development, program management, and outcomes assessment.

The results of CASE’s recent online giving survey will be presented during one of four general sessions and elective sessions will be available on two different tracks: strategy and tactics.  Small group sessions will provide an opportunity to ask questions and discuss individual challenges with faculty and colleagues.

Click here for more information.

Google turned 11 years old yesterday. It’s hard to imagine how, in a little over a decade, one company was able to have such an enormous impact on the way people search for and manage information, shop, travel, read, and view images.

As a technology firm, Google has stayed on the cutting edge. As a media agency, it has revolutionized advertising. As a service provider, it has changed the way businesses solve problems.  But what has Google done for philanthropy?

The answer is: a lot. Here are just a few examples of how Google has served the nonprofit sector in the 21st century:

• Google Checkout for Nonprofits – Provides fundraising organizations of all sizes with an easy solution for collecting and processing gifts online.
• Google Grants - Awards free advertising to select charities allowing them to promote their Websites through search engine optimization and making it easier for donors to find great organizations to support.
• Google.org – This tax paying philanthropic arm of Google has already contributed more than $100 million toward important causes including green energy and world health.

Thanks, Google! Happy Birthday!

Fundraisers often think that the end goal in cultivating a donor is to hear them say “yes” after a gift solicitation.  While “yes” may be nice to hear, “no” is often overlooked as good news.

When a donor says “yes” it can be the beginning of a long process of clarifying intentions, interests, and expectations.  How much will they want to restrict their gift?  Will it relieve existing expenses or add costs?  What conditions or stipulations are tied to their gift?  Will they make the entire gift this year or will they schedule payments over time?  Who will be responsible for stewarding the donor over time?

But when a donor says “no,” it’s absolute.  It may not be what you had hoped to hear, but it let’s you know exactly how they feel about that particular program, project, or cause.  It tells you something about that person’s values and interests so that you no longer have to waste your time (or their time) discussing things that don’t interest them.  “No” helps you know your donor better.

Like a sculpture artist chipping at clay one piece of a time, “no” helps a fundraiser eliminate those things that don’t belong.  Donor cultivation is about asking questions and listening to the answers so that, over time, you’re able to find a donor and a need that are the best fit for one another.

I recently listened to the Provost of one of America’s top research universities give a lecture on active learning.  A renown neuroscientist, he described how students today (with unlimited access to information through the internet) are no longer satisfied to simply study a particular subject.  They want to do things.

They’re not interested in just reading about a foreign city, they want to go there.  They don’t want to look at pictures of an MRI machine, they want to use one.  They don’t want to listen to someone talk about money, they want to make real investments.  The dirty little secret of learning, he said, is that without actually doing things, we forget.

Philanthropy has a similar secret.

To a donor, making a gift is an experience.  Too often, though, it gets treated like a transaction.  Their relationship with your organization likely started long before they received your solicitation and it shouldn’t end when you send them for a receipt.

Active donors are more likely to renew their financial support in the future, so don’t be afraid to ask them to volunteer their time, solicit their friends, or promote your organization on Facebook.  Donor retention problems are rarely the result of not soliciting donors enough.  It’s usually the result of not asking them to do enough.

Beyond making a gift, what do you ask your donors to do?

When my daughter was born, I couldn’t wait to tell the world.

I knew that my siblings would be looking out for an e-mail, that my parents would be waiting by their phone, and that my friends would be expecting a text message. I faced a complicated marketing mix and an audience that was nearly impossible to prioritize. But my biggest challenge was I that insisted on being the messenger.

First, I e-mailed my brother from my mobile phone. Then, while I fumbled to send more messages at the expense of not spending time with my new baby, I received a surprising influx of congratulatory messages from people who I hadn’t yet been able to contact. My brother, it turns out, had immediately posted the news on Facebook. It only took minutes for it to be viewed by dozens of people who shared networks with my brother and me. I felt frustrated. Not because of outcome, but because I wasn’t in control.

Fundraisers have a tremendous chance to use networks through social media to spread good news about their organization. Unfortunately, the need for control can compromise this opportunity by wasting important time and resources.

Give up some control and you may find you have more time to do the really important things.

Pledges are wonderful.  As promises, they represent trust.

In annual giving, we’re pleased if 75% of our donors’ pledges are fulfilled in a year.  Imagine if a baseball player got on base 75% of the time or if a presidential candidate received 75% of the votes.  They’d secure their place in the history books, right?

When someone promises to make a gift, they’ve made an important statement.  They could have said no, but they didn’t.  And while most of them will keep their promises, some of them won’t.  But that shouldn’t negate the fact that they cared enough to make a promise in the first place.

So why is it that the first thing so many of us do after getting a pledge is to exclude that person from future appeals?  More than likely, it’s because we’re afraid of appearing too aggressive or seeming to have forgotten about their promise.

The issue here is not who should receive your appeals, it’s the language contained in those appeals.  Every appeal should be, at its core, a thank you note.  We should always thank people for their support, whether that support came last year or may come next year, whether that support is in the form of money, time, or ideas.

Treat every appeal like a thank you note and it won’t matter who’s reading it.