According to authors Paul Schervish and John Havens, Americans over the next 40 years will donate to their favorite charities at least $6 trillion through bequests and other estate planning vehicles. In spite of the recent economic downturn, there is an overwhelming...
FIT Fundraising Articles
Fundraising Tips and Strategies.
Can You “Think” Like a Development Director?
Great development directors are relentless in their quest for the next big idea… they never drop an appeal in the mail without knowing what the next appeal will be to energize their donor base.
Sometimes Ugly Works…
SOMETIMES UGLY WORKS. Rest assured what gets an envelope opened is uniqueness. If it is too slick or too pretty it reeks of “junk mail”. I have seen successful acquisition campaigns mailed in a brown, paper bag, literally. I am not kidding. I have seen envelopes that I just said, “yuk”… and guess what they lifted response rates.
“Where have my donors gone… let’s see, did I remember to say thank you?”
Of the individuals who stop giving to your organization, according to Judith Nichols of Pinpointing Affluence Research, only four out of 100 former donors actually move away or die;
15 have decided to make their gifts to other organizations;
15 are unhappy with your organization;
66 think you don’t care about them.
Direct Mail: R.I.P 2011?
Direct mail pre-printed reply devices may be decreasing in use, but the direct mail fundraising letter is at an exponential high. People are reading their mail and then using the giving channel they trust the most. Remember, in 2011 the key will be how you use direct mail AND the internet, not direct mail or the internet.
CTAD… Do you know what it stands for?
This week I was surprised to talk to one of my friends who had been raising funds in the not-for-profit industry for more than a decade. To my dismay he had never heard of a term that I assumed every person in the fundraising industry was very familiar with: CTAD....
Show Me The Numbers…
My job today is about “doing the math”… testing, reading results, retesting, back testing and beating the control. In 1977 as a senior in high school if someone had told me that “you will be a MATH consultant, teacher and mentor for full time profession” I would have...
50 Steps to Ramp Up Your Fundraising in a Down Economy
In today’s down economy, it’s even more critical to not miss any opportunity to ramp up your fund development program.
H-O-P-E… The most powerful word in the English language
Today, for the first time in nearly six months I saw HOPE in the faces of a board of directors who had been giving their lives... some literally to help an inner city ministry stay afloat. Some cried, some praised God and some rolled up their sleeves and said, "let's...
Do you have a “PREAUTHORIZED GIFT” program? Why Not?
It doesn’t matter whether you call it a pledge program, recurring gift program, monthly giving program, sustainer program or preauthorized gift program it is the same technique and they all add up to a huge additional revenue stream for your organization or charity....
