The 4 Forever Facts About Fundraising

Fundraising is about being in it for the long haul. It's more akin to a marriage than a one-night stand. Spend as much money (or more) on cultivating your current donors, i.e., the folks who already love you, as you do acquiring new leads.

3. Fundraising is about being prepared

I'm not involved with the Boy Scouts, but I love their motto — "Be prepared." Say it after me. "Be prepared." Tape it to your laptop. Without a plan, you'll never succeed at raising money. You've simply got to have an editorial calendar to map out your appeals, a schedule for each of your campaigns, and you have to be aware of the other activities that are going on inside your organization so you can leverage, instead of cannibalize, these programs.