Search Results for: ask less
Raising Money Is Part Of The Job
The Boston Globe breathlessly reports here that nonprofits in the Boston area are discovering that program staff should be enlisted in the fundraising process. Really?! Holy cow! What a breakthrough! Observes the Globe: “With competition for donor dollars growing ever stiffer, many nonprofit organizations no longer consider fund-raising and marketing the exclusive realms of development […]
No Mercy Shown
At the recent DMA Nonprofit Conference, Jennifer Donahue of NARAL presented her strategy for successful integration of direct response fundraising channels. As reported by Fundraising Success, one element of NARAL's fundraising credo is: “No mercy shown the donor (be vigilant and consistent in staying connected to your donor base).” This along with the advice to […]
Planned Giving’s Urban Legend
Couldn't help but pay extra attention to the “Are Charities Losing Out on the Wealth Transfer” post in the always interesting blog review in Give & Take, Peter Panepento's column in the Chronicle of Philanthropy. Robert Frank, author of Richistan: A Journey Through the American Wealth Boom and the Lives of the New Rich, predicts […]
Is Your Nonprofit More Inspiring Than A Vacuum Cleaner?
Too many nonprofits treat their donors as just that … money givers. They don't recognize that at least some donors (your “best customers” so to speak) are probably motivated and prepared to take the further step of affirmatively championing a cause or charity they're involved with. Traditionally, we tend to wait for donors to cross […]
Tele-fundraising Rocks
Awhile back we interviewed Ken Whitaker of Public Interest Communications, asking “Is tele-fundraising dead?” To many fundraisers, too many, telephone solicitation is the neglected, even shunned, stepchild. But Ken asserted that tele-fundraising was alive and well so long as one used the telephone in the right applications. Recently, Matthew Guerin of Adams Hussey and Associates […]
Jeff, You Boob!
I read Jeff Brooks' Donor Power Blog every day. His creative insights are terrific. He really gets the relationship aspect of fundraising. But occasionally Jeff gets it REALLY WRONG, as with his breathless advice the other day that we should all rush off to use the Headline Analyzer to punch up our headlines. Don't you […]
Fundraiser! Are You A Fraud, Or Just A Fool?
Jeff Brooks at Donor Power Blog just did a post that spiked my blood pressure. He — correctly — took to task a report that, over a one year period, UK nonprofits earned merely 39 cents in donations for each $1 they spent on direct mail (and 44 cents for each $1 spent on all […]
Time To Pull The Plug At NAACP?
All I know about the NAACP is what I read in the news. So I'm writing as an average citizen. From the latest news, the “average citizen” takeaway has to be … this organization is brain dead … shouldn't somebody pull the plug? … are all nonprofits this inept? Not only are they laying off […]
Converting Online Subscribers Into Donors
In this Guest Agitator post, Karen Taggart, Director of Nonprofit Services at Care2, discusses the challenge of converting e-subscribers into donors. Says Karen: “It is no secret in direct mail that recency is key to successful fundraising. We all send appeals to donors who have just given and would never even consider prospecting to rented […]
Give Your Donors A Voice
By now, most nonprofits publish an e-newsletter of some sort. These range from uninspired re-hashing of print newsletters to original e-pubs that take full advantage of the tools that can make online publications far more dynamic and compelling. For example, commercial marketers increasingly are enlisting their customers to create and submit content of their own […]