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A crowdsourced blog on fundraising and changemaking.

De 5 snelste groeiers en het recept van hun succes

Dat we allemaal gek zijn op ‘lijstjes’ bleek wel weer toen Reinier afgelopen december hier op 101fundraising een ranglijst publiceerde van de snelste Nederlandse stijgers in fondsenwervende inkomsten van de afgelopen jaren. Het betreffende blog werd ‘by far’ het best gelezen artikel van 101fundraising tot nu toe en kreeg enorm veel reacties.

Het blog zoomde niet in op de organisaties die het voorgaande jaar veel zijn gestegen, maar juist op de organisaties die gemiddeld over meerdere jaren (2006 – 2010) een hoog groeipercentage laten zien. Door naar de langere termijn te kijken, komen de organisaties bovendrijven die echts iets bijzonders aan het doen zijn binnen de fondsenwerving, zo is de gedachte.

Bij Reinier en Ramses Man (Nassau) kwam gelijk de vraag op wát die vijf organisaties dan zo goed doen. Ze besloten een zogenaamd ‘diner pensant’ te organiseren en nodigden de vijf snelste groeiers hiervoor uit.

Jolanda Omvlee (directeur Compassion), Frits Hirschstein (directeur KiKa), Ruud Tombrock (directeur WSPA Benelux), Ellen Kooij (hoofd marketing, communicatie en fondsenwerving War Child) en Wimco Ester (hoofd communicatie en marketing Open Doors) vertelden tijdens het diner openhartig over wat hun organisaties zo succesvol maakt. In dit artikel geven Reinier en Ramses een impressie van deze gedenkwaardige avond in Restaurant Eetvilla van den Brink in Soest.

(more…)

Reinier Spruit Reinier Spruit

3 Tips for “Radical” Fundraising Communications

I was recently re-reading Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals, and couldn’t help but extract a few nuggets of advice that any fundraiser could benefit from with a quick refresher:

TIP #1: A good tactic is one that your people enjoy.

“If your people are not having a ball doing it, there is something very wrong with the tactic.”

Pause for a moment and take stock of every fundraising tactic that your organization employs. Now consider if your staff are “having a ball” doing it. Are they? If not, either you’re using the wrong tactic, or you’ve got the wrong people. (more…)

Brock Warner

Why you should consider a telethon

2011 was a very special fundraising year for the Dutch Cancer Society (KWF Kankerbestrijding)  in which over € 130 million was raised. That’s an increase of over 20% versus last year. Especially income from legacies, Alpe d’HuZes ( a major cycling fundraising event which generated € 20 million in 2011) and income from private donors led to this significant increase.

An important way for the Dutch Cancer Society to recruit donors is the campaign “Stand Up To Cancer” in which a telethon has a major role. TV is for the Dutch Cancer Society an almost steady part in the multichannel mix to recruit donors and this was the fifth telethon since 2006.

In 2010, for the first time the “Stand Up To Cancer” concept was used and this campaign resulted in no less than 50,000 structural donors. That was an amazing result and far beyond everybody’s expectations. The fundraising potential of this concept was clearly demonstrated. I wrote blog about it last year. Consider this as part two so it could be helpful if you read the first one.

With this concept funds will be raised to accelerate groundbreaking research that can get new therapies to patients quickly, enabling (inter)national scientists to work together. (more…)

Lars Arnoldussen

Waarom je een telethon moet overwegen

2011 was een zeer bijzonder fondsenwervend jaar voor KWF Kankerbestrijding waarin ruim 130 miljoen euro aan inkomsten werd gegenereerd. Dat is een stijging van ruim 20%. Vooral nalatenschappen, Alpe d’HuZes en particuliere donateurs zorgden voor deze aanzienlijke stijging.

Een belangrijke manier voor KWF Kankerbestrijding om donateurs te werven is de campagne ‘Sta op tegen kanker’ (SOTK) met daarin een belangrijke plek voor een fondsenwervende tv-show. Tv is de afgelopen jaren een bijna vaste waarde in de kanalen-mix om donateurs te werven en dit was de 5e fondsenwervende Tv-show van KWF sinds 2006.

In 2010 werd voor het eerst het SOTK concept gebruikt en deze campagne resulteerde in maar liefst 50.000 structurele donateurs. Het potentieel van dit concept voor fondsenwerving werd overduidelijk aangetoond en ik heb hierover eerder een blog geschreven. Dit blog is hier een vervolg op, het kan derhalve handig zijn om mijn eerder blog te lezen.

SOTK is een uitnodiging en symbool van een beweging van mensen die in actie komen en opstaan om hun bijdrage te leveren in de strijd tegen kanker. (more…)

Lars Arnoldussen

The Stolen Recipe for a Legacy Event

This is my second blog post for 101 Fundraising and, just like my first blog, the inspiration was coming from a presentation that I attended late last year.  [Yes, I steal ideas from others! Don’t judge!].

My job in WWF is to build a knowledge system for WWF’s legacy fundraisers. One of them is to organise a virtual presentation about legacy fundraising. This presentation was one of them and it’s about the recipe of success for legacy event. It was presented by Sarah Cunningham who is legacy marketing manager for WWF UK. [I already have permission from Sarah to use her presentation as my blog sources. Thanks Sarah!]

So, let’s get cracking! Sarah presented how she prepared the legacy events as if she cooked a recipe for dinner. I like the idea of it since a legacy event is not a fast-food standardized product, but more likely to be a customized and adaptable dish. It needs to be personal. (more…)

Juan Hendrawan Juan Hendrawan

I’m awesome. You’re awesome. We’re AWESOME…aren’t we?

A few years ago, while discussing a learning opportunity, a colleague of mine said: “The last thing I need is to sit and listen to a bunch of fundraisers talk about how great they are.”

At the time I was pretty offended. Now I think maybe she was right. We (fundraising professionals) really do look to each other for validation. We build ourselves up, cheer each other on and even have award ceremonies for each other. We need to inspire and support each other because we are still a long way away from this profession garnering the public support and respect it deserves.

You have read about my mother in law in previous posts. Eileen, didn’t really want me talking about my job of fundraising in social situations with her friends. I remember one birthday party in particular when one of the guests disclosed that he ran a small foundation and suggested that I submit a proposal. This innocent, friendly, organic conversation resulted in a family scandal that lasted for weeks. Eileen just couldn’t understand how I could be so crass as to “solicit her friends”. I never did follow up on the lead. The personal strife simply wasn’t worth the donation.

On another occasion at a major donor cultivation event I somehow ended up on the receiving end of a lecture about how fundraisers don’t need to get paid. In fact they “SHOULDN’T” get paid. I set my immediate defensive instincts aside and tried to patiently justify my paycheck by explaining that I have specific training. (more…)

Kimberly Mackenzie

A tribute to George Smith, 4th March 2012

Out of respect for George Smith, who passed away over the weekend, we re-publish the eulogy that Ken Burnett has published on SOFII.

George Smith, writer, colleague and friend, died on 2nd March 2012 after a long illness.

We returned this afternoon from the marriage of George’s youngest daughter Jenny to Aaron Fenell at the Winters Barns in Canterbury. The wedding was a roller-coaster of emotions, both draining and spiritually uplifting; the festivities marred of course but not spoiled by the death on the previous day of the father of the bride, George Smith.

We came home to see many tributes to George posted on Twitter and various Internet sites from friends and admirers around the world. George was always leery of social media so we fear he might have felt this a bit unseemly, would have railed against it but, secretly, he’d have been both intrigued and chuffed. He was also a private man embarassed by limelight, not a seeker of personal accolades. So he’d have dismised those with a joke too, though secretly in his heart he’d have been hugely pleased.  (more…)

Ken Burnett Ken Burnett

Does online fundraising have to mean restricted funding?

For the last few years, the buzz about ‘crowdfunding’ has been steadily growing and a increasing number of crowdfunding sites for charities have been appearing, and continue to appear at an astonishing rate – to the point where I increasingly finding myself questioning how necessary and valuable some of them are (do we really need specific sites for charities in particular regions or sectors when there are sites that allow all regions and all sectors, and are searchable?).

But, a while ago, I started to wonder whether these sites were changing something they hadn’t actually set out to change – that they were responsible for a trend towards restricted giving online.  I found myself pondering how big a trend it would become, and what impact it might end up having on the sector.

The launch of CRUK’s MyProjects sticks in my memory as a pivotal moment that made me stop and wonder whether I had been witnessing a trend emerging.  I observed, with interest, the restricted nature of the projects that donors could choose to find through the site and was surprised that the charity had taken that tack.  Surprised because, during the 15 years I’ve been a professional fundraiser, I can only think of a handful of times that I’ve worked on an appeal that wasn’t unrestricted – because most individual giving is, for reasons I won’t insult anyone by explaining. (more…)

Rachel Beer

Un-define fundraising

I love fundraising, but recently I’ve tried to create some distance between ‘fundraising’ as a descriptor of what it is I do. It’s not because of how I feel about the term, but because of how the general public feels about it. Here in Canada, the most recent stats show that 23% of Canadians donate to charity. So when I refer to the general public, I’m talking about the other 77%.

The general public doesn’t like fundraisers, it tolerates them. However, there are exceptions. When Bill Gates asks Warren Buffett to give half his fortune to the Gates Foundation, is he a hero? You bet. When you send an acquisition mail pack, or an e-appeal, are you a hero? Nope. You are a nuisance.

So, it seems the general public only has a problem with professional fundraisers. From where I stand, it sounds like “fundraisers are great, as long as they aren’t asking me for money.” (more…)

Brock Warner

Protect one of your greatest fundraising assets

It’s not a killer creative proposition. Or your favourite go-to copywriter. I’m talking about your database.

paper database

The predecessor to the modern CRM (© adesigna)

Databases are often seen as a necessary means to an end, but time and time again I have seen this major asset overlooked even by experienced fundraising teams. Here are just four tips I’ve used in the past to protect this asset and make it work even harder for fundraising.

Tip #1: Standardise your database rules
Having a single CRM software system in place is not the same as breaking down silos. If three different teams use the same database – but use it very differently from each other – then it’s not really one database. You may interpret one field to mean one thing, but for another fundraiser it can mean something entirely different. That could mean they get irrelevant letters from the charity, or that two very distinct donor groups end up getting treated the same way through a misunderstanding.

Create a glossary to define each term or flag on your database so if someone wants to know what something means, there is an organisation-wide definition. That means there is a single, consistent interpretation of the non-transactional data.

Tip #2: Beware static segmentation and ring-fencing (more…)

Alison McCants

Reader Beware: Contains Dangerous Ideas on How to Motivate (Face-to-Face) Fundraisers!

Greenpeace International Executive Director with some motivated street fundraisers

It will come as no surprise that the highest achieving face-to-face fundraisers you are likely to come across are also among the most highly motivated people working in any organisation. How else do you imagine they deal with a working life that places them on a daily collision course with public indifference, slamming doors and verbal and physical abuse and yet still come away at the end of their shift holding onto their sanity never mind a bunch of new sign-ups for their non-profit?

To be sure, successful face-to-face fundraising requires a degree of talent and a positive mindset is certainly a must, but without motivation no fundraiser would last more than a few days. In fact the high rate of staff turnover in face-to-face fundraising is well known and is a headache and a major expense for most organisations.

Managers are aware of the importance of this fuzzy thing called ‘Motivation’, some even spend a lot of of time, effort and money in the hope that their team will be motivated enough to get through the day with success and show up for work again the next day. But despite this awareness and the efforts put in place to harness motivation there is still a constant “churn and burn” of staff. Why? (more…)

Jack Ryan

Get Away From Your Desk And Remind Yourself WHY

In my role at a fundraising agency, I don’t have much chance to speak to anyone aside from my co-workers and the fundraising departments of our charity clients. I get to read nice case studies and hear my accounts department talk about the clients’ work, but I rarely get to see this work for myself. And it’s just not the same.

That’s why last week, I was excited to get out of the office for a few hours and head south of the Thames to do a couple of interviews. I got to speak to two women who work for one of the UK’s leading medical charities, helping people to pick up the pieces and move on after being suddenly struck with a serious medical condition. By acting as a support system to their patients, aiding them with almost every aspect of their lives – sometimes for years as they recover, they are heroes to those they help.

I can’t get into the specifics of their work due to confidentiality, but I can tell you that while speaking to these women and seeing their eyes well up with tears as they told the stories of the people they work with, I felt injected with a shot of inspiration. (more…)

Margaux Smith

De meest kansrijke erflater vindt u hier!

‘De typische erflater: Een alleenstaande vrouw van ongeveer tachtig jaar zonder kinderen. Het laatste testament is een paar jaar oud en in dit testament staat, meestal samen met een aantal andere doelen, jouw organisatie opgenomen. Voorwaarde om in het testament genoemd te worden is uiteraard wel dat de potentiële erflater bekend is met jouw organisatie. Of beter: een relatie heeft opgebouwd als donateur, vrijwilliger, zelfs medewerker’.

Dit profiel komt de gemiddelde nalatenschapfondsenwerver geregeld tegen in boeken, in masterclasses en onderzoeken. Voor een kansrijk nalatenschap programma lijkt het dus noodzakelijk om je op deze doelgroep te richten, en dan na gemiddeld vier tot tien jaar een stijging in inkomsten uit nalatenschappen te merken.

Maar: richt je je dan op die miljoenen mensen buiten je database, omdat die groep veel groter is, of beperk je je tot de mensen van wie je zeker weet dat er al een relatie bestaat, namelijk je eigen achterban?

Een kleine speurtocht op de websites van nalatenschappenexperts Henk de Graaf en Arjen van Ketel leert mij dat beide wegen kunnen leiden naar (meer) inkomsten uit nalatenschappen. Dat is goed nieuws! (more…)

Elsbeth Takkenberg

Read this only if you want to change the world!

When Reinier called for someone to write a last-minute blog yesterday, I had coincidentally just purchased a book on social marketing. I have been interested in the subject for some time, but the discussion on the recent 101fundraising blog about donor centered fundraising and public perception really made me think more about how social change organisations leverage donors.

Think about it – our donors are so much more than financial benefactors. They are consumers. And they are, above all else, consumers who feel strongly enough about the work we are doing to actually fund it. In fact, their financial behaviour proves again and again that they share our vision so strongly to actually invest in it. So how many organisations are actually utilizing donors to affect social change?

As fundraisers we have a tendency to keep using the same topics that score the best in terms of response and income. And besides occasional tests, we shy away from talking about the more difficult, longer-term or more complex areas of our work – either because we think we will fail to properly tell the story and convey the urgency; or because assume that in a saturated charity market, donors will perceive another “simpler” issue as having greater priority. (more…)

Sarah Clifton

Climate change needed for donor centric fundraising!

From left to right: Ellen Kooij (War Child), Wimco Ester (Open Doors), Frits Hirschstein (KiKa), Ruud Tombrock (WSPA), Jolanda Omvlee (Compassion Nederland) (photo credits: Jaap Zeekant)

Recently I had dinner with the 5 best fundraising organizations in The Netherlands. This was a follow-up from my previous blog post: Who are the best Fundraisers in The Netherlands? The very same day Ramses Man had picked up my message to start “doing our homework”. We were going to look beyond the market figures and get into the qualitative side of these organizations. Why is it, that these organizations are so good in fundraising?

At our dinner we had decades of fundraising expertise around the table. Ramses and I will share that experience in more detail later (both here and in the Dutch Fundraising Magazine), but I wanted to focus here on one particular part of the discussion that I’m sure resonates with many of you.

Frits Hirschstein, founder and Executive Director for KiKa (charity for children with cancer) said something that has been on my mind for some time now. We were talking about what obstacles his charity faced in growing even faster. It sounds strange to talk about growing even faster if you know that KiKa has grown at an average annual rate of 25% 4 years in a row…

So what is holding KiKa back to grow even faster? (more…)

Reinier Spruit Reinier Spruit

It’s you, not me

Today’s post is a morsel.

Short and sweet, it’s a petit four or, if you’re more of a savoury person, a piece ofbleu benedictinto finish a sumptuous year of blogging on101fundraising.org, our crowdblog.

A year ago next weekthe very first blog postwas published on this site. Since then, many more fundraisers have written, shared, and debated on many aspects of our profession: the theoretical, technical, and ideological. I have no agency to speak on behalf of anyone but myself, and so I thank you personally, Reinier and Jeroen, the Men in Black, for your genius and hard hard hard work bringing fundraisers of the world together in this space. And of course a multitude of thanks to my fellow crowdbloggers: your content has enriched my professional practice.

Now.

On the subject of thank you’s, today’s blog post subject: a quick case study on email subject lines. (more…)

Rebecca Davies Rebecca Davies

How my pissed off donor came back…

Earlier this month I spoke with Reinier and he asked me if I would write another blog. I immediately agreed and I didn’t have to think long about the topic of my blog. Because that same day my organization MSF received a donation from a donor, about whom I can tell you an educating story.  Some time ago it appeared we had lost this donor forever…

We all make our share of mistakes, like every other human being. It is not a bad thing per se, as long as you learn from them. And sometimes your mistakes aren’t as bad as they seem at first; moreover, sometimes they can create a nice topic for a blog!

Some years back my organization received a relatively high donation from a company. As a good relationship manager does, I tried to call the responsible person to thank him, try to figure out more about his motives and engagement wishes and hopefully set up a meeting. I was told by a receptionist that the responsible person was extremely hard to reach by phone, and that email would be the best option to reach him

(more…)

Gerbren Deves

Annual Reports – Print or Online

Something that is often asked is how to share annual reports with supporters, should these be printed, online or both?

Annual reports and how they’re distributed should be included in your annual communication plan and not left until the report is due to be released, which sadly can be the case in many organizations.

Supporters, current and potential, want to know about your organization, they want to know what you have been doing, where the resources have been allocated and they don’t want to have to wade through reams of paper to get the answers.

With internet being widely used it makes sense for organizations to make use of it to share not only what they do, but also share their annual reports and much more. (more…)

Graeme Russell

Waarom Nederlandse fondsenwervers soms uit hun nek kletsen…

Soms wordt ik een beetje moe van alle fondsenwervers die elkaar allemaal napraten. We weten allemaal best hoe het moet. Maar tussen de theorie die we tot ons nemen (101fundraising/ IFC-Masterclasses/ IF-opleiding etc.) en de praktijk gaapt een gigantisch gat. Vooral als het gaat over de inzet van ons bestuur in onze fondsenwervingsplannen. We hebben allemaal wel ergens een stappenplannetje liggen. Bijvoorbeeld Neil Sloggies ‘Essentials of Major Gift Fundraising‘ uit de onvolprezen ‘Tiny’-serie’. We wéten, hóren en beséffen dat we ons bestuur moeten inzetten. Dat doen ze namelijk in de Angelsaksische fondsenwervingwereld al lang -en met succes. Dus moeten wij dat ook doen.

Maar doen we dat ook? Daarom de volgende vraag om eens te overdenken: hoeveel geld heeft jouw bestuur voor jouw organisatie binnen gehengeld afgelopen jaar en hoe heb je ze zo ver gekregen? (more…)

David Heyer

Stop recruiting donors!

We live in very interesting times, times in which a charity can achieve outstanding results with less effort and money. The world is connecting at an enormous space, and connections are made based on shared values and passion and a common purpose, social media being the driving force behind these partnerships. Fundraising is no longer dominated by the main fundraising techniques Direct Mail, Telemarketing and Direct Dialogue, but online social network fundraising, crowdfunding, open innovation, facebook, eBay, SMS, Mobile giving, products and also services among others are at the disposal of every fundraiser to integrate and execute.

The fundraising income that will also grow significantly in the next years is that of companies. Companies are expected to become more social and contribute to society. This is not only required from the customer point of view but also to acquire the talent of today and tomorrow to make the business grow.

More and more companies are interested in cooperating with charities to create emotional relevant partnerships for everyone. It’s no coincidence that Some American Charities call themselves Emotion Providers. (more…)

David Berg

Unexpected (?) fundraising tool: your ears as your moneymakers

“Recently a charity asked me if I had put them in my will. I was astounded and felt insulted by this question. After the conversation I immediately went to my notary and changed my will. I deleted all three of the charities that were in there. My kids are once again the only beneficiaries.”

I posted this quote on Twitter about a year ago, after a ‘kitchen table’ conversation with one of the major donors of a charity I work for as a consultant. The conversation was part of a feasibility study for a major gifts and legacies program. A fellow fundraiser has asked me to blog about the subject.

Well, here are my thoughts. (more…)

Vera Peerdeman

Adventures in innovation – be a donor detective

Innovation is often misunderstood. For many, the word innovation conjures up thoughts of pointlessly whacky idea sessions, fluffy ideas that never amount to more than a collection of hopeful post-it notes left over at the end of a team day and green beanbags.

For innovation to be successful it must be rooted in organisational strategy and be driven by the core mission of an organisation. This ensures that idea generation and delivery are focused on solving relevant challenges.

Innovation in your fundraising involves looking for opportunities; where is there a need that isn’t being fulfilled? The key is how you uncover those opportunities and then develop solutions to turn the opportunities into successful fundraising.

In the same way that corporate organisations work hard to understand their customers needs and provide goods and services for their customers, fundraising organisations need to work hard to understand their donors and develop compelling and easy ways for them to give support. (more…)

Lucy Gower

2011 overview: Ranking the best fundraising blogs!

101fundraising is a crowdblog on fundraising. A free resource. A volunteer initiative. By fundraisers, for fundraisers. And we’ve done it. We’ve reached the end of our inaugural blog season!

This is the last post of the 2011 season, before we take a well deserved break. We will see you back in 2012 with renewed energy and high hopes for another streak of great fundraising blog posts. But before we leave you with your holiday spirit we want to share the 101fundraising highlights of 2011…

We launched on 8 February 2011. We had 37 blogging fundraisers. We’ve published 97 posts, 75 in English and 22 in Dutch. More than 26,000 unique fundraisers from 157 countries visited our crowdblog and have read 72,000 pages… The key word here is WE, because this is a crowdblog, and there is no successful crowdblog without our bloggers. Thank you bloggers!

A special thanks goes out to our Bronze Bloggers Sarah Clifton, Rebecca Davies, Peter Goudkamp, Lucy Gower and Alison McCants!

But there is more… Which social media platform spreads fundraising blogs the best? And off course: what are the most popular blog posts in 2011? (more…)

101 fundraising icon 101fundraising

The donor lifecycle map

A basic donor lifecycle map

A few months ago I posted a blog critical of the donor pyramid and asking why it is still so widely used in the Netherlands (and undoubtedly also some other countries). So now I’d like to propose an alternative. The problem with the pyramid is that it is only useful to show one metric – donor financial value. But it doesn’t tell the larger story of engagement – how a donor interacts with and builds a relationship with an organisation over time: the lifecycle.

So what does your donors’ lifecycle look like? And more importantly, are your donors growing in value (whatever that means to your organisation – financial value, volunteerism, advocacy, etc.) over the duration of that lifespan? How can you visualise how your organisation is performing and how you want to be performing? A simple tool that I favour is the donor lifecycle map. The primary purpose of this tool is to show the correlation of donor value with engagement – both of which, of course, should be growing!

(more…)

Sarah Clifton

Who are the best fundraisers in The Netherlands?

Last week the Central Bureau Fundraising (CBF) in The Netherlands released their 2010 overview of fundraising (read it in Dutch or the English Google translation). Most news about these figures is about general market trends, or growth compared to last year, but never ever really gives you an insight you can work with as a fundraiser. But it’s always interesting to have a closer look, because we can learn more from these figures.

I’m always particularly interested in the organizations that are showing growth figures over a longer period of time, because it shows consistent good performance.

I focused my little analysis on the top 50 fundraising organizations in 2010. In 2006 they raised €760M and in 2010 the same group of organizations raised €936M. This group consists of charities that all raise more than €5M. (more…)

Reinier Spruit Reinier Spruit