Award-Winning Blog


Dead Wrong, And Dead Right

Mark Rovner at Sea Change Strategies recently wrote that the "fundraising pyramid is a lie." He argues that most major donors are recruited into a nonprofit on a peer-to-peer basis, rather than being cultivated up the donor pyramid from initial small gifts. From my experience, I think Mark is dead wrong on this. Lawrence Hence, […]

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2009 Online Giving – 10 Questions

Last week we reported some data from online firms Blackbaud and Convio regarding 2009 online fundraising. To refresh you on the highlights: Online fundraising revenue was up 46% over 2008 for all groups in Blackbaud’s universe (over 1,700 nonprofits), with 35% of groups reporting no increase in online revenue. According to Blackbaud, fully 46% of […]

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Online Use By Generations

Here is a fairly detailed examination of online activity by age, prepared by Pew Internet Research. What I like about this slide presentation is that a wide range of internet activities (25 in all) is parsed against six different age cohorts, from Gen Y to GI Generation. What I don’t like is that, once again, […]

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A Living Case Study On Dealing With Disasters

Frankly, I’m sick and tired of  the dismissive comments with which many in our trade dismiss the money raising accomplishments of the American Red Cross in this Haiti disaster. Sure it’s a ‘big brand … sure it gets top media attention … sure the President and First Lady added to the media attention with their […]

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Gift Receiving vs Fundraising

Yesterday the Chronicle of Philanthropy was reporting $210 million raised in the first six days after the Haiti earthquake (for comparison, $457 million was raised in the same timeframe after Katrina). The lead sentence of their story caught my eye: "Contributions continue to pour in for relief efforts in Haiti." Then they referred to the […]

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Haiti Fundraising Update

The Chronicle of Fundraising is doing an excellent job of monitoring giving response to the Haiti disaster. Here is their report as of January 16: "So far, donors have contributed more than $150-million to major U.S. relief groups, a Chronicle tally finds. By comparison, such charities had raised a quarter that amount — $30-million — […]

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