3 Tweaks to Get Your Fundraising Back on Track

Dear Marc,
I’m not reaching my fundraising goals. I have the list and feel like I’m doing all the work. But I’m not finding the connection with donors. They seem to think that my solicitation is a “take it or leave it” proposition rather an attempt to find the right gift level. Can you help?
— Panicked in Pasadena

Dear Panicked,
I feel your pain. It can be awful doing the work, even having actual meetings with major donors, and still not have the fundraising results you expect. Here are three tweaks I find help my coaching clients get back on track to reaching their fundraising goals.

Tweak No. 1: Be specific
Ambiguity will kill your fundraising. The most common reason I’ve found for nonprofits not hitting their fundraising goals is a lack of specificity. You need specificity in both your goal — what you want to accomplish and how much it will cost — and in your ask amounts.

You sound willing to make the ask. But many people in your position see fundraising as merely a “necessary evil.” Embarrassed by this task, they sloppily ask donors to “support” the nonprofit. This unspecific ask shows an incredible lack of respect for the donor.

Knowing the specific change you want to make makes asking for money much easier too. No longer are you asking for a gift for your nonprofit. You are now asking a donor to invest in the change. “Will you invest $150,000 to preserve art so people can view it regardless of their net worth?” can be far more effective than, “Will you make a $150,000 gift to the museum?” You’re respecting the donor enough to help him see how his gift will invest in his values.

Knowing specifically what you want to accomplish also gives you options. If you know you want to make a change in the community, you’ll be more open to seeing the different ways that change could be accomplished. Perhaps the donor isn’t ready to give money at this point in the relationship. Now you can ask her for help in collaborating with another organization. Or for a gift-in-kind that will offset your costs in accomplishing the goal.

Tweak No. 2: Offer options that are good for both the donor and your nonprofit
Another area fundraisers often stumble over is collaboration. Face it, we tend to perform tasks that we get “credit” for. If our annual review asks us about how much money we raised rather than how we were able to move the organization toward its annual goals, we’ll focus on getting cash in the short term over exploring working with other groups or organizations. This can be one of the roots of donor fatigue. Whenever we share a problem with donors, we seem to think the only solution is money.

If you know specifically what you’re trying to accomplish, you can be more open to seeing the solicitation as a dialogue. You’ve done the relational work to know that the donor is interested in making the same change. Now you get to explore which of your organization’s chosen fixes will meet with the donor’s desire to give.

What if you’re only measured by dollars raised? If your position is as a fundraiser, your goal is by definition raising funds. You can still bring a collaborative attitude to the table.

If a major-gifts donor doesn’t say yes when you solicit for the $150,000 mentioned above, you have an opportunity to negotiate. Two normal ways of showing flexibility are timing and total amount.

• Timing: Most donors don’t think in terms of months or years. They hear a dollar amount and assume they’re being asked to pay it right now. If they stumble over the number, you can break it down for them. You might share that $150,000 is “just” $75,000 a year for two years. Or “just” $18,750 a quarter for two years. You could also start with smaller pledge payments and move to larger ones.

You and your team need to figure out what terms you’re comfortable with. Some organizations like shorter payment terms. Others are comfortable with five or even 10 years. But you have to make the donor aware of them. Even if the terms are in writing, show her enough respect to let her know that the terms exist.

• Total amount: If you ever look at a gift-range calculator like mine at GiftRangeCalculator.com, you’ll see that you need three to five prospects you think are capable of giving at each level to actually land one gift at that level. That is a possible 80 percent rejection rate. So it’s entirely possible that your request isn’t going to be fulfilled at the level you mention. (That’s why it’s so important to ask for a higher number rather than a lower one.)

So when you go into the ask, be sure to have the ask you’re willing to make and then a couple more gift levels that you’ll be comfortable receiving. I call these “arrows in your quiver.” An archer only shoots one arrow at a time, but he has more to draw from when needed. Just like an archer, only make one ask at a time, but have options you can smoothly draw out if needed.

One of my clients in the Southeast heard of a donor making a $250,000 gift to endow a fund. The fund would help causes like my client’s. My client wanted to know how to get a grant from that fund. But rather than fight over a few thousand dollars with everyone else, I helped him strategize a face-to-face solicitation of this donor. He asked him for a $250,000 endowment fund.

But we also set up two other options that were extremely valuable for the nonprofit: publicly hosting and inviting the donor’s friends to my client’s largest annual event, and a $10,000 annual gift.

The donor choked on the first ask, laughingly saying he’d just given his first $250,000 away and needed the dust to settle on that. But he willingly accepted the second ask. This allowed my client to have visibility, media coverage and the best annual event the organization has had.

If he’d just had the first ask, he’d have taken the no and tried to fight for a couple thousand-dollar grant. Instead, he left the meeting with a gift that was equivalent to a five- or six-figure contribution to his nonprofit.

Tweak No. 3: Go for no
Last month in The Nonprofit Academy, we had a training by Andrea Waltz, the author of “Go for No!” Her perspective has revolutionized the fundraising experience for many of my clients.

Take a look at the list of your assignments that you hope will give this year. Now beside each name, write the date when that person said “no” to you. How many can you put an actual date on?

In my experience, we tend to interpret silence as a “no.” We assume that since they’re not communicating back to us, they’re not interested in us. We fill the silence with a story we’ve made up. But again, this is quite disrespectful. We end up making a giving decision for someone else, robbing him of the opportunity to invest in something he values. What gives us that right?

Without giving away the story of “Go for No!,” the idea is to respect donors enough to only stop when they ask us to. I know, I know — that immediately conjures up a picture of an overly aggressive salesman. Or of the Comcast person who won’t let a customer disconnect service. But that’s not you, is it?

In fundraising, it means letting the donor actually tell us she won’t be making a gift this year. If you don’t have that kind of clarity, your job is to get it.

• Develop a focused list of changes your nonprofit is focusing on.
• Create three or four meaningful ways for the donor to be involved in that change.
• Keep inviting the donor until she tells you she isn’t going to participate this time.

As they have for my coaching clients, putting these three tweaks into practice will help you move from panic to poise. And help you fully fund your nonprofit.

To your fundraising success!

— Marc

Marc Pitman is the author of “Ask Without Fear!” and founder of FundraisingCoach.com and the weekly e-mail service “Fundraising Kick.” He is also a member of the FundRaising Success Editorial Advisory Board. Reach him at marc@fundraisingcoach.com or follow him on Twitter at @marcapitman