Properly implemented, a feasibility study can be useful throughout the fundraising stage of a campaign and beyond.

By Leslie Mollsen and John Biggins

A development feasibility study is not a political poll or a marketing study. Because confidentiality is at the heart of the process, a feasibility study will not succeed in a focus group. It is not broad-based. It does not endeavor to extract consensus from a large group. Rather, it seeks to solicit the frank opinions of those few participants whose influence and affluence can ensure the campaign’s success. If done well, a feasibility study is a superb donor-cultivation tool.