Fundraiser Education

In June, everyone shifts into summertime mode. The kids are done with school. Summer camps and vacations are anticipated. And for many nonprofit marketers, work slows down or takes on a different pace. How can you make the most of summertime mode? Here are a few creative summertime fundraising projects Taylor Shanklin discussed during last…

When people give to causes that are deeply meaningful to them, they feel like a million bucks. Understanding this—truly, deeply understanding this—is so important I’m going to repeat it in bold and italics. When people give to causes that are deeply meaningful to them, they feel like a million bucks. This is the key to…

This week the internet is awash in news about the latest number from Giving USA and the record amount given to charity. But if you are the more typical fundraiser, wearing several hats and trying to eke out enough donated income to meet your budget, you may glance at all this coverage and say, "So what?"...

The beloved and I were meeting recently over dinner with Robert, (not his real name) a fundraising executive with one of the top 20 health care nonprofits. Robert had been in this particular position for only four months, and was telling me about the challenges he is facing navigating the organizational chart to get things done...

How is it good in the context of nonprofit fundraising, marketing and management? How do you know you’re changing in the right direction? And at the right time? I'm a firm believer in challenging the status quo, as long as that does not ipso facto mean throwing the baby out with the bathwater...

Every so often, I'll read a blog post titled something like, "9 Ways to Write Better Fundraising." I love pieces like that, because I'm fascinated by what people consider "short-list" critical elements for success. And, as often as not, I learn something from those lists. The thing that dismays me is how often one of those…

One of the challenges every fundraiser has is being told constantly what he or she must do—a daily dose of articles and seminars, not to mention advice from the organization’s management, board leadership and colleagues about what must be done to make sure the fundraising machine is primed for success. And yet, the reality for most fundraisers is limited time and money. We often know what we should do and would like to do—but constraints mean something "important" is being neglected...

In a recent, intentionally provocative opinion piece on the Plymouth University Critical Fundraising blog, Joe Jenkins shared the notion that the social benefit sector has “a big problem: the entrenched homogeneity of charity communications. To the rest of the world we mostly look, act and appear to be the same.” Does nonprofit fundraising have an innovation problem? In part one of of a four-part series, we look for answers...

College graduates across the country are kicking off their first job hunt, looking to launch their dream careers in their fields of choice. And for many recent grads, that field is nonprofits. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, average employment in the nonprofit sector increased 8.5 percent from 2007 to 2012, while employment in…

Good recipes are road maps to desired outcomes. Do you want to eat a homemade load of bread? Follow these 10 steps, and you’ll have one in a couple of hours. Recipes can be easy or hard. They can take practice and require tinkering. But once someone develops a good recipe, anyone should be able…