Wednesday, February 20, 2013

Do you know what makes successful major gift fundraisers?

A question posted on a Linkedin discussion board recently asked what are the characteristics of successful major gift fundraisers. At last count over 20 people had offered their lists "successful" characteristics. The suggested characteristics offered have a predictable repetitiveness yet with a range of "outliers."

Passion for the mission is the characteristic most often dubbed the most important. I'll say it's overrated and among the least important characteristics for successfully garnering major gifts. More on this later. 

Many of the suggested characteristics are collectively called "soft skills." Soft skills are personal attributes characterizing relationships with people. The characteristics offered included:
     
     Integrity             Patience
     Good listener      Positive
     Sincerity            Good with people 

Some of the suggested characteristics fall in to the hard skill category. Hard skills are about a persons ability to accomplish a certain task - in this case closing major gifts. Suggested hard skills included:

     Self-motivation         Strategic
     Creative                   Good writer
     Organized                 Positive

Will finding all of the characteristics in one person equal a successful fundraiser?  Maybe. Maybe not. There are few, if any, that possess all of the soft/hard skills. Some combination, greater or lesser, is the reality.

The problem with lists is it provides convenient excuses for NOT raising money. If you lack a skill or two you can't raise money.

  • I can't raise money because I'm not good with people.
  • I don't have the patience to raise money.
  • I'm not good at raising money because I'm not creative.
  • I'm not organized enough to raise money.

It goes on and on and on. You've heard them. Heck, you may have even used them! 

There are literally thousands and thousands of people that will bleed for their mission and can't or won't raise a dime for the cause they profess such great passion for.  You've seen it. You know it is true. This is why "passion for the mission" is highly overrated.

Given that a person is not socially inept or against the cause, there are two essential characteristics that are absolutely necessary for successful major gift fundraising - along with one tool. The two characteristics are:

  1. The desire to raise major gifts.
  2. The ability/discipline to use the tool. 

I don't wish to minimize the soft/hard skill list. Certainly, adding more from the soft/hard list to the essential characteristics will enhance the major gift outcomes. The more the merrier! But, without the desire to raise major gifts - success is unlikely.

The tool that is essential to major gift fundraising is a proven major gift process. It's an equalizer. Those who rely only on "being good with people" etc. will close fewer gifts. Those that use a major gift process, yet lack some soft/hard skills will close more gifts. 

Widely known as moves management, a major gift process levels the playing field. It allows the majority of us, with fewer of the soft/hard skills, to be more successful than those who are blessed with the skills but don't use the tool. Using a set, sequence (process) to guide the qualifying, cultivating/ stewarding, soliciting, and closing of major gifts can mitigate the lack of soft/hard skills. 

If you haven't heard the phrase moves management or you're not sure what the phrase means you can access a free, easy to understand, ebook titled De-Mystifying Moves Management by following this link.

It's not rocket science. 

  1. Find someone that wants to do it
  2. Provide the tool and the guidance to use it.

It's an equalizer. More major gifts will be closed. 





Tuesday, February 12, 2013

Survey says fundraising problems are extensive and entrenched!



What nonprofit executives are saying about development directors;
  • 30% are less than satisfied with their development director
  • 25% of their previous development directors were fired
  • 24% of their development directors have no experience/novices at securing gifts
All of the above and much, much more can be found in "UnderDeveloped: A National Study of Challenges Facing Nonprofit Fundraising" a new national study released January 14, 2013.

“This study shows that the fundraising problems facing
 nonprofit organizations are more extensive and more 
entrenched than anyone imagined,” 
said Jeanne Bell, CEO of CompassPoint and coauthor of the study.
 “As a sector, we need to elevate the importance of fund development 
as a leadership issue, invest in a stronger talent pool, 
and strengthen the ability of nonprofits to develop 
the systems that enable fundraising success.”

I was struck by two words in Jeanne Bell's comment. Specifically extensive and entrenched"Extensive" is very worrisome to me but, it doesn't scare me. "Entrenched" defined by dictionary.com is "to place in a position of strength; establish firmly or solidly," - really scares me

No, I don't think that anyone purposely "entrenched" a problem. As the leadership of organizations, boards and npo executives must shoulder the lion's share of the blame for fundraising problems, consequently they must lead the charge on solving the fundraising problems. What scares me, are the ones that have contributed to the problem and don't recognize it in themselves! If you don't see it - you don't know to fix it.

The "UnderDeveloped" report sounds alarms in many directions. The "calls to action" prescribing specific directions to begin solving the problems outlined in the report are spot on. It is a good document and you can read it by following the link in the report title near the beginning of this blog.


Strengthening the talent pool is one action point. The report points out that when seeking to hire a development director many of the positions go unfilled for 12 months or more and that 53% of the candidate pools don't contain candidates with sufficient skills. Leading one executive director to say: 

"I think some kind of self-perpetuating cycle is going on 
where, on one hand, the jobs are really hard and 
not that many people are successful at them, and then
 there is the issue of salaries, they just keep going
 higher and higher and higher. So development directors 
who are good can write their own tickets and command 
 what they want. And the larger institutions pick off 
the best. And so then there’s scarcity, so all of us
 have to pay more for a shrinking pool of people." 

Along the same line, I recently came across this in the biography of a newly hired development director on the organizations website; "...... she brings with her 18 years of customer service experience in the sheet metal industry." Hiring someone for a position that has never done the job - especially if the candidate pool is dreadfully thin - is not ideal but may be understandable. 

Some how you have to convert the experience in the sheet metal industry into the successful tools for fundraising industry!

With talent in short supply, for my two cents, too little emphasis was placed on one key tool in addressing the problem. When skills are lacking they can be acquired in two ways; hire the skills or acquire the skills through training. Yet, training without follow-up action that includes quality supervision and leadership is rarely enough.

"UnderDeveloped" points to changes and areas of emphasis that can only be done my an organizations leadership. The tone and tenor must come from the top. The support to solve the fundraising problem must come in words, actions and deeds. Including actions and deeds that spend dollars where and when it is appropriate.

So, what's it going to be? Get busy on the fundraising problem, or "they're not talking about us. We are doing just fine."

We'll have to wait and see!









Monday, February 4, 2013

Communication that is seen - read - heard

Communicating with constituents and donors is considered a "must do" and rightly so. There is no substitute for keeping your constituents and supporters well informed. Effective communication is a tie that binds.

Because of rising postal costs many organizations are taking a fresh look at the effectiveness and "return on investment" of the printed newsletter and magazine-type mailing pieces. The rush to gather email addresses is underway to take advantage of the more economical email versions of newsletter. 

The question is how to communicate in a way that is cost effective - and gets read! 

You might investigate Constant Contact, Mail Chimp or Vertical Response  to mention a few. You can use each of these to reach out to constituents via standard text email. Using these same vendors you can also easily create attractive HTML newsletter formats - I don't know about you, but I'd rather get information that is pleasing to the eye, with pictures than a standard, run of the mill email.

Simplebooklet makes it easy to create a basic "page turning" effect and even provide a link that you can post in emails or add the HTML code to your website or blog! Still others use various forms of "home grown" solutions. 

The point is, creating visually appealing email messages can be done quickly, cheaply, easily, and often. Anybody can do it! If you are not using these or similar products - get on the stick. If you are using them great! Now get ready to take another step.

Now you can give supporters voices - your voice - the voice of a board member - a message delivered by a grateful recipient.   A familiar voice! A thankful voice!  Imagine the impact that voice and video can have on how your supporters know and understand your organization.

Thanks to the availability of internet technologies you can communicate in ways that are meaningful, cost effective, gets read and now - HEARD!  A collection of words, colorful visuals and audio - a winning combination.

YouTube , Present.me, and Movenote and others can allow you to use video with audio, some use split screens allowing live narration of a slide presentation or other visual aids. To talk to your donors in a more personal, meaningful way invest a few minutes in a Google search for free video and audio postings and you will find solutions - most require very little or no technical skill. Free and no technical skill is a winning combination.



Share the steps have you taken to better communicate with your constituents below.