Tag Archives: Major Gifts

Nonprofit Radio for November 13, 2023: Fundraising 401

 

Laurence PagnoniFundraising 401

That’s Laurence Pagnoni’s latest book. When this first aired, it was his new book, but Laurence’s strategies and tactics are timeless. It’s a series of masterclasses for all levels and a collection of revelations he gained over 35 years in nonprofit management and fundraising. (This originally aired May 29, 2020.)

 

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Board relations. Fundraising. Volunteer management. Prospect research. Legal compliance. Accounting. Finance. Investments. Donor relations. Public relations. Marketing. Technology. Social media.

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Nonprofit Radio for September 6, 2022: Sustainable Fundraising

 

Larry Johnson: Sustainable Fundraising

Larry Johnson is author of the book, “The Eight Principles of Sustainable Fundraising.” He walks us through several of them, including “Donors are the Drivers™,” “Leadership Leads™” and “Divide & Grow™.”

 

 

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We’re the #1 Podcast for Nonprofits, With 13,000+ Weekly Listeners

Board relations. Fundraising. Volunteer management. Prospect research. Legal compliance. Accounting. Finance. Investments. Donor relations. Public relations. Marketing. Technology. Social media.

Every nonprofit struggles with these issues. Big nonprofits hire experts. The other 95% listen to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio. Trusted experts and leading thinkers join me each week to tackle the tough issues. If you have big dreams but a small budget, you have a home at Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio.
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[00:01:51.84] spk_0:
and welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio big non profit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host of your favorite abdominal podcast. Oh, I’m glad you’re with me, I’d suffer with infra occlusion if I had to bite down on the idea that you missed this week’s show, sustainable fundraising. Larry johnson is author of the book The Eight Principles of sustainable fundraising. He walks us through several of them, including donors, are the drivers, leadership leads and divide and grow. I’m Tony’s take to make it about your mission. We’re sponsored by turn to communications. Pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o and by fourth dimension technologies I. T. Infra in a box the affordable tech solution for nonprofits. tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant or d just like three D. But they go one dimension deeper here is sustainable fundraising. It’s a pleasure to welcome Larry johnson to non profit radio He is founder of the Eight Principles and author of the award winning book the eight principles of sustainable fundraising. He’s an internationally recognized coach trainer and thought leader in fund development and philanthropy. The principles are at the eight principles dot com and larry is on linkedin. Larry johnson, Welcome to the show.

[00:01:54.56] spk_1:
Well Tony, it’s indeed a pleasure. I’m looking forward to this.

[00:02:14.05] spk_0:
Thank you very much. I am as well. It’s a pleasure to have you, Let’s talk about the eight principles. What were you thinking when you uh rarefied fundraising into into eight Cognizable bites for folks.

[00:03:22.38] spk_1:
Well um you know, I’ve been in this business what 30 plus years now, yikes anyway. One thing I’ve noticed throughout my career is that people tend to focus on the process or the tools and not really the underlying principles or unchanging sort of laws that are operating in the background. And, but if you look at organizations that are truly transformative in the way they raise money and the way they engage their donors in the way they continue to grow every year. Even if they don’t, they ever heard of the eight principles, you could take and look at their organization and see them observing all eight of them. And so when I went to write the book, the idea was to create a book that was sophisticated, yet simple and that could be applied both at the technical levels and at the board level that here, this is what’s going on. And if you understand it, then you’ll be able to assemble a program that makes sense for your organization because not every organization is the same. The constituencies aren’t the same. And so it’s really, it’s foolish to try to make everything work everywhere because it won’t. Uh, and that’s one of the reasons why so many organizations are pushing uphill.

[00:03:32.41] spk_0:
So, you see these as a, as a foundation for all sustainable fundraising.

[00:03:33.99] spk_1:
Yeah. And the reason why is they’re all based on human nature. Um, and, uh, I mean, we’re actually gonna be going into into, into ASIA, into India later this year and they’re just as applicable there as they are here because they’re based on human nature.

[00:04:24.33] spk_0:
Okay, well, we’re gonna, we’re gonna hit three of them that I feel are areas that we haven’t had many guests or any guests talk about. And then, you know, if, if there’s still time we’ll go back and hit a couple. But uh, you know, for listeners, I want, I want it to be stuff that we haven’t talked about very much with with other guests. So your number one of the eight principles of sustainable fundraising is donors are the drivers. What’s going on here?

[00:05:33.58] spk_1:
Well, um, donors A. K. A. Investors. I like the word investors. Um, they are driving the philanthropic enterprise without them. There is no philanthropy. There is no fundraising. But the irony here is they’re not driving it with their money. There’s the key, um, people are obsessed about the money. Well, yes, money is involved, but it’s not really the focus. And especially at the focus of, of donors, investors. They’re looking for something different. But then it’s also not really, their focus is really not the mission of the organization either. Um, it is, again, tangential, what donors are looking for is the fulfillment of their own dreams and aspirations. That’s what they’re really looking for and the organization that can provide that they’re the ones that will elicit the transformative and ongoing support of these people. Um, and so they are indeed driving the enterprise. And there’s a lot of, a lot of my friends out there in the wealth management world, tell me that for lack of engagement by nonprofits, there’s probably at least a billion dollars sitting out there un engaged. And, uh, and that, that doesn’t mean it’s tied up in a donor advised fund or any sort of instrument there. It’s just sitting out there because it’s never been engaged.

[00:05:48.98] spk_0:
I mean, there could be more than that. That that’s a very speculative,

[00:05:51.90] spk_1:
right? It is, it is

[00:05:56.19] spk_0:
Estimate, I mean, it could be $10 billion. I mean, I know nonprofits could be more engaging with donors. So I’m not, I’m not quibbling that it’s not a billion. It could be 10 times that,

[00:06:03.96] spk_1:
yes, it could be absolutely, absolutely. But the keys, they’re driving the enterprise, but they’re not driving it with their money,

[00:06:19.09] spk_0:
right? You’re saying their aspirations and their dreams say more about how you see nonprofits fulfilling donor aspirations and dreams.

[00:06:46.11] spk_1:
Well, tony if I were approaching you as a, as an executive of a nonprofit or a fundraiser, a board member or anybody else and you were a potential investor. Um, I would first try to figure out what it is that you that really gave you fulfillment what it is you’re really looking for. And we’re talking about very serious transcendent fulfillment, not immediate short term and, you know, especially with today’s technological tools that are available, you know, in the old days, you just ask people and that still works. Um, but you can figure out pretty quickly, you know, what is it that’s driving these people, what is it they’re not missing because what you’re giving them is something they cannot buy. You see, they can’t buy that. Um, and let me tell you a little story

[00:07:21.93] spk_0:
before your story, hold, we’ll get we’ll do your story. I love stories, not putting the kibosh on the story, but hold off what they can’t buy. They can’t buy the fulfillment that nonprofits can provide, that

[00:09:26.91] spk_1:
they can’t buy that. So, if the if the nonprofit is going to offer this to them, you know, and then they will more than gladly give them an exchange. You see, let me let me let me illustrate this. There is a there is a for profit market vertical that understands this intrinsically and in fact, their entire um market proposition. Their whole sales proposition is if you use their product, you will become personally fulfilled sex appeal, you know, self worth all in one package. And most of us use those products and I, and I usually say, so what is it to a group? And maybe one person will get it right, It’s the cosmetics industry, Alright, that’s exactly their sales proposition you use our product, you’re going to be beautiful, self fulfilled sex appeal, the whole thing. So, and the story is okay to illustrate that I went into a department store, it’s been four or five years ago now and I went into the cup of the men’s cologne fragrance counter, whatever you wanna call it. And there was a young clerk there, young man and I walked up and I knew what I wanted, you know, and he says, um, can I help you sir? Well, if you know me, you know that I love to ask questions just to see what kind of response I’m gonna get. And right in front of me on the counter was this, you know, men’s health? One of these men’s magazines opened to a full page cosmetics at full page. And the ad was very simple. It was a um it was a photograph, full page photograph. And it was this this uh this gigolo with this, with this blonde in a white bikini on a yacht, in the Aegean. And then the, an image of the product was superimposed onto the photograph very prominently. And it’s, you’ve probably even seen it. It’s a very well known brand. So I said to the young man, I said, well, so tell me pointing to the ad, if I buy this, do I get hurt? Well, he looked at me like he didn’t, he was just he was he couldn’t quite

[00:09:31.60] spk_0:
was a man,

[00:09:33.80] spk_1:
it was a gigolo with the, with the blonde.

[00:09:36.78] spk_0:
Oh,

[00:09:38.32] spk_1:
okay, so you know, the the idea is you’re you’re transmuting yourself there on the yacht with this blonde, that’s the whole thing. Okay,

[00:09:46.19] spk_0:
Yeah. The guy at the Clark county has to offer you?

[00:10:19.58] spk_1:
Well, first of all, he couldn’t quite process what I just said because it was so damn obvious. That’s why. And then, so then I said so, but that’s the implication, isn’t it? And he said, yes, it is. That’s what I’m telling you. And you see, and you see, so they’re making billions of dollars selling a counterfeit. And what I tell nonprofits is you have the real thing because people want to be involved in something that’s bigger than themselves. They want to feel they’re part of something bigger than themselves. And if you can provide that they will be with you over and over and over again. You try to browbeat them with with moral ISMs or statistics or other things. You know, people just kind of tune you out. They may give you a hush and go away gift. Like here, take some money, go away. But you’re not gonna get the kind of transformational engagement that you can, if you really understand that you want to tap into that person’s desire to do something bigger than what they can do.

[00:11:11.01] spk_0:
Let’s see what are some ways that, that we can, we can do this. How can we, I guess I guess I’m asking you in our, in our marketing, which may just be conversations, I don’t, I don’t mean necessarily in our print marketing or digital. But in our conversations even, you know, how can we rise to this principle of fulfilling dreams and aspirations for donors?

[00:12:17.47] spk_1:
Well, the first thing is you have to figure out what the dreams are. You have to know what they are. And that takes some time. Um, it takes some effort. It’s not impossible. And you know, I worked for one of the major consulting firms for over seven years and I did a lot of campaign feasibility studies a lot, uh, could do them in my sleep. And one thing I discovered about those is even though they consisted of anywhere from 40 to 50 individual interviews, um, if the initial interviews were chosen correctly, if we could get the right balance in the first half dozen or even maybe nine, um, I knew how it was gonna turn out in the end. I can tell you this is what’s gonna happen at the end and that comes from doing it from the experience. So, but the client of course one of the 50 interviews and that’s what the client got. All right. But I could because I remember getting a call from my boss once after the after the first three or four days. How’s it going larry? I said, well, it’s going to be X, Y. Z. Okay, fine. And I spent the balance of the time during the interview. So a lot of it is, you know, I’m an old school guy. Be

[00:12:27.18] spk_0:
careful there. I hope you didn’t, I hope hope after those first eight or nine interviews you didn’t engage in confirmation bias and then you just you just attempted. You and your all your subsequent interviews. You, you skewed your conversations to confirm what you had already told or you already fixed in your mind even was gonna happen. You didn’t let that happen. Did you know, confirmation bias?

[00:12:43.26] spk_1:
No, I’m an engineer by training.

[00:12:47.04] spk_0:
Okay. You’re

[00:12:48.01] spk_1:
looking at the data at the end.

[00:12:49.76] spk_0:
All right.

[00:13:40.22] spk_1:
You’re you’re looking at, okay, this, this is all the answers to the questions how they all stack up, but you can get a pretty good idea of how it’s going. If you’re listening carefully, you begin to see patterns emerge. And there are there is the odd ball one that you, at the end, you get a few interviews that that throw everything out of whack that happens. But typically you don’t have my point in saying that is you don’t have to, you don’t have to go out and interview 300 people. You really don’t have to do that. Um, you know, you interview a good segment of your population and the key is to be listening uh, and ask open ended questions. And if you guarantee them anonymity and confidentiality, they’ll tell you anything, you want to know, people really want to do that. So that’s that’s an old school guy. And so that’s what I would do uh to get some ideas as to what are the messages And there aren’t, they don’t have to be that many, maybe three or

[00:13:42.97] spk_0:
four that

[00:13:59.89] spk_1:
resonate with the people who support us because I know we’re not talking about principle for, but principle four is learning plan learn who would naturally support you because not everybody will okay, learn who that is, who big picture and, and then then make plans on how to reach out to those people because they’ll be reachable different ways. So you go back to donors. Other drivers, figure out what those touch points are, you know what and there and they’ll be there and they may be a little bit different than what your mission is, but it doesn’t mean it’s, uh, it’s contradictory, it’s just, it’s just a collaborative or a line.

[00:14:36.07] spk_0:
Okay, let’s move to, uh, principle number three. Of the eight principles of sustainable fundraising leadership leads, leading by example, Talk about this one. Why is this so critical? What are, what are leaders not doing that? They ought to be doing?

[00:14:42.99] spk_1:
Well, let me go back and say one thing about, is the drivers that I’m going to go into this.

[00:14:47.90] spk_0:
Alright, alright.

[00:15:30.90] spk_1:
There are levels of donors are the drivers, remember if donors are driving the car, they’re in the driver’s seat, they got their hands on the steering wheel. Um, if that donor is a really good match for you and you’ve done your work, you’re gonna be in the passenger seat, you’re gonna be in the navigator seat up front. Uh, if there’s sort of a match, you’ll be in the back seat, you’ll still be there, but you’re not gonna get the kind of attention that the, that the navigator would get or if you’re barely hanging on, you’re gonna be in the trunk, okay? And so you get whatever’s left over, you open the trunk after two hours and you’re still breathing okay, fine. That’s their levels of that. Not every donor is going to be that 100% sweet spot. Uh, and I’m not suggesting that you limit yourself to that. But if you’re focused on that, you’re gonna pick up everyone that would remotely be in that, that, that universe.

[00:17:12.88] spk_0:
It’s time for a break. Turn to communications, like so many other things in life. Getting in the media depends on relationships. You’ve got to be known by folks who work in the media to be heard by folks who work in the media to get their attention. It’s so much easier when you know somebody, it’s so much easier when you want to be heard when you have an existing relationship before you’re out for the ask, right? You draw the fundraising analogy first meeting. Do you ask somebody for a gift, highly unlikely you build up a relationship, you get to that point. Media is the same way. You have much, much better odds if you have an existing relationship when you make your ask based on the news hook or something happening at your organization that, that is no, is newsworthy? Whatever it is, it’s the existing relationship turn to knows how to set those up for you, how to build them and grow them. So you get heard at the time you make the ask turn to communications, your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot C o. Now back to sustainable fundraising.

[00:17:17.97] spk_1:
Leadership. Leadership

[00:17:19.68] spk_0:
leads. Yes. What, what, what, what can we be doing better here?

[00:18:57.77] spk_1:
Well, let’s look at what that means. Leading by example, you look at any organization, whether it’s a commercial enterprise, whether it’s a civic association, whether it’s a political party, whether it’s a nonprofit social, whatever it is. Um, leaders are expected to assume certain responsibilities. I mean, they’re obviously the fiduciary ones, uh, and the other issues that are related to that, but it’s, they set the pace for the example. What’s the quality of the leadership by these people morally upstanding? Do they represent the essence of the organization? Um, you know, are they representative of those who are investors to the organization? That’s a big key. Uh, and I’ll give you an example about that. Um, I was working with a social service organization that covered about 45 counties and they were concerned, they weren’t getting any support out of this one county. And I said, well, who on your boards from that county. Well, no one I said, well, there’s your problem right there. You’re not tapped into the networks there. So they corrected that. Um, but then the other key is they only have in a nonprofit setting leaders, I. E. The governing board and certainly their their employee, the executive. And I think that needs to be stressed is that the executive is an employee of the board. Sometimes you get these weird sort of relationships and how they relate to one another. Um, but the key there is that they only have three things they should be focused on. Number one setting policy for the organization, number two advocating for it. Hey, if they’re not, if they’re not a fan, why are they on the board? And three, they should be there charged with making sure they’re sufficient resources with the delivery of the mission and in a non profit that almost always includes some philanthropy or some fundraising. I mean, there are other sources of revenue,

[00:19:17.15] spk_0:
but fundraising

[00:20:57.82] spk_1:
is a part of it. So wherever the leaders lead you, that’s where your people on the outside are gonna take their cues. So if for instance, I’m a big believer and I make no bones about this. Is that every board member and I’ve been a nonprofit board member needs to be financially committed. And now, what does that mean? Well, some people use it to say there’s a board minimum or we have this or that or whatever. You know, I really don’t, I don’t really like those because I prefer something I call equal sacrifice, not equal amount because everyone around that table is gonna, their pockets are gonna have different depths to them. And you know, for someone, $1000 could be quite a sacrifice. And for someone else, hey, they’ll spend that at Sun Valley down the road for me and one weekend easy. So it just depends on who you are and and where you come from. And because I’m a big believer in that board should be representative of the constituencies they they support or that they reach out to. So, so but they all have to be and that includes person that should be personal funds, not corporate funds. I think, you know, people use people, you know, people who are corporate appointees. Um they not, they may not be useless, but they tend to be very weak board members because they’re told by their boss to go and be a part of that. They want to have a representation. Um, it’s not really that effective. Neither is the board member who’s on 12 other boards and you’re getting them simply because they have a recognizable name names don’t bring in support. They really don’t. But but leadership leader, they will lead you irregardless of whether they’re leading you in the right place at the wrong place. They will lead others, they will get that message, but here’s another piece of it is people before

[00:21:07.03] spk_0:
you move onto the next piece. The equal sacrifice. I like that. Uh equal sacrifice instead of equal amount. Sounds sounds like the stretch gift. You know, everyone should be stretching to to what is a stretch for them.

[00:21:20.64] spk_1:
Yeah, it should be uh,

[00:21:24.66] spk_0:
I think

[00:22:36.94] spk_1:
stretch but doable and then the way you achieve that and what I, what I counsel clients to do is something called peer solicitation and that’s not what it’s known in the current and the current. That’s not the current version of that. Pierre solicitation is where boards, there’s a small group of the boards that that takes and evaluates people in terms of their bill And then people are asked face to face for a specific amount for their annual gift at the beginning of the fiscal year. Uh they can pay it in cash, they can make a pledge, they can make payments whatever they want to do, but it’s got to be satisfied by the end of the fiscal year. And then you take all those, all those, all those evaluation amounts, you add them up, take about 20 or 30% discount on that total. And that’s your, that’s your group goal because you want the board to feel as though they’ve accomplished something. I don’t like goals that are so high that it’s almost impossible to reach goals should be floors, not ceilings because the idea is to create that momentum. And if you do it up front and you can say, hey, you know, our, our goal for our board this year was $65,000 and we raised 72 5. Great, Wonderful. That’s terrific. Think about how that plays in the public square. Think about what that says to the people who are on that board and and all their friends and people they know, wow, Hey, you know, they must really believe in that, that that organization is going places. Let me let me learn more about it.

[00:22:48.96] spk_0:
And alright, well, and you achieve that by taking the, the what you expect the aggregate to be for the year and you’re discounting it.

[00:23:04.21] spk_1:
Yeah, yeah. But, but it’s reasonable. It’s something that’s based on what, you know, the individual. All

[00:23:04.48] spk_0:
right, what else about leadership leading?

[00:25:02.28] spk_1:
Well, another thing is, you know, I said, fundraising is a big part of it and people, they always start groaning well, you know, um, You know, I’m not good at asking for money. That’s just not for me, I don’t feel awkward, I feel awkward. Well, what I tell people is board involvement in fundraising only about 5% of its actually asking. Alright, that’s the very minor part of it, a big, big part of it is the board to be able to number one properly resource a fundraising program knowing it costs money to raise money. And then also when they, when the reports are made and when the analysis is done for the board to be sophisticated enough to ask the right questions of the fundraiser and the executive, you know, you know, one of the, you know, the number that usually, or often let’s put it that way comes up, you know, at a board meeting is, well, what did you raise in the last quarter or six months or whatever it was? That is a totally meaningless number from a fundraising perspective, that’s an accounting number. That’s a cash number. That’s the result of your fundraising. That doesn’t predict anything. Even the brokers say past performance is not an indicator of future performance. They get that in real fast. So, but there are other variables that are identifiable in a program that will, if the board is aware of these and presented and educated, they’ll be able to evaluate, they’ll be able to see, okay, you know, our retention rates really low. We need to work on that our average giving rate is stagnant. You know, we’re here here here and you see board members are not stupid people, You know, they can assess this, but they’re not given this opportunity. I think there was a study, Oh, it’s been several years ago now where I, I shocked that 75% of the board members they surveyed wanted some sort of formal understanding of fundraising or training and only about 20% were ever offered anything like that. And that’s, and so these are these people are volunteers Tony this isn’t their full time job. So it’s not their stick to go in and kind of relationship is really, really aggressive to go and figure it out on your own.

[00:26:28.74] spk_0:
It’s time for a break. Fourth dimension technologies. They have the free offer. It’s still going exclusively for nonprofit radio listeners. You know, you’ll get the complimentary 24 7 monitoring of your I. T. Assets and they’ll do it for three months, 90 days monitoring your servers, network, cloud performance, your backup performance All 24, 7 of course, if there are any issues during the period, they’re going to let you know immediately and then at the end of the three months you’re gonna get their report, telling you how you’re doing. It’s all complimentary. It’s on the listener landing page. It’s at tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant D just like three D. But they go on to mention deeper, Let’s return to sustainable fundraising. Let’s talk some more about what board members can do around fundraising besides soliciting. And I understand re sourcing you said re sourcing the development function, properly asking the right questions, focusing on the meaningful metrics, not the vanity metrics. Uh, let’s talk something about individual board member activity aside from soliciting. So, you know, making introductions, hosting small events, things like, you know what your ideas around those that individual board members can do around fundraising.

[00:28:03.88] spk_1:
Well what I tell you what I tell organizations when they’re looking to evaluate their board or improve it or whatever I say, you know, the, you know, boards are, excuse me. Boards should be organic groups, meaning they’re responsible to each other, they’re not responsible certainly to their employee. The executive and the boards that do best are the ones that are, are organic. And the way you get that is that first of all, the idea of equal giving excuses of equal participation and that kind of commitment. But another way you do that is to things you make sure that you have a variety of skills on your board. You don’t need six accountants and nine attorneys. You know, you need to spread that around a little bit and then the other pieces, if you look at the constituencies from which you expect to raise money and however you want to identify those, you should have at least one board member that represents those constituents. Each of those constituencies because they’re the person that has the network that you’re looking to to, to to build and then that that individual’s job, one of their jobs is advocacy, is making sure that their network knows who you are as an organization and the great work you’re doing, that. You’re willing to introduce your friends and relatives to this organization, you know, and if a board member isn’t willing to do that, I question their commitment. Why are you on the sport? I mean, if you don’t really feel good enough to tell your friends and relatives and business partners that this is a good thing, why you know what you’re doing that.

[00:29:47.58] spk_0:
I was on a board years ago by the way. Larry. If you need to take a sip of water, please go ahead. I’ll, uh, I’ll make my question. Uh, uh, Loquacious to give you a chance to take a, take a drink and a breath. Um, I was on a board many years ago. Uh, and one of the board members was, was kind of embarrassed to ask for money. He didn’t, he didn’t feel that the organization really merited the support of his friends he was giving personally, But I think that’s because we all have an obligation. But he, he was, he was kind of embarrassed actually. He felt that, yeah, that the organization just was not, wouldn’t be meaningful to his, his colleagues in his, this happened to be an attorney in his, in his law firm wouldn’t be meaningful to them. They wouldn’t be interested without, without ever having talked to him about it. Very, you know, very unfortunate. Um, yeah, it’s just a terrible, unfortunate, sad mindset. You know, why are you on the board? If you don’t think your friends, even your colleagues forget friends, Your professional colleagues are going to have any interest that you serve on the board. I mean, that’s your biggest hook or at least that’s your first hook. Maybe it’s not your biggest hook. That’s your first hook. I spend time with this organization. I go to their performances. I go to the meetings. I’m on the, I’m on a couple of committees. You know, that’s your, that’s your entree and then what good that the, that the community that the organization does, the education program in the elementary schools, the performances, etcetera. But he just had the vastly wrong and very unfortunate mindset.

[00:30:12.95] spk_1:
Well, you see that mindset goes beyond board members and what’s happening there is the person is not comfortable. And so they’ve feel authorized to take the agency away from the other person. They’re making the decision for

[00:30:18.50] spk_0:
them. That’s

[00:30:19.63] spk_1:
what they’re doing. And, and I, it’s like when, you know, you’re doing an awareness meeting or an event

[00:30:24.78] spk_0:
well, and they’re also, they’re also just making everything easier on themselves.

[00:30:28.84] spk_1:
Of course they,

[00:30:29.81] spk_0:
well, my, my, my, my fellow, uh, partners aren’t gonna be interested. So I’m not going to approach them.

[00:31:23.95] spk_1:
So, but it’s the whole idea of awkwardness and you, but they don’t realize they’re taking agency away from these people. They’re not giving them the opportunity to make the decision on. That’s really what they’re doing. Now. There is the flip of this. I’ll tell you a story. Um, I was working with a client up and catch them, which is Sun Valley. I live out in Idaho and Sun Valley is a very wealthy community. It’s not very big, but there’s a lot of, a lot of money there And we were doing an annual fund where this one individual had made a cash gift to $250,000. And so he was assigned to do another to go and solicit one of his board members and this man’s name. Others call him John offered the guy that the other board member will, will you take 50? And where upon the board members said, Bill, don’t embarrass yourself with that. I want the 2 50 that I put put in. I mean, there’s, I mean, I wouldn’t necessarily advise that, but he obviously knew the man well,

[00:31:42.07] spk_0:
right. Talking about peer to peer. Yeah, if you can, if you can get friends, I was gonna say putting pressure on, let’s just say soliciting, uh, if you can get friends like that soliciting each other, Nobody’s gonna walk away disappointed.

[00:31:52.60] spk_1:
No, No. I just love what he said was, don’t embarrass? You

[00:31:58.61] spk_0:
Don’t embarrass yourself 50,000. Yeah, Yeah. That’s, that’s a, that’s a great lesson in peer to peer board board soliciting keep the keep the professionals away and let’s just get the 22 good friends having lunch together. One of them has an agenda to talk to the other about his or her board. Giving all right,

[00:32:17.59] spk_1:
Anything

[00:32:18.22] spk_0:
else you want? I I got admonished on because donors of the drivers, I left that too early. So anything else you want to share on leadership leads before, before we move ahead.

[00:32:33.32] spk_1:
Um, I don’t think so. I just say that, oh, when you in, when you insist, when, when you insist on equal sacrifice, here’s what happens. You get a group of people, of individuals that become accountable to each other.

[00:32:46.92] spk_0:
There’s

[00:32:57.13] spk_1:
the key and they begin to function as a group, not as a collection of individuals. And that’s where the trail, that’s where two plus two equals five, you see is because that synergy of a group functioning as a group, not as a group of it, not as a collection of individuals. And that doesn’t happen very often. But when it does, it really really energizes an organization. You see it make great strides very quickly,

[00:33:20.21] spk_0:
shared sacrifice. If we’re all sacrificing equally. And I don’t mean dollar wise, I mean, I mean, capacity wise, we’re all sacrificing for the good of this organization. Yeah. That’s going to create a cohesion.

[00:33:27.51] spk_1:
That’s what you that’s what you’re looking for. Is that kind of, you know, we’re all in this together. Um and we’re gonna make it we’re gonna make it successful

[00:33:36.03] spk_0:
partnership in sacrifice.

[00:33:38.32] spk_1:
That’s right. That’s exactly what it is. And as I said, it becomes an organic group. It’s not it’s no longer just a collection of individuals.

[00:33:55.30] spk_0:
Good enough. Okay, Let’s talk about principle number six, divide and grow. What’s this? What’s this about?

[00:35:20.41] spk_1:
Well, a divide and grow. Um The shorthand version of that is treat different donors differently. Alright. So that um what you’re essentially doing here is you realize that your donors are not all the same, they’re not all the same age that they don’t have the same situation in life or as the Germans would say, where they are in their lifespan, um, their interests, all of the, they’re all different to some degree. They come from different backgrounds, different places. So that the organization that can allow for these, and that creates a pathway for donors to come closer to you emotionally over time and see, I’m a big believer in really focusing on high retention rates, not cache entry rates. Those organizations are the ones who achieve this transformative giving over time. Uh, and that’s so that when you divide your constituency into these air into these levels of, you know, you know, ages and, and where they are in life and income level and all these kinds of things that, that define, you know, what the person is going to be like when they come to you and you treat them that way. And, and you, you can, of course with today’s technology, even the very smallest organization can do this kind of thing. Uh, it doesn’t, you know, in the old days, you know, three or three or five cards and an army of researchers and, and people making phone calls and you can still do that. But the point is, you don’t have to, but you know, I’ve known this for a long time. But then there was research published about five years ago, I think it was Russell James, I’m sure, you know, russell

[00:35:33.09] spk_0:
Russell Professor Russell James texas Tech University.

[00:36:46.40] spk_1:
Yeah, So and what they discovered was when donors are given a pathway that brings them closer emotionally. And I stress that word, the emotional connection with the organization over time To the point where they make a gift out of an asset, not income. And it doesn’t have to be a large one can be maybe a couple $1000. I mean really it doesn’t have to be huge when that happens. And you can get a core group of people, maybe only 10 or 15% of your donor base that has done that the entire fundraising program in terms of income, just skyrockets. And the reason why is you have a core group of people that are so emotionally committed to you. They come hell or high water they’re gonna, they’re gonna be there for you no matter what happens, you see, and that’s what you’re looking for. Is that core group of people that are so emotionally committed to you and they may not be your top givers financially, but they will drive everything else. That’s the key. Um, and that’s why although I’ve done most of my work in capital fundraising and major gift fundraising in all the conventional terms, I I even sort of steer away from the term major giving anymore because that’s an internal term. It’s reflected on ability. Um, and I really, really focus on emotional commitment because I think the rest will come. And of course in your area, the deferred giving area, that’s those are asset gifts, you know, usually by definition.

[00:37:01.29] spk_0:
Yeah, right. You were talking about giving from assets, but

[00:37:16.11] spk_1:
I mean, I had a fun gift be satisfied by the liquidation of a small, a small money market. 10 grand. Okay. I mean, yeah,

[00:37:51.83] spk_0:
sure. That can happen. Um, yeah, the ultimate, you know, the for a lot of folks that their ultimate gift has to come in their estate plan because either they can’t or they believe that they can’t make their ultimate gift while they’re still living. So they put it in their estate plan and there there’s there’s a plan to get in a nutshell. Alright, So, yeah, so, all right. So you want us to, you know, dividing and growing, you want these, you talk about mutual, mutually beneficial relationships.

[00:39:22.17] spk_1:
Yes, these are, these are not one way relationship. These are mutually beneficial relationships. Um, you know, you know, I have something called the, if you read my book or my other stuff, I have something called a donor pipeline pipeline signs kind of commercial and kind of cold, but what it really is, it shows how donors come to you and they come to you through three or four different sources and then over time, how you get to know them and move them closer to you and then you can attach certain kinds of fundraising methods and relationships and things that they do over time and then a capital campaign, which is a very specific, relatively short term way to raise a lot of money for a specific so set of, of things or ideas then what that, how that serves in all this is to kind of goose what I’ll call goose the whole system because it raises everybody’s awareness of what’s going on. And then, you know, for those who understand that the real or that I would think the more significant payoff Quote of of a capital campaign is not the money raised in the immediate, uh, for the immediate, in case it’s how you’ve positioned your, your donor base to continue to give at higher levels over what, 10 or 15 years. And universities, they figured this out 30, 40 years ago when they invented what they called the continual campaign, the continuous campaign. And so, you know, before that, you know, you and I probably have to remember that these universities would hire, you know, couple score of, you know, field officers and run the campaign then fire everybody. And five years later they do the whole thing all over again. That’s a very inefficient way of raising money. And so they realized, oh, we can do this differently. And so that’s, you know, but you can do it even as a small organization.

[00:39:45.82] spk_0:
Yeah. Keep those relationships going rather than trying to renew them every five or seven years on your on your campaign cycle. Yeah. That seems antiquated. Alright.

[00:40:00.38] spk_1:
Yes,

[00:41:36.64] spk_0:
it was, Yeah. My early days. It’s time for Tony’s take two. Make it about your mission. Your work. That’s what you have in common with your supporters. Whether we’re talking about volunteers, donors, other types of supporters, they love your work. You do the work. The mission is what you have in common. So you know, as we’re approaching rapidly, the all important fourth quarter, keep the mission in mind as you’re crafting messages, whatever digital print the mission is what moves your supporters. That’s what they love about you. That’s what they give their money, their time to make it about your mission. It’s special to them. Sort of keep it special in your mind. Don’t let it become routine and mundane and, and un interesting to you or you think what’s interesting to you is not going to be interesting to other folks. Not so not so they love your mission. Your mission is what you have in common with those who are loving you who are supporting you. Make it about the mission. That is Tony’s take two. We’ve got boo koo, but loads more time for sustainable fundraising with larry johnson instead of doing just three of the 8, 3/8. Let’s, let’s talk about four of them. We have, we have a little more time left and then we’ll just tease, you know, all eight of them. But I would like to talk and you’ve, you’ve talked around this one and you’ve alluded to it. Number seven renew and refresh. You know, keeping a high renewal rate, high retention rate. Let’s, let’s just flush that one out as, as our, as our fourth one renew and refresh.

[00:43:27.63] spk_1:
Well, it’s, it’s said, it’s said in that order on purpose, your first goal is to renew the investors you currently have, that’s your first priority. And your second priority is to refresh your base because people die. People change their interest. People go into a different stage of life. I mean will go into bankruptcies or they lose their all sorts of reasons why people will stop giving to you and many, most of them legitimate reasons. You know, you haven’t necessarily quote pissed them off or anything. So that, so that renewing should be your number one priority with your donor pool. Unfortunately it’s not for most people. I can’t believe, I can’t tell you the number of development officers I’ve heard tell me, well, I’d like to renew more, but my executive just wants to get more new donors into the fold. And that just seems to be the, I mean, I’m like, I don’t understand where that comes from quite frankly. I mean, but I mean who am I to say? But anyway, renewing first And the, and there’s, you know, and renewing donors is actually easier now than it was when I was just in this business. And yet it seems that there’s more turning going on than it was when I was first in this business, I think there are a couple of things that are driving that first of demographics we’re dealing with, we’re dealing with younger generations in the boomers whose patience and attention levels, attention spans are quite a bit shorter and their reasons for giving are different. They’re much more impact driven than those in our age range.

[00:43:33.34] spk_0:
This is interesting. Larry, let me, let me let me stop here. Do we know that retention rates, which are, which are quite low, uh, around 20,

[00:43:43.98] spk_1:
pathetic

[00:43:45.38] spk_0:
Part. Yeah. Our retention rates lower than they were 20 years ago.

[00:43:56.38] spk_1:
I think they are. I mean, I would have to check the numbers, but in terms of my experience, excuse me, there seems to be less churn, have

[00:43:59.62] spk_0:
a drink, have a drink while I uh, say that Larry’s having a little sip of water from his yellow yellow water bottle. Very pretty.

[00:44:47.75] spk_1:
Uh, there’s, there’s, there seems to be more turn that may simply because there’s more younger donors. I mean, people send, there’s sort of this false calculus out there that millennials aren’t philanthropic. Well, they are, they’re a very high percent of them give, but they give it a different way than baby boomers do like you and I, but yes, the renewal rate is pathetic. And what I, the, the, the analogy I use is that, you know, I think the, I think, I think it’s like the the first year renewal rates always hovered in the high thirties 30% somewhere in there, the ones I’ve seen. But if you look at the consumer products, Uh, renewal rates, they’re 95 and 96%. So what I say to people is people are more loyal to their toothpaste and they are their charity. This

[00:44:57.24] spk_0:
is a very good example actually.

[00:45:06.18] spk_1:
Mean P and G. Has that figured out tony They got it figured out. So why is it if they can figure it out for something as mundane as toothpaste. Alright. Uh, why is it that nonprofits can’t employ there again? They’re selling the real thing. They’re not selling a pony thing. It’s real. It’s hard. You know, why is it? They can’t get there. Well, because they’re not investing the time and effort to make it happen. It’s just not on their radar screen. Um, that’s, that’s what I’ve seen. And maybe

[00:45:27.48] spk_0:
your advice around increasing retention.

[00:45:49.66] spk_1:
Well, it has to be an organizational mandate number one. We are going to set these goals and they’re gonna go up. I mean, there has to be the board executive. Okay, This is gonna happen. All right. We’re not happy with this. Okay. Number one, we’ve got to make a change and then you go back and you just deconstruct every single piece of what you’re doing and you look at, okay, Is this adding to or or or or taking away from the ability to renew

[00:45:55.38] spk_0:
looking at the donor journey?

[00:45:57.40] spk_1:
Yes, yeah, just

[00:46:10.66] spk_0:
listeners, we recently had um uh, I guess talking about the, the welcome journey, your email welcome journey just within the past month or six weeks or so, So you know, that’s welcoming brand new donors, you do that over the first week to 10 days, so that’s part of what you’re talking about. That’s

[00:46:19.99] spk_1:
just absolutely, that’s

[00:46:21.07] spk_0:
the initial phase of what you’re talking about, that. But the whole journey, let

[00:46:24.43] spk_1:
me give an example of the initial phase why it’s so very important. Um you maybe you’re, I know, I know you’re old enough, I don’t remember a woman with the name of Pearl Mesta.

[00:46:33.82] spk_0:
No

[00:46:35.29] spk_1:
esto was the heiress to the Mesta Machine fortune in Pittsburgh, and they’re the ones that produced a lot of the heavy artillery and guns during World War two.

[00:46:43.25] spk_0:
I went to school at Carnegie Mellon. Uh

[00:46:45.69] spk_1:
there you go. I

[00:46:46.82] spk_0:
knew, so I know. Andrew Carnegie Did you ever

[00:46:50.17] spk_1:
machine in Homestead? It’s still there.

[00:46:52.45] spk_0:
Okay, I know Homestead Homestead works used to be, it was a big Steeltown Homestead. Okay. Mr Works. Alright.

[00:47:33.73] spk_1:
So anyway, Pearl Mesta uh in the 90 the sixties, uh, you know, was the grand dame of Washington social life. Okay. Everybody wanted to be invited to one of Pearl’s parties. Okay, whether you’re Republican democrat, it didn’t, it was the place to be boy and if you don’t wanna pearls list, you’re at the top and everyone came and it was a very congenial group? Well at one point someone asked her pearl, you know, what is it that makes your party? So everyone just can’t wait to get there. And here’s what she said. It’s all about the hellos and the goodbyes.

[00:47:38.65] spk_0:
Mm think

[00:47:43.30] spk_1:
about that. You know how

[00:47:43.71] spk_0:
welcome you feel, coming, coming and going

[00:48:00.93] spk_1:
right, right. And and she saw that as her job when someone crossed her threshold who may not know more than two people in the whole room, okay to make them feel at home and welcome. And that takes

[00:48:02.66] spk_0:
purpose

[00:48:03.63] spk_1:
to welcome them. Call them by name and you know, take care of their coats or whatever it is that you need to do and then introduce them to someone

[00:48:11.00] spk_0:
introduced right and

[00:48:28.66] spk_1:
get them started and break the ice for them. That’s what she did. And then when it was time for someone to leave, she didn’t let them sneak out the front door, the side door. Oh, tony thank you so much for coming. I can’t wait till I can have you here in my home again. See the difference, but that’s the hostess is as an active role then, you know, she’s not over there huddled in the corner with all of her friends,

[00:48:37.18] spk_0:
you

[00:48:37.35] spk_1:
know, and and there’s the difference and I’ve seen this in awareness meetings when I was in universities where you got the administrators all hovered over in the corner talking to themselves. you know, what the hell is this about? Get out there and talk to these other people?

[00:50:10.31] spk_0:
Yeah, I hope. Yeah, I used to see that when we had in person meetings, you know, too many, too many development folks or even it doesn’t, they don’t, it’s not even just the fundraisers, it’s, you know, too many insiders talking to each other because they’re all comfortable with it instead of talking to the donors who they don’t know or maybe just, you know, casually. No, but you know, I’m breaking the ice with those folks and making them feel welcome. Yeah, I hate to see those clusters of employees. Again, not only fundraisers, you know, anybody for any, anybody doing program work, anybody representing the organization at a public event, you shouldn’t be huddled with your fellow employees, you should be out talking to the public, telling them what you do. You it may be mundane to you, but it’s not mundane to them. They, you know, quoting from glengarry glen ross. They don’t step foot on the lot. If they don’t want to pay. If they don’t want to buy, they don’t step foot on the lot. They’re not ready to buy from the, from the alec baldwin, you know, booming iconic speech folks don’t set foot on the lot if they’re not ready to buy, they haven’t come to spend time with your organization, if they don’t want to learn about it. So whether you’re a fundraiser or you’re not, if you don’t have an outward facing job, then, you know, if you don’t want to talk to the public, then don’t come to the event. This is, this is an awareness raising. You

[00:50:15.95] spk_1:
know, just

[00:50:28.82] spk_0:
come to the employee holiday party and then you can huddle with all your fellow employees, but coming to a public event, talk to the public, get away from the folks, you know very well because you work with them and, and get out talking to folks you don’t know, tell them about what you do

[00:50:33.01] spk_1:
when I Years ago.

[00:50:35.31] spk_0:
That was a bit of a,

[00:50:36.67] spk_1:
it was not

[00:50:37.38] spk_0:
sure. I’m sorry. But

[00:50:38.83] spk_1:
you shouldn’t be

[00:50:40.50] spk_0:
years

[00:50:41.34] spk_1:
ago when I was running the major,

[00:50:44.06] spk_0:
when

[00:51:09.56] spk_1:
I was running the good major program at Suny Buffalo. I was very, we were very much mindful of, you know, and this is politically incorrect today. But we were in the Chiefs and indians A’s okay. How many, how many people do we have? We gotta make sure we balance this thing out and, and I, and I made I made it very clear to, to fundraising staff that were there. You know, here’s your assignment. You are not here to suck up free food and booze. Thank you very much. That’s not your role here. In fact, if you get anything to eat or drink at all. That’s, that’s lucky on your part. Okay. That’s not what your

[00:51:15.30] spk_0:
extreme. I like to feed food, I like to see that folks are said and, and uh, you know, plus you can meet people over the buffet table. Oh

[00:51:24.62] spk_1:
yeah, I mean I, I said that, I mean I expect people to enjoy themselves. Uh and I, and I think it’s important that,

[00:51:30.78] spk_0:
but, but there’s a reason that you’re there.

[00:51:32.71] spk_1:
Yeah, you’re not there just to suck up free food. I

[00:51:35.88] spk_0:
used to go to these events with the name, list of pack,

[00:51:38.85] spk_1:
list

[00:51:39.22] spk_0:
of pockets. I’m getting too excited. I used to go to these events like this with a list of names in my pocket, on a piece of paper folded in half. So it would fit in my breast jacket pocket. And these are the folks that I want to talk to who said they’re coming and from time to time I would excuse myself, go in the hall, look at the

[00:51:57.37] spk_1:
list,

[00:52:18.29] spk_0:
check with the front, the registration desk to make sure that these, you know, I can’t find somebody. Did they come or that they didn’t come so I can’t talk to them. But I would check the list, go and talk to folks you should be going with and, and for some of these folks, you know, there were, there were reasons I wanted to talk to them. Some of them, it was just a refresh and renew. But some, you know, I had a specific agenda item to talk to them about. You know, these these events are not, you know, to your point, you’re lucky if you eat and drink, they’re not social, these are work events.

[00:52:29.27] spk_1:
That’s right. You’re not

[00:52:30.01] spk_0:
gonna be, you’re gonna be working in advancing relationships.

[00:52:32.61] spk_1:
You’re not, you’re not just schmoozing, You’re working.

[00:52:36.47] spk_0:
Uh,

[00:52:53.03] spk_1:
this is purposeful. Um, well, and I used to, and I used to have the officers that attended, I used to have them submit the names to me of all the people they have meaningful conversations with. You know, how did we cover the floor? You know, it was left out. Um, that was key cause this, this was a very, of course, if it’s a sit down event, it’s all about strategic seating. Of

[00:52:58.37] spk_0:
course, yes, Yes. Don’t put the employees together. Put the right donors with the right potential donors. Put the right staff with the right donors. Yes. Be very intentional. Very purposeful

[00:53:10.75] spk_1:
or donors who have personal differences. You don’t see them together.

[00:53:16.96] spk_0:
Yes. Um, if it’s not a sit down event or if it’s the cocktail hour, you see somebody standing alone or sitting alone, over in a chair or a sofa, go up and introduce yourself.

[00:53:25.67] spk_1:
Don’t

[00:53:34.44] spk_0:
let people sit by themselves alone and stand alone in the cocktail hour. You know, they’re looking for somebody to come up to them, do it again. If you don’t want to do that kind of work, then just go to the employer employee holiday party.

[00:53:40.85] spk_1:
You

[00:53:41.90] spk_0:
know, you might not have an outward facing job. but if you’re going to an outward facing event representing the organization, then you need to be outward facing and not huddled with your fellow employees.

[00:53:51.68] spk_1:
So

[00:53:52.67] spk_0:
going back

[00:54:24.09] spk_1:
to the premise here of renew, that should be the number one driver in terms of the donor pool focus on renewal and building that relationship over time. Uh, it’s, you know, you know, in terms of, you know, I’m an engineer, I’m a business guy, you know, I’m interested in return on investment. How much does it cost? You know, and it is a cost. It’s much less expensive in dollars and cents to maintain a relationship to get a very large gift than it is to constantly be trying to bring new people into the fold as you know, No,

[00:54:25.71] spk_0:
that’s donor acquisition costs a lot more than donor.

[00:54:28.83] spk_1:
Yeah, it’s so much more expensive

[00:54:32.09] spk_0:
multiples.

[00:55:10.77] spk_1:
And so then from a financial point of view, it’s makes sense. Everything, It just makes sense. But you, but you’re really working on this relationship over time and then you do have an acquisition program that, that drops people in at various levels when they come in, but that’s where the focus should be every and so people aren’t doing that. As I said, the first step is to go back and deconstruct the entire program and begin to rebuild it with renewal as the number one focus. And then, and of course that’s gonna really, um, give some executives heartburn because they’re so dependent on these small first time gifts to make, to make a budget, you know, which is, you know, that’s an exercise in futility. But it happens all the time because that will absolutely give them heartburn. But what’s gonna happen here? What’s gonna happen there? But

[00:55:20.51] spk_0:
over time you’ll have a more sustainable fundraising revenue when you retain your donors and grow them

[00:55:27.41] spk_1:
well, not only sustainable, but a lot more money. Pure and simple. And I would go so far as to suggest that you could probably do this in a way that it wouldn’t even affect your current income levels. I think you get enough replacement from your acquisition in your renewal’s

[00:56:22.00] spk_0:
maybe maybe. But even if you don’t, it’s still worth, it’s still worth investing in the long term retention or renewal and growth of your existing donors. All right. That was # seven renew and refresh. Alright, so Larry, give us the rundown. Uh, are you able to recite them? Okay. Okay. Okay. So we’re gonna go through the eight. We, we touched on 4/8. So we did half the other half are at the eight principles dot com. Larry, please just run down your, your eight principles of sustainable fundraising.

[01:00:11.58] spk_1:
The a principles are principal one donors are the drivers donors dr philanthropy, but they drive it with their dreams, not their money principle. To begin at the beginning, you need to be able to know your mission and be able to communicate it in a way and in language and in areas and places where your prospective investors will receive it and understand it. Clearly three leadership leads, Your leadership leads, sets the tone for everything else and they will lead. Everybody else will follow their lead, whatever whether that’s good or bad principle for learning plan. You need to first learn who would naturally support you because not everyone will even philanthropic people, Not everyone will and then construct a plan or a program. And how do you reach those people? Where are they? What do they read? What do they do? Who are their friends? All this sort of thing. Principle five. Work from the inside out. Begin with those people closest to you, both in terms of, of affinity and to your mission but also closeness to your organization. That’s why I’m a big believer in doing board campaigns, annual campaigns and doing employee campaigns because it’s you begin and you move out in concentric circles, it’s like building that network. Principle six divide and grow simply treat different donors differently And you’re constructing a pathway that over time will bring your donors closer to you emotionally. Principles seven renew and refresh. Your first focus should be to renew your current investors, the other people who have already voted with their money. You know, they’ve already told you, hey, we support you and oftentimes they’re ignored or simply given you know, whatever. Quick, quick Thank you and then Principal eight integrate, evaluate, integrate, invest, integrate and evaluate. I get that. Right. Okay. So you, you tricked me up. Okay. First of all you have to invest in your program. It costs money to raise money. But this is the role of the board to understand what these general guidelines are in terms of what it takes to raise money over what length of time, you know, how much of investment do we have to make for it begin to pay off over time? Um, integrate. Now this can be, this can be a problem with small organizations or large organizations. And integration is simply understanding that you need to make sure that you, as you communicate as you solicit as you focus on your donor constituency. It needs to come across as a uniform message to the receiver. And what I mean by that is in the case of a big university. You, we have all these different appeals and their college and their this and plan giving and major giving and all this sort of thing. And you know, if, if those things aren’t coordinated the effect on the donor, it, it’s like they’re coming at them. They don’t know, you know, and we’ve all had the horror stories of that sort of thing. Um, you know, one in particular was, I was running again this back at Sunni and a major gift officer called me up. They were in California and they said, I just had a very interesting experience. And I said, what’s that? He said when I was in there visiting the couple, the doorbell rang and it was a plan giving officer. Well in the university’s wisdom, you know, our two organizations were silo where you see the result that God and so and then on the other end of the spectrum, another kind of offender of this kind of thing are the independent schools where they are soliciting parents left and right for every little ding dong thing on the face of the earth and people get worn out with that really quickly. And so you know, when I worked with independent schools, I say, hey, we need to budget as much as this is possible and have a uniform appeal to these donors and organizations schools that have done that the donor satisfaction goes up and they raise a lot more money. Okay,

[01:00:26.41] spk_0:
that’s integrate. So invest, integrate and evaluate,

[01:00:38.64] spk_1:
evaluate. You know, how many times have I heard? What we’ve always done it that way. What do you mean? You’ve always done it that way. That’s prescription for death in most places. And so every year there ought to be an evaluation of the plan evaluation. How do we perform, what do we do well, what we do not do well, what do we need to change? What do we need to tweet? What

[01:00:48.80] spk_0:
are the important, what are the real meaningful metrics?

[01:00:55.09] spk_1:
That’s right. And then how do we make those better larry

[01:00:55.64] spk_0:
johnson. The Eight Principles, You find the principles at the Eight Principles dot com. His book is the Eight principles of sustainable fundraising. You’ll find larry on linkedin Larry, thank you very, very much for sharing.

[01:01:08.53] spk_1:
Oh, it’s my pleasure, tony This was a lot of fun,

[01:02:18.43] spk_0:
I’m glad. Thank you. Thank you very much for being with me. Next week planned giving with eastern donors. I learned a lot in this one. If you missed any part of this week’s show, I beseech you find it at tony-martignetti dot com were sponsored by Turn to communications. Pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turned life into dot C. O. And by fourth dimension technologies i Tion for in a box, they’re affordable tech solution for nonprofits at tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant for d just like three D But as you know, they go one dimension deeper and they’ve got the free offer. Our creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff. The shows, social media is by Susan Chavez. Marc Silverman is our web guy. And this music is by scott Stein, thank you for that. Affirmation Scottie with me next week for nonprofit radio big non profit ideas for the other 95% go out and be great

Nonprofit Radio for October 11, 2021: Next Year’s Plan For Your Year-End Donors

My Guest:

Poonam Prasad: Next Year’s Plan For Your Year-End Donors

We’re in the 4th quarter and you’re expecting a lot of fundraising revenue. You want those donors with you next year and beyond. Poonam Prasad has the strategies to make that happen. She’s president of Prasad Consulting & Research.

 

 

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Board relations. Fundraising. Volunteer management. Prospect research. Legal compliance. Accounting. Finance. Investments. Donor relations. Public relations. Marketing. Technology. Social media.

Every nonprofit struggles with these issues. Big nonprofits hire experts. The other 95% listen to Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio. Trusted experts and leading thinkers join me each week to tackle the tough issues. If you have big dreams but a small budget, you have a home at Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio.
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[00:00:10.84] spk_4:
Hello and welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio

[00:01:41.44] spk_1:
Big non profit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host of your favorite abdominal podcast and oh, I’m glad you’re with me. I’d suffer the embarrassment of Ruba malaria if you made me hot with the idea that you missed this week’s show next year’s plan for your year end donors. We’re in the fourth quarter and you’re expecting a lot of fundraising revenue. You want those donors with you next year and beyond. non Prasad has the strategies to make that happen. She’s president of Prasad consulting and research on tony state too planned giving accelerator. We’re sponsored by turn to communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot C. O. It’s a pleasure to welcome to the show for the first time Hunan Prasad. She is founder and president of Prasad consulting and research, providing board and staff training, audit, major gift capital campaign and publication services to non profits. She’s on the executive committee of the Giving institute, leading consultants to nonprofits before nonprofit work. She was an investigative reporter and worked in journalism, advertising and pr in India south Korea Hong kong the West Indies and the U. S. Her company is at Prasad consulting dot com and she’s at prasad c Welcome to the show. Prasad opponent. Prasad. Welcome to nonprofit radio

[00:01:53.44] spk_0:
Thank you Tony. It’s a pleasure to be with you.

[00:02:02.54] spk_1:
My pleasure to have you. Thank you. There’s so many so many facades. I guys called um facade instead of being um so you’re in you’re in new york city, right? You’re coming

[00:02:05.65] spk_0:
to us from new york? Yes. Coming to you from downtown Manhattan

[00:02:09.30] spk_1:
downtown. What neighborhood?

[00:02:11.54] spk_0:
Oh, east mid down. Sorry.

[00:02:13.84] spk_1:
Oh, now you moved in downtown anymore.

[00:02:16.17] spk_0:
Yes. Now we moved, we moved recently near Grand Central Station.

[00:02:20.74] spk_1:
Okay. And your Grand Central. And how about your home? Where where, where is your home?

[00:02:24.55] spk_0:
Also in midtown,

[00:02:26.08] spk_1:
midtown, midtown east. Also,

[00:02:28.39] spk_0:
midtown east. Also. Okay,

[00:03:06.04] spk_1:
East side of new york city. For your business and your home. Wonderful. So we’re talking about this year’s fourth quarter donors and how we want to treat them and work with them So that we hold on to them into 2022 and beyond. So just, you know, because we know the donor attrition is a big problem. It’s a appalling somewhere around 75% annual donor attrition rate. What do you see? You know, generally that, uh, nonprofits could do better about holding on to their year end donors

[00:06:17.64] spk_0:
actually, tony uh, the attrition rate or the leaky bucket is almost, uh, from three donors, you get down to 1.5 or from two donors, you could be down to one next year. So for all the efforts that you’re putting in to bringing these donors in. If you think about, you know, we were a research firm. So we often get people asking us, can you find me new donors? Can you find me new donors? I’m sure we can find them new donors. But the point is, once they’ve got them in, they have spent so much effort and time and money on getting them in. And then if you don’t steward them, if you don’t get to know them and you don’t work with them, then you’re going to lose them by next year. Um, and that’s the tragedy of uh, fundraising. You know, that is really very inefficient. So I suggest only just two little tips, the donors that you get in at the end of the year. There are only two things you need to do with them. one is get to know them. And then the 2nd 1 help them to get to know you. So show them that you are doing the right thing with their money. You know, the impact report reporting, telling them what you did with their money and how you could not have done it without their money. And the second thing learn about them. You know, if you were trying to become friends with someone, you went to a party and you met somebody and you said, you know, this was a really interesting person. Uh, they came to my birthday party, they gave me a present. I would like to be more friends with them. Would you not write them or thank you not? Would you not invite them to a body afterwards. Would you not say it? Let me have coffee with you. These are simple things that we do in everyday life. But then when you’re the executive director of a of a charity, a little social service charity, you said, I don’t like to do fundraising? Well, it’s not it’s human relations. These are people who gave you something they didn’t have to give you. They could have bought a boat, they could have bought a car, they could have bought a dress, they could have bought a rug for their living room. No, they gave that money to you. Shouldn’t you be grateful? Don’t we tell our Children you get a thank you gift for Aunt Mabel. You never met Aunt Mabel writer. Thank you. Not sit down here and right, right, and a thank you note, she sent you this gift. It’s simple. It’s it’s it’s not it’s not it doesn’t even have to be about fundraising. Yes. A lot of small agencies don’t have fundraisers, don’t have dedicated development people, but this is not even about development, This is about standard manners, you know, standard courtesies, things that we grew up with. But when it becomes, oh my goodness, it’s my donors. I don’t like doing this. I’m afraid to ask them for more. You know, just thank them first before you think about asking them for more, you know, and don’t wait too long to figure it out. You know, have the plan now, you’re getting the money in 40% of the money is going to come between October and November and December, that means it’s coming in now, October. You know, and in December you’re gonna get 20% of your money. So what is your plan for January? What is it that you’re gonna do?

[00:07:17.04] spk_1:
Okay, well, we’re gonna we’re gonna get there, we’re gonna get there. Hold on. Um So you made a couple of things, points that I want to amplify about it. Just being a matter of common courtesy in in a lot of respects, and it being about relationship building. All right. So, you’ve got, you know, in in in corporate marketing, there’s the idea of get a finger grab a hand. You know, someone walked into a Starbucks, they bought a coffee. Well, Starbucks doesn’t only sell coffee. They sell music, they sell food, they sell coffee accessories, they sell a tire, right? But not to mention they sell an environment. Uh, so I think there’s a lot we can learn from that. You know, get a finger grab a hand. So someone, let’s let’s take the donor that’s made their first gift, Right? Because that’s the tougher one. That’s the that’s the easiest one to lose

[00:07:20.79] spk_0:
that 1st 1st. That’s the that’s the most fragile relationship,

[00:07:56.14] spk_1:
right? So, we’re gonna start with that. I’m giving you the toughest hypothetical, right? So, all right. So we’ve got a bunch of first time donors, we had a very successful fourth quarter in donor acquisition. We brought in a good number. What however good number is defined by My listeners. That could be 12. It could be 1200. It could be 12,000. We’ve got a bunch of new first time donors. You started to allude to, you know, what’s your plan? What’s your plan for january? What’s your first recommendation for? What we’re gonna do with this, this nice rich cadre of first time donors?

[00:07:59.40] spk_0:
Well, my first recommendation is of course they didn’t within 48 hours to get a tax

[00:08:03.07] spk_1:
receipt. If it’s

[00:08:04.11] spk_0:
Over a certain amount that you need to give them a tax two

[00:08:06.41] spk_1:
$100, requires a receipt. How about your about just a simple acknowledgment letter

[00:08:20.04] spk_0:
Also, you start then you start with the next. So then depending on how much money they got They sent you, you need to figure out who they are. If it’s over $1,000, you need to send it to somebody to research somebody in your office or somebody you outsource it to. You need to figure out who this donor is and why they gave to you.

[00:08:34.84] spk_1:
Well, all right. But for some non profits that could be, if it’s over $100,.

[00:09:16.54] spk_0:
Yes. If it’s over $100, you might wait till January and take the whole batch and screen them. So we are now screening a batch for a social service agency in Connecticut and we’re screening uh $690 that gave From $20 up in the last two years now. It’s late that we’re doing it now. But you know, it’s better than nothing. So ISIS suggests that, you know, we have another client that we’re doing over the pandemic. They said they had 274 new donors who gave over $500. And we’re looking for people within that Group within that cohort who would give maybe $10,000. They actually have people, we just finished that project and they actually have people who would give them, not just $10,000, but $100,000.

[00:09:46.04] spk_1:
Okay. Okay. All right. Let’s take a step at a time. So We’re sending our acknowledgment within within 48 hours. And if the tax receipt is required, then you might incorporate that into your acknowledgement or you might send something separate. Alright. We’re saying thank you fast. Now, is there is there nothing else between, you know, suppose that’s in october or november, donor. Nothing else between that and screening them in january. Don’t we want to we want to be involved with

[00:10:41.94] spk_0:
them. Yes. Yes. So then you start then you start with the seven. Thank you. Then you start with the seven. Thank you because this person has given you a a donation and depending on their level of giving and the effort you have to put in. You start with sending them your annual report, your newsletter. Welcome email. Some some agencies have a three series of welcome emails. And so you do that. Maybe you send them a donor survey which they respond to and tell you what aspect of their uh of your program they are interested in. That will help you a lot uh to know you know, we have a social service agency. They do senior care, they do middle school education, they do uh other kinds of adoption. So now which program is that person interested in? They can tell you or you can find out given are based on when you do the screening and when you do the research, you will see what else they’re giving to. And that will give you a clue as to which part of your program they care about.

[00:11:03.94] spk_1:
All right, well, you also have a clue based on what they gave to. Yes.

[00:11:04.45] spk_0:
Yes. If if

[00:11:05.88] spk_1:
if you know a lot of people don’t designate a gift. I agree. I agree with you. But if they designate their gift to a particular program, then you know where their affinity is.

[00:11:14.69] spk_0:
Yes. And you know that in the database right away. Of course.

[00:11:33.44] spk_1:
Absolutely. Yes. It’s important to preserve what people give to. Just like. It’s important to preserve the donors survey results that you suggest? Absolutely. Okay. What what might be. What what might we be soliciting uh information about in that in that follow up donor survey? You want to get to know folks better

[00:12:47.54] spk_0:
which aspect of the program they care about how they heard of your agency. You know uh Would they ever would they attend a webinar? If if you had one would they be willing to travel and come and see your facility? Uh You know is there a particular staff person that you know they have met with or or they know about you know each each agency is different. So you would ask different questions based on what you want to know about them. Uh what would help you? So those would be for instance with this where there are three different uh we have an irish theater company. Well they would want to know which which playwright you know with their favorite if you’re a music or something you might want to know which music they care about. If you’re a medical agency might we used to send out service and say which disease do you want to know more about? So we can send you newsletters about that disease. So you know based on your interest based on your work. You ask the right questions.

[00:12:49.08] spk_1:
Okay. And you also mentioned the seven. Thank you.

[00:12:52.23] spk_0:
Yes

[00:12:53.93] spk_1:
I say a little more about your seven. Thank

[00:15:37.44] spk_0:
you. This is this is my mantra that I have been teaching. You know I’ve been teaching at N. Y. U. And also at Columbia and I teach workshops all the time. And this is one of my mantra that I teach. And now my students have started deciding it back to me. So and it seems like oh my God you’re going to say thank you thank you thank you. It’s not that you have to be creative. So you might send them the tax receipt which is the first thank you. And then depending on after that you might have uh the executive director writer. Thank you. You might have the development director writer. Thank you. You might have the program director. We have a little archaeological excavation. You know there are two main archaeologists, archaeologists involved with it. and depending on which one uh is uh you know closest to that person who send the gift. We’ll have them right appears on the on the thank you note which we draw for them for some people. I might call them and say you know because I’m in new york city I might call them to say thank you. I have received your gift. It’ll take a while for us to process it. But in the meantime I want you to know that your check was received and we’re so grateful and the excavation will start on such and such a date and we’ll send you pictures and this is our facebook page and you know communicate with them. Uh one of my friends uh sent her son to a boarding school and she sent a little gift where she’d been sending it to the local school all the time. But now because it was a boarding school, the parents suddenly she got a call from my parents really wanted, why is the parent calling me when she said, you know, I know you sent a gift and I wanted to tell you thanks from the school. But also I want to tell you that I was yesterday at the tennis match in which your son played and my son is captain of the team and he played so well and we were so proud of my goodness, do you think that lady is not going to give another gift after that? I mean it’s just brilliant and it wasn’t even a staff member. It was a volunteer. I have I have another agency this year. There was a crisis and people ask me and I happened to have insight into that particular problem. They said what should we give to? I said, oh, this is a great agency. I’ve been, you know involved with them as a volunteer for a long time. You know, they use the money very well. They’re doing really great work. They sent the money. I sent the money. None of us have ever gotten a thank you note. Now they’re doing the work. They have social media, they have facebook, they have Lincoln they have a blast. They’re sending us the, all the information about what they’re doing and we are so happy. They’re doing it. But they didn’t do God one Thank You. And one of the donors sent it from a donor advised fund. He’s got no thank you, let alone seven.

[00:15:43.44] spk_1:
It’s time for a break.

[00:16:43.64] spk_2:
Turn to communications. I’m on their email list and they said something this week. That’s very interesting. They talk about seeing good news stories on social media, uh, specifically linked in, in this case and the uh, frequent lament that people will, will comment that you’ll never find stories like this in the mainstream media. In fact turned two points out that many, many of these good news stories originated in mainstream media. Um, you know, some are, we’re in newspapers, others might have gotten exposure from national outlets like the new york times or CNN, or one of the major networks. But the point is a lot of these stories originate and in some mainstream media and then make their way to social media. So what’s that mean for you? It means there are a

[00:16:44.64] spk_3:
lot of journalists

[00:16:58.94] spk_2:
that are interested in good news stories that maybe just generate a laugh or a smile or it’s, it’s um, it’s more of a story about work that a nonprofit has done.

[00:17:02.04] spk_3:
So the journalists

[00:17:03.33] spk_1:
are out there.

[00:17:04.28] spk_2:
They are hungry for these good news stories. If

[00:17:06.79] spk_3:
you’ve got something

[00:17:07.85] spk_2:
like that.

[00:17:09.74] spk_1:
Look internally,

[00:17:10.74] spk_3:
if you’ve got some good news

[00:17:27.94] spk_2:
turn to, can help you get it noticed right, help you craft that good news story and then get it exposed in all the outlets you’ve heard me talk about. So they finish up this on this. I’m choking up. That’s, that’s how that’s how, uh, much this touches me,

[00:17:33.04] spk_3:
they finish up there

[00:17:58.64] spk_2:
their email by saying there are lots of journalists out there that are ready to give good news stories a look despite what you may read on linkedin. So, you know, they’ve got their eyes on the media market. Turn to communications. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot C O. Now back to next year’s plan for your year end donors.

[00:19:01.14] spk_1:
Yeah. I mean, that’s that is a very bad practice To have gone. Well, you know, some folks say 24 hours, you’re, you’re being more generous 48 hours, that’s still fine. But If it goes much longer than that and you’re, you’re saying it’s been months or whatever, you know, that, uh, to not acknowledge every single gift, I don’t care if these are $3 gifts. I don’t care if the dollar and a half. It still deserves an acknowledgement. You just never know. Someone might be testing you with a small dollar amount and really who gives a dollar and a half anyway, so that, that’s, you know, that’s a hyperbolic on the low end, right? Uh, but if someone gives you $5, they might be testing you, they might have capacity to give 5000 or 50,000. They may have capacity. They may feel whether they can’t or or they know they can, but they’re they’re trying you out every gift deserves acknowledgement. So when you were just describing that’s very poor practice.

[00:19:08.04] spk_0:
Well, unfortunately, the excuse is that they are because they’re doing such good work. They are understaffed and their non profit. So they don’t have capacity.

[00:19:34.24] spk_1:
That doesn’t, that doesn’t sell. That’s a that’s a nonstarter. You need to invest in your organizations to the extent that you can thank people. Thanking people is not overhead, It’s not worthless. It’s it’s an administrative investment. It’s not an expensive, it’s it’s an investment in the relationships that you’re talking about. You mentioned earlier, you know, absolutely relationship building, if that’s an investment thanking

[00:21:02.24] spk_0:
people. Absolutely, and and that’s how one needs to think about it. And and you know, the board members, the staff, the executive director, everybody needs to be aware that how important this is. Now, another thing that people ask us a lot is we got a gift from a donor advised fund and we don’t have any access to the donor. So we don’t know how to thank them and we want to know who they are, what they are and you know, they’re freaking every sort of possible way of trying to google it to trying to get us to do it. This is so simple. This these these two donors who gave to this charity that gave through the donor advised fund that I know about, they are friends of the board members if they put a list in front of the board members and said, you know, we got a gift from. So and so family fund and unfortunately we don’t know how to thank them. They said that maybe they sent a thank you note to the to the donor advised fund agency. Somebody would speak up or you look in your database and say, oh, they came to the gala. This is the same person who came to the gala and sat at, you know, board member access table. So he’s gonna know this person. So let’s tell him that your friend gave us a gift even though there was no gala, even though there was just a virtual gala and he still gave us a gift. He didn’t even sit at your table.

[00:21:24.64] spk_1:
All right. So those, right. Those are, those are good ideas. But there is frustration among, among nonprofits getting donor advised fund gifts when you know, okay, so you’re right, try try your board query your database. But there are gifts that come that sometimes that folks can’t identify and that I know that is a frustration among nonprofits.

[00:21:56.24] spk_0:
Yes. But you know, more and more people have who have set up donor advised funds want people to know who is giving. It’s, it’s less and less about being anonymous. Now, people are going back to setting up foundations or entities from which they can give, uh, and be known and they want that because they want to add their credibility to the gift. They want people to know that a person whom they know give to this charity because it helps the charity.

[00:22:28.74] spk_1:
It does. Right. But there are, there are donors who would not agree with you. But I do, I agree. But there are always some donors that are going to remain anonymous. And I mean, I’ve always thought, you know, focus on the donors who you can identify. I understand the frustration for those. You cannot, they may come to you through a facebook fundraising event and facebook doesn’t share the information. They might come to you from a donor advised fund. That is not a name that you can track, uh, focus on the folks that you can thank and for the donor advised fund. Of course we should be sending a letter to the fund. Right, thanking asking them to forward the letter onto the anonymous donors.

[00:23:12.94] spk_0:
Exactly. And they would, I’m sure the same donor, the same donor, the friend of mine that gave because I said, oh, this is a good charity could give to them. It’s also sent to another charity in the same space. And he got his seven. Thank you. He actually told me I got seven. Thank you. So, he said, you know, the development director wrote, the executive director wrote the board member wrote, they sent him an annual report. You know, they invited him to an event. They sent him different things. You know, I mean reports, personalized. Yeah. All right. I mean, you could take a little video and send it to the person, you know, that you can do

[00:24:18.44] spk_1:
personalized video is a terrific idea. Um, I’ll give a shout out to a company that’s not expensive. Bond euro bongiorno dot com, bong boro easy personalized videos. You shoot a one minute video and you say thank you. And you can, you can be walking, you can have any background you want to know the production value is not the concern, sincerity, The genuineness. That’s the concern. And you do it in a 45 seconds or one minute video. You sent it right back to the right to the person. You can do it immediately. You could do it the next day. So, and Bongiorno is by no means the only personalized video platform out there. But Um, yeah, you’re right. Personalized video is a good one. all right. So you mentioned these screenings. So now we’re now we’re a little longer on now. We’re into January. Right? We’ve done our activities for the fourth quarter. Now we’re conveying into January. What kind of information uh, you’re looking for in a, in a screening. Does it have to be a commercial screening? You know, what are we,

[00:25:09.24] spk_0:
what are we looking at? You could, you could do research or you could just go for a screening depending on the number of donors. If you have seven donors, you know, you just give them to somebody to research who has tools like screening tools and research tools and ask them to do it for you and that’s all you need, You don’t need a sophisticated screening. But if you have 670 donors or something that I knew and they were given maybe over $20 or $50, then you certainly should have a screening down. But don’t try to do it yourself because then when you get it back, you have this information and you have no idea what to do with it because there are mismatches in the screening. It’s an automated process. There are mismatches in the screening. You know, there’ll be a lot of tony-martignetti is and Putin presides in there and you have to make

[00:25:30.54] spk_1:
sure that I don’t know if there are such good examples who not pursued and tony-martignetti are not very common names, but there’ll be a lot of there’ll be a lot of smith’s and uh smiths and joneses et cetera. Okay.

[00:25:32.68] spk_0:
Yes. And and you know you being me is how many food and presents? All

[00:25:39.12] spk_1:
right. There aren’t too many tony-martignetti is I would be surprised.

[00:25:50.84] spk_0:
Okay. In fact it’s more confusing when there are only two or three because then you really begin to think this is your person and then it turns out it’s not your person.

[00:25:53.14] spk_1:
Right? Okay. So you’re you’re you’re caution against doing it on your own or I mean if you’re going to do it on your own. You said if you had just seven or so. You know, you’re not gonna hire an agency for that. But you just, the point is you need to be careful that you’ve got the right person

[00:26:08.50] spk_0:
right? Like checking,

[00:26:10.24] spk_1:
check middle initials, check addresses, check whatever you do know against what you found to make sure you’re, you’re dealing with the right person.

[00:27:04.64] spk_0:
Well, you can, you can outsource, you know, a little bit of work every month with somebody with some research firm. We do that all the time. Uh, you know, it’s not that we do it all, you know, in one go and finish. You know, we have like an arrangement where if somebody new comes in, gives more than $1000 get more than $500. Whatever matters to them, they send it over to us and we screen them, research them, give them back information on that person. Okay. Okay. But it’s geared to small agencies. It’s geared to small agencies so that, you know, because otherwise what happens is the Harvard University’s and the big, big who have seven researchers get all the big donors because they have the tools and they have the staff. So you, you do need to implement some of the techniques that the top fundraising organizations you

[00:27:13.64] spk_1:
mentioned, you mentioned before screening and research tools there, are there some out there that you can suggest that folks can use

[00:28:02.94] spk_0:
on their own. Yes. You could, you could make a substitution with with something like ivy or donor search and try to do some work on your own. You could look at the, you could look at the linkedin profile of the person. If you know, you know, I mean small simple things. You could google them of course. Uh small things that you know, you could look at if you know where they work. You could look at the bio most law firms have the lawyers while on on the website many firms have the, you know, employees, bio senior employees bio doctors. There are free sites for looking at doctors to see what kind of specialty does the doctor have. Is it something that’s relevant to my cause?

[00:28:05.45] spk_1:
Yeah. Good. Alright, right. If you can find the person’s company firm that they work for or practice. Okay. And you mentioned I wave and donor search.

[00:28:31.94] spk_0:
Yes. These are subscription services. So you have to pay a little bit uh, you know, usually it’s in your subscription and you can check out your donors through that. And the aggregate information of other gifts that the organization has received. Other organizations have received from the same donor. Okay. Right. Right.

[00:28:37.14] spk_1:
Other charities that the person is given to us. So then you start to get a little profile of person. All right. So you can have

[00:29:03.54] spk_0:
to be careful because of the person your donor is in new york and the person, a person with the same name is giving in texas, you have to be careful to see why would my donor given texas? Maybe it’s another person or maybe he went to school in texas and he is giving in texas. Or he’s giving to a senior center in texas because my daughter has a mother there who’s in that home. So you know you need to be a bit intelligent about.

[00:29:30.84] spk_1:
Yeah right with that. With that caution you gotta you gotta that caveat. You gotta be uh certain that you’re dealing with the right person. Otherwise you’re going down you’re gonna start talking to the person about their gifts to texas. And they’re going to say I don’t know what you’re talking about and then then you’re gonna be embarrassed. So all right. All right. Um Okay so screening is a possibility. Good. You can engage your company. You can do some on your own. What what what what are we gonna do from what we learned from our screening now? What?

[00:31:54.44] spk_0:
So there’s the thing I mean you know we do research where research for and we send research to our clients. The question is how do you read this research? What does it mean to you? What what is the interpretation you get out of a research report on? Suppose we write a little bio on this person. So what what what what is the strategy that comes out of this research. So the first thing that indicates higher giving is age. So anyone over the age of 60 or 65 has more disposable income. They paid their mortgage, they probably paid their children’s college education. They’re beginning to think about their own, you know, legacy and they’re beginning to give more generously. So 60, you have a better chance of getting a higher upgrading their gifts before that. People are still on that little hamster wheel, you know, increasing their mortgage, buying a little bigger house, sending their Children to a better school. You know, getting them into college, they just often do not have time unless they are very community minded and they might give to their local community or their college or things like that. But but they become more Uh philanthropic, more generous generally after the age of 16. Now, there are always exceptions. The other thing there are a lot of people look for as you know, being in plan giving is people without Children, because people without Children do not have that usual legacy is, oh, I’m leaving good Children into the world. Yeah, that’s great. But when you don’t have Children, you have to really think, what is it that I am leaving? What footprint am I living in this world that I lived and who benefited because I lived And those people take a little more care and thought and and usually we’ll try to make an impact in a different way and you can help them do that and make them happy. And you know, there there’s a lot of studies that say people who give are happier people who give actually benefit more from their gifts than the person receiving. So it’s at that age, particularly when you have that reflective time for reflection that we see better gifts.

[00:32:02.64] spk_1:
It’s time for tony steak too

[00:32:59.84] spk_2:
planned giving accelerator. I’m starting the promotion again this time for the January 2022 class, I have accelerated the accelerator. It’s no longer a 12-month course. It is now a six-month course. I will teach you step by step, Everything that was in the 12 month course, but we’re gonna, we’re gonna step it up six month course. I’ll teach you everything you need to know about starting your planned giving program and you’re not only learning from me, you’re learning from your peers, folks who are similarly situated, they’ve got the same frustrations, they’ve got the same tensions bandwidth constraints as you do. You learn from them, They’re your, they become your friends, your allies, your safety net in planned giving accelerator. So if you want to get your plan giving program started,

[00:33:03.14] spk_3:
You want to start in 2022,

[00:33:05.64] spk_1:
you can start

[00:33:06.28] spk_3:
with plan Giving accelerator. I

[00:33:19.34] spk_2:
hope you’ll join me. All the info you need is that planned Giving accelerator dot com. That is tony stick to, we’ve got boo koo

[00:33:20.86] spk_1:
but loads more

[00:33:21.61] spk_2:
time for next

[00:33:23.10] spk_3:
year’s plan for your

[00:33:24.59] spk_1:
year end donors,

[00:35:46.14] spk_0:
then there are other things like education for one thing, if you know the education you can no other people who went to that school. So maybe you can have them go on. Maybe have a board member went there so you can build a relationship more strongly. But also of course education indicates more disposable income. So you begin to see when you build a profile of the person you say, oh well they went to the school from that area, They studied social work or they studied history or that tells you something about what they are interested in. Right? And then there’s the question of, Although I said that people who don’t have Children, you know, are very sought after by plan giving professionals, on the other hand, people in their lifetime are more generous who have Children over the age of six Because they’re trying to inculcate good values in their Children. They start to see the value of a community. So there are studies that show that people who have Children over the age of six, there could be 6-18, they could be 18-24. But a family unit, a couple usually has more disposable income. It could be a same sex couple or a heterogeneous couple. But the heterosexual couple. But the point is because there are two incomes in that family, they usually have more disposable income. So so that that’s important when you see that. So those are little things that you’re looking at. And then of course there’s the interest, what else they give to, You know, how old are they? Was it their parents that also gave to this charity or this type of charity? I have a I have a friend and he gave to a university music program. And I said to him, why do you give, you didn’t even go to that university? Why are you giving to that music program? He said, well, I became friends with the dean. They invited me to an event. I went on a trip with them to Austria to listen to classical music. And he said in the end, you know, my father died when I was very young. And the one thing I remember is sitting on his lap when he played the piano. So the piano music to him was, and he doesn’t have any Children. So, you know, that’s what makes him happy giving to students who play the piano

[00:36:20.23] spk_1:
reminds us of course reminds him of his dad. And he hopes that that uh those young students will have Children of their own and their those Children will sit on their laps the way he sat on his dad’s lap. All right. Those are good. Those are, those are valuable insights that we can, we can get from uh, that we that we can get from the screening. So now going back to what you had suggested earlier when you said get them to know you and let them get to know, uh, sorry, get to know them and let them get to know you. So how do we do the second part of that now that we have this information, valuable insights? How do we let these new donors get to know us?

[00:37:37.13] spk_0:
Well, we talked about the series of three emails that welcome them. We have invitations. Uh, and of course in this environment, maybe you can’t invite them so easily, but you could still send them a video. Now. We had a homeless, uh, organized agency for homeless people last year that we were working with. And they sent out a video of their new building and somebody sent them $25,000 just from that video because it was the Executive director going through the building and saying, you know, we had such hopes for this building. We finally got it built. We’ve got all these people were going to bring into this building and the person was so touched. He was also a senior citizen. He had money. He felt like, oh, let me help. There are other people out there my age who do not have housing. And here is somebody who’s an agency that’s providing it. And that video, you know, a small video that they didn’t even actually seriously ask for money in it. They just said, and if you’d like to, you know, there was a little bit and

[00:37:44.23] spk_1:
well, it it touched it touched somebody. Well, video can do that. It’s powerful that way.

[00:39:16.22] spk_0:
All right. And of course a tour with the executive director. So you’re really getting to know the person, you know, face to face. So as best you can in this environment. You know, it’s a trusting relationship. So by video you’re seeing them as best you can. The other thing is of course you could set up coffee with them and people are much more accessible now because they’re not going out. So people are taking calls even if they are not. Yeah. In where at home, they’re still taking calls from wherever they are. They’re doing zoom with you. They want to be conducted. All of us are starved for human contact. We took these things for granted. And now suddenly we realized how valuable our community is. You know, I walk out, I’m an anonymous new york city right where nobody really knows anybody and you walk on the street and nobody should recognize. You know, it’s not like that anymore. The moment I walk out on the street, my neighbors are standing out there, they’re also walking. There’s no nowhere to go and nothing to do except to go for a while. So they’re all out there walking and they all suddenly know each other. So you realize how important your community is. So do you think that the area neighborhood association and things that are being done in our neighborhood are getting more attention. Sure, more people are planting, helping to plant in the parks, more people are helping to give to the local community association. Suddenly that’s becoming more important. So something that’s good for the small agencies.

[00:39:18.39] spk_1:
So engagement, Yeah. Uh, engagement at whatever level it might be something communal and community and in, in face to face,

[00:40:10.61] spk_0:
yes, might be something come and paint a mural on your wall of your, you know, of your agency. We have a, a friend of mine runs a clear art center community, you know, they make pottery, they got the local artists together to come and paint the wall even urine Corbett, they could still do that. You wear your mask, You come and paint the world their artistic. So you could plant flowers in your garden, invite them to do that, invite them to do outdoor things in the local park. You could have a gathering of rooftops. People have been doing gatherings or some of our clients have been doing gatherings or rooftops whatever you can do outdoors, especially in the summer. And then also we were talking, well, we were

[00:40:14.43] spk_1:
talking about january, but that’s okay. Well into spring

[00:40:55.71] spk_0:
now january, you could do a lunch and learn, which is a good time to do a lunch and learn. And that also gives you an information back because the people who attend, you do the lunch and learn on different programs and people sign up based on the interest. So then, you know, well this donor signed up for this lunch and learn on this program. So obviously that’s what they care about or they might write to you and say I didn’t, I really wanted to attend this, but I couldn’t. So you send them the recording of that lunch. That’s another, uh, value of having something which is recorded, which you’re doing on zoom. You can record it like, just like your radio programs, tony

[00:41:15.11] spk_1:
I’m a, I’m a big fan of big fan of audio. I think it’s very intimate medium, yep. All right. So we’ve, we’ve, we’ve thought through our engagement, it might be something in real life. It might be something virtual. I love. I mean, you gave a lot of good ideas. Um, now we need to plan for the next solicitation.

[00:41:21.53] spk_0:
Now

[00:41:49.61] spk_1:
we’re in, we’re in like the third quarter of 3rd quarter of next year and it’s coming time to solicit the person again. They made a year into gift this year. So we’re going to presume, but they’re, they’re going to do the same. Let’s exclude the folks who maybe became major donors and they’ve got a relationship now with a gift officer. We’re not, we’re not at that level. Uh, we’re dealing with the larger group. We’re planning our fourth quarter. What should we be thinking about in terms of possibly upgrading or should we not try to upgrade in the second year. What’s your advice around planning that, that second year solicitation?

[00:45:27.39] spk_0:
Well, another thing that we never spoke about and some of my clients and colleagues will be very upset if I don’t mention it is creating a giving circle. So you could have, if you have enough donors at certain levels, you could try to upgrade them by creating a council, uh, you know, giving society, you know, so, so somebody who gave 500 you could give them an incentive to upgrade to 1000 because when they’re at 1000 they’ll get such and such benefits. You know, they’ll meet somebody that they care about or they’ll get a painting or they’ll hear a concert or you’ll have some event just for them. So, so you’re constantly upgrading those who gave 500 to 1000, those who gave 1000 to 5000, those who gave 5002, 10,000. So, so a little theater client is probably going to say, oh, you know, uh, famous irish actor is going to speak with 10 of you and you only get invited to that if, if you give, you know, a little bit more than what they were already given and that and that creates a cohort of people. So they have a little sense of community because that giving society is going to meet, um, we have the example of a museum that was up. It’s a very famous glass museum called the corning Museum of Glass and it was very well supported by the corning company. But the corning company went through some very tough times and so they needed private support during that period. So they started with a giving society where people came up, they went through the museum, they were passing by on their way to Niagara Falls or they were interested in glass or whatever and they were told that if you give this much that’s great, we are very grateful. But if you give this much you’ll be invited to an event the opening of our show and guess what? We’ll fly you up in our private plane because corning had the private plan and you won’t have to drive all the way you know from new york city well and and that was something the company could no longer support the museum financially. But they had this plane which flew up with their executives and I was such a such a cashier to to fly up in the blind drain, arrive at this museum, attend this beautiful event on roman glass with food from roman times and then have the director of the museum walk you through the show. I said one of the most beautiful things that you know, I was a stuff remember trying to attend this and I thought I was wowed and and so you know you can be creative with almost anything you could if you’re a social service agency will say well I can’t do that well you know you have people in your community who will come out and provide their celebrity help to you. So you could still have somebody do a little concert or somebody, somebody from your community who’s a wonderful singer musician or something. And and it may be not relevant, but maybe their daughter was helped by your uh, you know, educational charity or their mother was served by your senior citizen center. They will do things for you. There was a person who used to come and play the piano at a senior citizen center in uptown all the way up, you know, above the Columbia University is in Morningside

[00:45:30.03] spk_1:
Heights or something, riverside

[00:46:01.08] spk_0:
riverside riverside. Yeah. You know, they’re above Colombia where the cloisters, the museum is there and nobody knew who this person was. But when we looked him up, he was a very famous pianist who used to play at the Carlyle and his mother was in the center. And so he would come up and perform. And so we asked him if he would perform and he did a concert and Steinway hall for us because he was a famous man and there are little treasures in your community. You just have to find out about them. There are little gems floating around.

[00:46:14.68] spk_1:
All right. So you like the idea of incentivizing folks to give a little give more, Even even in the 2nd year. So they were they were our, it was first year was last year. Now we’re planning for the next year incentivize them to increase even in that just in that second year. Yes,

[00:46:46.98] spk_0:
yes. And they will because you’ve been talking to them, you’ve been engaging with them in different ways and, and maybe some of them will become, you know, much higher level donors because for small agencies, a small amount can make a big difference. There is if they gave that small amount of a much larger organization, they can’t give them that personalized attention and it’s not going to make, its going to be a drop in the bucket.

[00:46:52.58] spk_1:
Yeah. There are those folks who will be more will be more generous

[00:46:56.35] spk_3:
to smaller agencies

[00:46:57.35] spk_1:
because they get a lot better treatment. They have more fulfilling relationships with a smaller organization than they would at an organization where their gift was

[00:47:07.88] spk_0:
not in their communities. They, you know, they feel closer to it.

[00:47:14.38] spk_1:
Okay. Alright then. Um, why don’t you leave us with some final thoughts please?

[00:47:54.88] spk_0:
Well, just remember about the leaky bucket. You know, it’s a, we all grew up with that song. There’s a hole in the bucket, realize a dear Liza. So just remember you are not going to let your bucket leak. You’re gonna make every effort you can to get those the donor who’s gonna fall through the cracks, Give him as much attention as I say lavish movie cultivation, whatever tactics you can think of. Whatever relationship building and getting to know you uh, thoughts and strategies that you can come up with, have a plan, learn about them and let them learn about you.

[00:48:16.47] spk_1:
Excellent. I’m gonna look, I’m going to remind myself uh refresh my memory about there’s a hole in the bucket, dear Liza, dear Liza what do we do something like? What do we do? All right, thank you. Hernan Prasad founder and president Prasad consulting and research. The company is at prasad consulting dot com and she is at Prasad C Thank you very much. Program.

[00:48:24.37] spk_0:
Thank you Tory pleasure to talk to you.

[00:48:27.07] spk_1:
My pleasure as well.

[00:48:30.77] spk_2:
Next week engaged

[00:48:31.62] spk_3:
boards will

[00:48:32.58] spk_2:
fundraise with Michael Davidson and brian

[00:48:55.77] spk_1:
Saber from asking matters if you missed any part of this week’s show, I Beseech you find it at tony-martignetti dot com were sponsored by turn to communications pr and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission turn hyphen two dot c o. Mhm. Our creative producer

[00:49:26.17] spk_4:
is Claire Meyerhoff shows social media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our web guy and this music is by scott stein, thank you for that. Affirmation scotty you with me next week for nonprofit radio Big Donald. profit ideas for the over 95% go out and be great. Mhm

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[00:00:13.74] spk_0:
Hello and welcome to tony-martignetti non

[00:00:21.63] spk_2:
profit radio big non profit ideas for the other 95%. I’m your aptly named host.

[00:00:23.19] spk_0:
We have a listener of the week Rusty Stall in Beacon, New

[00:01:47.40] spk_2:
York He went back and shared number show number 4 19 which is the encouragement show on Twitter. That one is from December 2018. Folks, you share, I shout out, Thank you very much, Rusty. Thanks for sharing the show. Glad you loved it. Congratulations on being this week’s listener of the week. Rusty Stall. Oh, I’m glad you’re with me. You’d get slapped with a diagnosis of metastasized a phobia if you missed our fifth show in The Innovators. Siri’s get to the next level stop overlooking investment level, giving opportunities because you’re spending too much time on events and Facebook ads. Sherry Kwame Taylor walks through how to start your major giving program or how to find Tune and kick it up a notch. She’s a fundraising consultant and coach on Tony’s Take. Two planned giving relationship stories were sponsored by wegner-C.P.As guiding you beyond the numbers wegner-C.P.As dot com But Cougar Mountain Software Denali Fund is there. Complete accounting solution made for nonprofits tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant in for a free 60 day trial and by turn, to communications, PR and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission. Turn hyphen to dot C e o so great for to our sponsors really appreciate them so much.

[00:01:51.94] spk_0:
What a pleasure

[00:02:14.80] spk_2:
to welcome. First time to the show Cherie Kwame Taylor. She teaches non profit leaders had a pivot from small dollar donations to securing larger investment level donations so they can finally fund their missions. She does this nationally through her private coaching and her 90 day Let’s Grow Fundraising accelerator. She’s at kwame taylor dot com And at Sherry.

[00:02:19.22] spk_0:
Cute Taylor. Welcome. Es que t?

[00:02:22.49] spk_5:
Hey, Tony, how are you today?

[00:02:23.96] spk_0:
I’m doing very well. Where you calling

[00:02:25.46] spk_2:
in? From Sherry Kwan Teller.

[00:02:27.11] spk_5:
I am in Chicago

[00:02:28.49] spk_2:
land. Chicago. Your home. Okay. Your home base. You’re in Chicago. Okay. I

[00:02:31.87] spk_5:
am right in the middle of the country. Where were you? Where It’s cold.

[00:02:35.53] spk_0:
Yeah, Chicagoans always bring that

[00:02:37.09] spk_2:
up. I don’t like the first thing they say in the winter.

[00:02:40.07] spk_5:
We’re really tired of it

[00:02:41.42] spk_2:
here in the end of February. Got

[00:02:43.11] spk_5:
a couple months ago.

[00:02:52.83] spk_2:
I just asked somebody the difference Where was he calling from? Ah, the difference. Is there a difference between 10 below and 20 below? Do you know that? Does that marginal? 10 degrees to make no difference.

[00:02:58.61] spk_5:
Not not to me not to let

[00:03:00.20] spk_2:
it go

[00:03:00.47] spk_5:
under under zero. It’s kind all the same.

[00:03:03.17] spk_2:
It’s also okay. Okay.

[00:03:05.34] spk_0:
Um, so you have Ah, You have a pretty

[00:03:17.94] spk_2:
interesting practice. An interesting niche. Just why I wanted you to be one of our innovators. Um, you’re helping organizations get going with individual and then and Major Given,

[00:03:25.33] spk_5:
Right? Right. Yeah. I mean, just like you, tony. I’m really focused on those groups who are under that Usually $1 million mark And I love working with

[00:03:33.29] spk_2:
Okay. There was a lot of chatter on LinkedIn, so lots of

[00:03:36.66] spk_0:
lots of women. I think I was the only guy

[00:03:38.11] spk_2:
who commented in here on your link with you. Do you have anything do you work with? Do you work with Male of fundraisers? Ideally, you will. I

[00:03:46.91] spk_5:
think I made about 50 50%

[00:03:54.87] spk_2:
representative of population. Okay, um, I was just interesting. I said I noticed we’ll get a chance to shout some of them out of shortly if if they’re listening, in fact. So

[00:04:00.53] spk_0:
where do you see

[00:04:08.44] spk_2:
people sticking? Like What? What’s what’s what’s the typical, um, scenario for someone who needs your help? Where are they that you’re trying to get them past?

[00:04:16.13] spk_5:
Yeah, great, great question. So typically the people

[00:04:19.20] spk_2:
I’m working with

[00:05:51.62] spk_5:
are you know, I work with a lot of founders who have started non profits. And so, you know, they’re absolute subject matter issues, subject matter experts at their mission. And they started the non profit, and they’ve had a great level of success have gotten it to a certain point. But then there’s becomes the sticking point. It’s like, Oh, this is this is getting harder and harder to fund and what we have a waiting list for our service is and or gosh, I’d love to hire my first staff person, but I don’t know how to scale this financially and so I mean the favorite. I mean, really, probably the favorite part about my work is working with mission experts and people who have raise your hands and said, Yeah, that is a problem, and I’m going to, you know, found a non profit to try to solve that, but they necessarily they probably haven’t ever needed to know how to do major major level gift cultivation. So they’ve never been taught how to do it. And until oftentimes I find that, um, they’re funding, maybe has plateau because they’ve been kind of trying all the thing with some successful some not. But I really don’t know how to move into a larger gifts and so usually to kind of profiles I work with. And one would be what I just described. And then I also work with a lot of groups who are over that $1,000,000 mark. Um, but maybe they have a tremendous amount of either program revenue or revenue from the government. And they haven’t really strengthen their charitable giving,

[00:05:53.25] spk_2:
you

[00:05:55.98] spk_5:
know, they’re not bringing in a that could be bringing it.

[00:06:50.94] spk_2:
Yeah, or now a lot of people who ask me the question, How do you get to the next level had a week. How do we get to next level? Are wedded to events? You know, I whether it’s a gala or it’s a run or it’s a bunch of smaller events, you know, and my concern there is that they’re they’re fearful of and and also have not been trained in, as you said, individual individual giving, that they’re not comfortable sitting across a kitchen table or a desk, and hopefully it’s in their office because I like to control the setting. But we’ll get to the details that and ask people for whether it’s $500 or $50,000. Whatever level you at your at and you believe they should be at, they’re not comfortable doing that. So they host these events because they never have. They just ask for tickets on gates and auction items, and there’s never a face to face. Would you consider a gift of $50,000 for the for the mission that I just described and to get us to where I just said We need to be?

[00:08:22.09] spk_5:
You’re speaking my language, tony. I mean, I see so often, um, that organizations Oh, we have five annual events or, um, you know, we just you know, the board says you write more grant proposals or let’s just try. You continue to try all the things and that that concept you just nailed it that that step by step plan into oh So you’re telling me I should be carrying in my my world a top 30 portfolio of donors and that top 30 actually should be bringing in between 50 and 75% of my revenue. And you actually want me to go sit down one on one and present to them, or you don’t have a relationship with them and ask them for money. Oh, I like that Could never do that. Like I hate asking people for money, right? I get that all day long, and and that’s really where? Why I see people stock and frankly, why, in my opinion, you know, 77% of nonprofits are under a $1,000,000 because that that fear is kind of holding the back of What would I say when I get in that meeting, right? Like what? Is that? What questions are they gonna ask me? And so I think that being open to saying If you don’t know how to do that, it’s time to invest in yourself

[00:08:23.66] spk_2:
to

[00:08:37.90] spk_5:
learn how to do that. Because that’s a way to protect fundraising. Then, um, you know, the events or the appeals are giving Tuesday, which are all fine things. But if the majority of your funding really should be coming in from your top 30 donors, why are you allocating all of your time and energy and budget into smaller gifts?

[00:09:17.62] spk_2:
Okay, we’re gonna get to our we’re gonna take our first break. And after that, well, we’re gonna get into the steps and answer a lot of those questions that you just rhetorically asked wegner-C.P.As so that your 9 90 gets filed on time so that your audit is finished on time so that you get the advice of an experienced partner. You know which doom? Just on the show last week. You know him and he’s been on before Aunt and his firm, wegner-C.P.As, that has a nationwide non profit practice with thousands of audits under their belt under their belt. They just were. Collectively, they just wear one belt. It’s a whole bunch of accountants, one belt wrapping, all of

[00:09:22.79] spk_3:
them on,

[00:09:32.52] spk_0:
and you get that expertise in the in their advice. Alright, wegner-C.P.As dot com. Let’s do the live love. Um, starting with that, I’m gonna start right here this time. You don’t do that. But New York, New York, we got multiple right here in New York,

[00:09:37.18] spk_2:
New York and moving out from the New York area got Falls Church,

[00:09:42.00] spk_0:
Virginia, Albuquerque, New Mexico. I love

[00:09:46.55] spk_2:
Albuquerque. I think I stayed at the The Albuquerque. The hotel Albuquerque. Is there such place? I love Al Albuquerque is a beautiful, beautiful city. Live love Out to Albuquerque and

[00:09:54.61] spk_0:
Tucson, Arizona, Fairfield, Connecticut, Tampa, Florida Barberton, Ohio. Um, yes. Live, love, live love

[00:10:34.74] spk_2:
to our domestic live listeners. Thank you for being with us and going abroad. Looks like Adana, Turkey, I hope. Adana, Turkey. I hope your family members are all safe attack in Syria just yesterday. Right? I hope your family is all safe. Tehran, Iran. Thank you for being with us. Checking in often. Tehran. You get to be regulars. Thank you. Appreciate that. Live love out there. Um, Belo Horizonte. Orders aren’t a Brazil. I love that. Thank you. Thank you so much. Obey God! Oh, for our Brazil listener and Seoul, South Korea, of course, Always checks in. So loyal

[00:10:44.54] spk_0:
annual Casio comes a ham Nida and also a Saudi Arabia. I think that’s a new one. Jetta Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. Live love to each

[00:11:27.35] spk_2:
of our listeners abroad. Thank you for being with us on the podcast Pleasantries tour. Over 13,000 listeners in the time shift Pleasantries to you. I’m so glad that not profit radio fits into your life. Okay, let’s go back. Yes, Thio, get to the next level. All right, Sherry, you have you step by step. And if the host is any good at this show, which is always questionable, that seems after nine and 1/2 years. That’s still an open question. Then if he is, we’ll get to all the steps. So you want to start with the end in mind? Start with your endgame.

[00:11:44.24] spk_5:
Yeah, I d’oh! So you know, I might my challenge to people when I start working with them, as they say. Okay, so we’re gonna put a new cap on here or new lens on if you will. And that your investment level lens. And so if we’re gonna go prepare you to go start sitting down are forming relationships so you can eventually sit down with people

[00:11:51.25] spk_2:
and ask

[00:12:59.94] spk_5:
some first went for $25,000. We need to be We need to have a different type of lens on it. I if you saw me right now. I’d be doing this pivot with my body. But what I’m saying is I wanted to shift from Well, yeah, if we had the money. We do that. Yeah. If I had the money, I’d hire that person. If I had the money, I’d start that program. I want to shift that too. Here’s actually what our plans are. And here’s what we need this year. And so if you even think you know ahead to a solicitation and donor said so what do you need? And you hesitate and say, Well, you know what? We did this last year. We’d love to do this and we really hope we can vs. So glad you asked that we have an $800,000 need this year. And here’s what we’re going to dio and being Bing Bing, right? So it’s amazing That seems really simple, right? But that really that pivot from We gotta stop reacting to all the things and actually kind of push the pause button and put a proactive plan in place. Move from that scarcity to need model and move from trying to, you know, fundraise to everyone to really getting honed in on the top 30 donors.

[00:13:27.08] spk_2:
Okay, Now, at this step, we don’t We don’t have a particular donor in mind where we’re assessing our overall need for the year Or maybe maybe a two year plan or something like that. We’re just We’re focused on our our need. We’re not. We’re not focused on any individual donor yet. Or donors? Not yet. Because

[00:14:20.14] spk_5:
so often even budgets are sat. You know, sometimes how do you set your budget? Well, first we look at the money we have pledged. Well, hold on now. First, we need to look at what you need, right? And so what? We’re gonna talk about that step because budgeting is the key here. And so all of this tony is really rooted in me. My goal is to really help my clients learn how to leave their donors, every donor to giving their best guess and then helping them give that gift every year and getting them in a strong annual fund. And so I always say to people, if your donors best gift is $25 a month and that’s the best gift amazing, let’s provide the most amazing donor experience for that person. But if you’re if you’re, uh, donors, best gift is a $25,000 gift, and they’re only giving you five. We have some work to do, right? So if if all of our donors were giving their best guess, this would be a game changer

[00:14:24.44] spk_2:
How sorry. How are we gonna know what the best gift is for each of our top 30?

[00:15:00.24] spk_5:
Well, the first thing starts with relationship building and actually being comfortable talking about investment. And so oftentimes I find that we are so passionate about our missions way we know them obviously better than anybody. And so our conversations are a little bit like, Oh, here’s the crisis. Here’s the problem we’re solving And here’s what we d’oh on here some really great stories. And here’s some numbers of you know, this percentage of kids are doing this now and then It it kind of drops off like, Well, I think they’ll give because they really ask some great questions. And I know they have capacity, so we’ll see where that goes.

[00:15:37.21] spk_2:
Where where does a prospect research fit in? Do you? I’m a big advocate of gaining as much knowledge as I can about a person from the person themselves. And if you if you ask the right questions and if you’re a good listener, you’ll learn all about how many kids they have, what they what they do for a living or what they retired from where their vacation homes are. If they if they have them boats where they travel, whether they travel, you’ll learn a ton of things just from the person. But does thank you. Okay, but does does outside prospect research fit into your schema?

[00:16:28.74] spk_5:
Yeah, sometimes, like here’s the thing. What I find tony is I find that typically, and that kind of that model non profit where we started at the top of the hour. I actually find that many times they have donors who are sitting right around them, and a lot of times it’s they aren’t giving their best gift because A. They haven’t really known what the organization needed, because either they didn’t know how to share that, where they don’t know what they need or B they’ve never been asked, and so totally groovy. Oh, this is the slow game when we’re starting, when we’re getting to know our donors, why they’re giving why they value giving tow us, knowing every single thing and just having a relationship with him, right?

[00:16:32.37] spk_2:
Yeah, because Because the first meeting is not the ask.

[00:16:34.61] spk_5:
No, no,

[00:16:36.31] spk_2:
make that. Let’s make that explicit. Yeah,

[00:16:47.44] spk_5:
Yeah, I literally just had a client or a board member of a client. Say so. You mean to tell me we’re not asking in this meeting? I think it’s the first meeting you didn’t propose to your spouse on the first date,

[00:16:50.75] spk_2:
right? Good analogy. Yeah.

[00:17:07.88] spk_5:
Yeah. So, um, so it’s a slow game, But I would also say there’s just Yes, of course. I want, you know, people, you know, doing prospect research and, you know, running reports and doing due diligence. But I would also say Don’t forget that we can go talk to them

[00:17:09.30] spk_2:
and we can

[00:17:26.72] spk_5:
go for a relationship with them and share what we need, because they time and time again, I have clients moved five figure gifts to six figure gifts. I’ve sat in these solicitations and heard their donors say I didn’t know you needed that. What have you never asked? I mean, so great. But also Oh, my goodness.

[00:17:43.75] spk_2:
Subsumed in something you just said is Don’t let the lack of information keep you from that solicitation that that asked. You know, if you feel like I don’t know quite enough, you know, I don’t know. I don’t know what you know. You’re never gonna know everything. So you get a much as you can have those preliminary meetings. Maybe somebody on the board knows the person. Or maybe not. But, you know, but don’t let the ah lack of some some little bit. I never found out where they have Children or not, or whether how old their Children are. Don’t let that stop you from going ahead with your ask

[00:18:06.98] spk_5:
your right.

[00:18:07.60] spk_2:
Otherwise, you’ll you’ll spin

[00:18:12.79] spk_5:
your spin. Until this concept, Like what you said, Um, I want you sitting down one on one with your top 30 donors,

[00:18:17.17] spk_2:
but

[00:18:35.66] spk_5:
more than that and asking them. And every time I speak, I always have somebody raise your hand and say, Can I e mail him, you know, like not rarely, right or the other thing is yet I’ll say, Do you Do you do one on one ass? Yeah, we do. We have We’ve got a couple of in string here and we ask that our event. That’s not what I’m talking about. Totally different. Totally different angle here.

[00:18:39.84] spk_2:
Right? Thank you. Okay. And you also mentioned I don’t put a put an exclamation after it. Let’s get out of the scarcity mentality. You said that you said it explicitly. I’m I’m reiterating what you already said. We got it. We got to get out of this. I can’t afford that. I can’t afford the first employee. Uh, that’s part of your That’s part of where

[00:18:59.32] spk_0:
you want to be. I want to hire our first employee.

[00:19:01.01] spk_2:
This? What are we already have a staff of four. I want to hire our first director of development this year. And that’s gonna be ah, $75,000 position. And when I add benefits, it’s gonna

[00:19:10.18] spk_0:
be $100,000 position. That’s what we need.

[00:19:15.39] spk_2:
You know? It’s okay if you saw me. You said earlier if we saw you, you’d be pivoting around. You saw me. I’d be flailing my arms around

[00:19:20.35] spk_5:
sitting up in your care.

[00:19:23.74] spk_2:
Oh, yeah, I’m propped up my aunt. My arms are flailing.

[00:20:00.40] spk_5:
Your leave led me right into step to hear track each other. Um, so I mean, step like, so it’s really moving into. Okay. So, Cherie, you’re telling me I need to go sit down with these people? I need thio eventually. When I feel like the time is right. You want me to ask them for money and sit down and do that? So, you know, often the next step is So what am I saying to them, Right? And so in my world, I always say, there’s there’s three things that really have to be clear in a donor’s mind before they’re going to give you that investment level gift. So obviously one of those being planned, like, what are you doing?

[00:20:02.51] spk_2:
Yeah, we just talked about that. All right? Yeah. And then,

[00:20:14.09] spk_5:
uh, and also, like, I’ll send your strategic plan and whether you have the 40 page binder on the shelf or it’s in a napkin sketch, You know, your donors have to know what your plans are. What are you doing this year so that you can do this next year? Because in five years were kind of thinking this right. Like,

[00:20:21.99] spk_2:
you

[00:21:02.02] spk_5:
have to be talking about your plan in that annual rhythm to get your donors in that annual fund mentality. Right? So you gotta know your plan. You gotta be able to talk like that. So that’s kind of the planning of it, obviously. I mean, we don’t have to spend some time on this, but your programs, what do you do? And I think probably the biggest hang up I see in the Syria would be donors not totally understanding what you do. It kinda have an idea. And then oftentimes, uh, you know, the confusion comes with Well, we do this and this and this and this and this, and we list the activities that we d’oh. We don’t really talk about them in more of an outcome manner or in a in that programmatic structure that really helps him understand how holistically our programs fit together to actually be solving.

[00:21:21.04] spk_2:
And Sherry, if if this is an existing donor, let’s say and you’re trying to get them to the next level, you know, look at what they’ve been funding in the past because that’s if if they have a specific program, maybe it’s unrestricted. In which case we’re grateful for, of course, for general support too. But if there is something that they’ve designated they’re giving to in the past. Uh, focus on that. You know that. Focus on that part of your your plan and your need You need

[00:21:45.93] spk_5:
Absolutely. Absolutely. And so it’s always a balance of I want to feed the donor’s interest, right? Like, oh, they’re really, really excited about our scholarship program. Okay, great. We want to know that. But our job also is a leader is to say, OK, how wonderful. You know, we’re investing $300,000 in our scholarship program this year. Our organization has an $800,000 need, right? Like I want them to know the whole need

[00:22:07.03] spk_2:
of organization, but

[00:23:34.04] spk_5:
they’re super passionate about a program, you know, that’s what we’re gonna feed. Right? Um, So there’s there’s the donors who Really? Yeah, they understand. We do. They volunteer for us. They’re deep in this with us. They’re really stakeholders. Um, you know, I have some while those funny stories of donors who were giving to organizations who asked off the wall questions like, How do you guys were doing this, right? So there’s some clarity that needs to happen. There is, um, it might be that we’re speaking in acronyms are, you know, kind of speaking in our jargon because we’re so intimate with our industry. But how can we How can we talk about what we do in a way that really helps the donor see the impact that a gift could have on the lives that were serving? Um, Okay, So I said three things have to be clear so that there obviously their plans in the programs and the 3rd 1 which is maybe my favorite thing to talk about tony is the financial need. What do you need financially? And so every single time I talked to, uh, somebody new, I always say, I got to be honest. It’s a little bit of a test. Um, I say so. So what? What? Your what? Your financial need this year, I’m kind of asking, what’s your budget? And 9.5 times out of 10 I get. Well, last year we did about 6 80 And so we I mean, we hope we could do that. I don’t know, maybe 7 20 You know, in essence, a little our need is a little bit more than last year

[00:23:38.91] spk_2:
right there, but they’re Basically, they’re constraining it based on what they did last year versus what would be what? What would get the organization again to the next level. Or, you know what, really what I really need to do or want, want or need to do not just constrained and tied to what they did last year,

[00:23:59.18] spk_5:
right? Right. So I kind of called.

[00:24:00.68] spk_2:
It’s like an anchor dragging you down what you did last year. What

[00:24:04.09] spk_0:
do you want to do this year? What do you need to do this year?

[00:24:08.15] spk_5:
Yeah, yeah. You know, you’re gonna come to meetings with me, tony. So I call that

[00:24:11.75] spk_2:
I don’t think you can afford me. I’m sorry.

[00:24:16.23] spk_5:
Okay. Never mind that. I kind of call that like, Okay, so that’s your more of your squeak by budget. Look, you’ve got to get that number,

[00:24:22.02] spk_2:
But

[00:24:33.91] spk_5:
then, you know, when I dig a little bit, I’ll say OK, so So you need, you know, a 20 in my example. I guess so. What’s not in that number, you know, And when I start digging a little bit, it always happens. Okay. So, um, are you are you paid by the organization? Well, you know I was approved to take the 70

[00:24:40.71] spk_2:
$1000 salary, but

[00:24:41.81] spk_5:
I’ve only been taking a 20

[00:24:42.92] spk_2:
five or

[00:25:06.64] spk_5:
I we have a waiting list, but we don’t have enough er staff or, um, you know, do you have a reserve fund? Well, no. You know where it ebbs and flows, you know? Are you investing in technology? Are you? You know anything? So my point of this is you have got to create a riel. Need space budget to grow.

[00:25:11.44] spk_2:
No,

[00:25:12.12] spk_5:
this cannot desist. Moving from reactive to proactive.

[00:25:15.45] spk_2:
This is

[00:25:20.28] spk_5:
the biggest thing. If there’s a takeaway from anybody today, it’s budgeting. And sometimes I laugh. I don’t know. I talk about budgeting all day long, and I don’t know how I how this came to be, but your budget is your plan for the year.

[00:25:28.87] spk_2:
Andi. So, Daddy, and put

[00:25:30.90] spk_5:
those things in.

[00:25:32.10] spk_2:
Yes, what? Your deeds are what you what you aspire to. And don’t be anchored by what you did

[00:25:36.53] spk_0:
last year

[00:25:37.07] spk_2:
or the year before.

[00:25:38.10] spk_0:
That’s dragging you down. That’s that’s, you know, 10% 15

[00:25:53.97] spk_2:
percent growth, thinking you’ll reach your reach a $1,000,000 in revenue in 15 years. That wave incrementally 10% of 10% growth from year to year of your starting its 6 80 or something. What? How

[00:25:54.94] spk_0:
did you know? Think big.

[00:25:57.47] spk_2:
But in terms of staff and programs and, um, and needs, you know, how

[00:26:03.42] spk_0:
do you get where do you want to be?

[00:26:30.60] spk_5:
And I think this is why this is hard. But this is, like, such a sticking point. This is what I’ve kind of come toe watch with my clients because it’s actually like a really fun and clarifying exercise. Thio, get them to kind of watch them pivot into. I could do that. Yeah, well, let’s put it all in and see what the number is. I’m not talking crazy. I’m not telling you to jump from 600 K to 1.2. But what I’m saying is, if you do not say you know what, You’re right. We have even $850,000 need this year.

[00:26:36.14] spk_2:
Like,

[00:26:43.71] spk_5:
if you do not do that, how will you put a development plan in place to actually hit that? Because if you’re putting a development plan in place to,

[00:26:45.68] spk_2:
you know,

[00:26:51.69] spk_5:
way back down toe, maybe hit the 6 80 you will never hit it. And so I’m a big believer in Okay, fine. We have an $850,000 need. I’m looking around the table, right. I want that to roll off everybody’s tongue. And now we’re gonna put a plan in place on how we’re gonna bring that in

[00:27:03.20] spk_2:
because,

[00:27:12.70] spk_5:
you know, oftentimes way find we’re spending tons of time kind of on the expense side of our budget, right? Just every nook and cranny of every expense. But then we aren’t spending the same amount of time saying, OK, so how

[00:27:19.32] spk_0:
are we

[00:27:56.69] spk_5:
gonna bring in the 8 50 and let’s go back to where we started? It’s 50 to 75% of our revenue should come in from our top three donors. We sure as heck should start there. Right? And so I’m a really big believer in using your budget month to month of another little tip. So many people I work with, they haven’t looked at their budget month to month. Here’s what I’m bringing in this month. Here’s what we’re spending this month. It’s more looked at often as more of an annual basis. How do you know what to do in June if you need to bring 50 k n and you gonna spend 47 K. Okay. Well, how do we know what to do then? If we aren’t looking at it month by month?

[00:28:02.64] spk_3:
Okay, um,

[00:28:03.28] spk_5:
budgeting is huge in this huge, huge, huge.

[00:28:12.18] spk_2:
All right, we’re gonna take our our second break. Um, And since you’re, uh, fundraising professional, you’re gonna appreciate time versus goal. We’re halfway through the show, and we’ve only done two of your seven steps, so

[00:28:20.93] spk_5:
they get faster.

[00:28:21.95] spk_2:
Okay? Okay. I told you the host is lackluster at best. On a good day. Lackluster. That

[00:28:28.54] spk_5:
was my longest

[00:29:06.64] spk_2:
time versus goal. All right, take this break. Cookie Mountain Software, Their accounting product, Denali is built for non profits from the ground up so that you get an application that supports the way you work that has the features you need as a non profit and the exemplary support that understands how you work. You’ve heard me talk about that For the testimonials about the support. They have a free 60 day trial. It’s on the listener landing page at tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant. Now it’s time for Tony’s take two plan giving relationship stories. In my previous video, I talked about playing, giving relationship stories, and

[00:29:06.80] spk_0:
I left out the relationships. How do you talk about relationship

[00:29:09.12] spk_2:
if you don’t include the people I talked about, how they get started and the value of these plan giving long term relationships to your organization. And

[00:29:16.68] spk_0:
then I didn’t tell any relationship stories. How could you see Lackluster at on a good

[00:30:05.02] spk_2:
day? So, uh, plenty of relationships. Stories has four lovely stories, and there’s scores of them that I’m sure I could come up with if I put my mind to it. But these four or top of mind, um, and I tell some very touching stories about the plan giving relationships that the part of planned giving that I love the most those relationships. So those stories are on the video at tony-martignetti dot com, and that is Tony’s Take two. Now back to get to the next level with Sherry Kwan Taylor. She’s a private coach and runs a 90 day fundraising accelerator. Our Sherri, we’re getting to the donors now. We’re gonna start identifying our top 30 donors. We are suppose we’re a small organization. Can we Can we do this with 10 or 15 top donors. Absolutely. Okay,

[00:32:48.54] spk_5:
absolutely. Usually, people are like, Hey, Cheri, I love that you’re talking about top 30 donors, but I’ve got a solid nine, you know, it’s okay. It’s okay. We’re gonna start with nine, and then we’re gonna find the other ones, right? So I would say, like moving into this yet. Let’s talk. Let’s talk about our donors here. So, you know, we have those three things were our plans, our programs, our need. So now, especially with our top 30 now, we need to serve our donors. We need to make sure there’s clarity in those areas and tie it to why they would get why they value giving to the organization. And so my what I want people to hear today is you actually have way more control of the timing of the gift and the size of the gift than you think. And here’s what I mean, but I mean is you have got to craft and create great donor experiences for your top 30 donors, and I’m talking as far as saying okay, so let’s use our example. I always use Tom. And so, um, you know Tom and sue. They always male in a check of Thanksgiving. Yeah, I don’t know. They just always male in that $10,000 check. They must have a family meeting and mail it in. So I say, Well, hold on a second. Uh, we’ve done a little research on Tom and Sue, and they are giving $25,000 to the theater down the road, right? And so how do we How do we It’s It’s January right now. What do we need to dio? But two in January and November to raise their gifts, right? And so I am a believer, and we need to plan that out, and we’re gonna be flexible about it, too. But my goal would be great. So I actually want to get in front of that gift this year. And I want to make sure that I have done everything in my power to lead them to the point where we’re sitting down in October. And I’m having a really healthy, wonderful investment level discussion with them before they just mail in that gift of Thanksgiving, right? And so I want us looking at each one of our 30 donor relations donors and charting out what those steps are going to be and managing those. Because again, this could be 75% of your revenue. And so it is a lot of work. You will never hear the words come out of my mouth. Fundraising is easy because it is discipline. And it is someone waking up every morning and saying, Okay, I gotta push this bar here. I gotta push this here. I gotta move this over here and move this. It takes a lot of time. Um, so this But this is this is how you will grow. This is how you will move into investment level, gets by serving your donors in such an intimate way.

[00:32:57.24] spk_2:
Now, this will also work with Tom and Sam Couples, right?

[00:33:00.73] spk_5:
Yes, of course.

[00:33:01.96] spk_2:
Or Terry and Sue. Okay. We’ll work with it with anybody. Not strictly a hetero plan.

[00:33:07.31] spk_5:
Thank you. Thank

[00:33:08.20] spk_2:
you for pointing that out.

[00:33:19.96] spk_5:
And I’d also say, you know, sometimes people Oh, do you Do you also work with foundations or do you work with corporations or sponsorships? Um I mean, I focus on individual giving, but I would I’d say to you is I will tell you. He’s obviously these warm, wonderful relationship building experiences. It trickles down to every relationship that you should be having with a corporation who’s sponsoring something or, ah, family foundation. And so I’ve actually seen when people have gone through my program and really try to grow their individual giving that it actually has greatly impacted how how they’re approaching their events and how they’re approaching foundations and corporations. Because, um, it’s really all about creating and serving our donors in that way. So I can I’m happy to talk to some of those steps if you if you would like to dig in deeper.

[00:34:47.69] spk_2:
Yeah, well, let’s stick with our individuals of the individual donor side. So, you know, I should have also reminded our live listeners that if you want to join the conversation, uh, hit us up on Twitter, use the hashtag non profit radio hashtag non profit radio on Twitter. If you want to ask you a question or it seemed like there might be ah ah particularly motivated live listener crowd today. So if you want to join in, use that hashtag non profit radio on Twitter, please. That’s that’s what we’re checking and we’re watching it in the studio. So basically, you’re saying you need a cultivation and solicitation plan for each of your top donors. However many there are. You’re saying from between January and October, how are we going to get this couple, uh, in a face to face so that we can explain our need and hopefully raise their race? What is typically they’re you know, they’re November gift. We need a player. We need. We gotta be strategic. We need a plan for each of our donors.

[00:35:20.69] spk_5:
We need a plan and we have to allocate back to that. And we have to allocate your time towards that. It can’t just be the planet has to be really pivoting kind of thing. I’m gonna stop doing that one campaign that yields $4200 every year on Facebook because, frankly, that’s one donor that’s a $5000 donor. So again, don’t hear me say, don’t do Facebook campaigns. I want to do them, but not at the risk that you haven’t started or launched her your individual gift program.

[00:36:21.30] spk_2:
Yeah. Look, look carefully. Look carefully at events that maybe you’re hosting do eyes there. Is there a lackluster event that on this world lackluster today. But good work, eyes. They’re a lackluster event. You know, maybe maybe you don’t even like doing it. But there’s a board member or that loves this event. You know, you need to get around that you need Thio stopped with these activities that are dragging you down and are not as productive show. You’re absolutely right. A 42 100 event. That’s 1 $5000 donor. And in a year, it might be a year after that. It might be a 75 $110,000 donor, and your event isn’t going to scale that way, But individuals will so look strategically at all the things you’re doing. Not just the events, but I keep harping on those that if there is, there’s something unproductive. Put it into this individual giving plan. Yes. Oh, absolutely. But you gotta have cultivation station planned strategy for each donor, and then you gotta work it. You gotta work it. I gotta devote resources to it.

[00:37:02.23] spk_5:
Yeah, and I can I tell you the most important thing on this cultivation plan. Um, let’s say we’ve asked. You didn’t Awesome. High five. They made a decision. They said Yes. Amazing. Okay, so, you know, you heard me say, at the top of the hour, I want them giving their best gift. And I want them giving that gift every year. So after the gift, what do we D’oh! Right. I’m talking thinking my number one rule in thanking is exceed expectations. If that donor says to you, Sure. You didn’t need to do that. That was perfect,

[00:37:05.43] spk_2:
because

[00:38:10.24] spk_5:
I didn’t need to do that. How do we get our donors in an annual fund mentality? Bye. Thank you. Them? How do we get them back in the path, right? If you’re kind of thinking of this line of like, I’m gonna drive them down this line every year. I got to get him way back to the front of line and drive him down again. It’s done through thanking. And so a little tipple gives people who are listening. Oftentimes, it could be a simple of this because all of my clients say Okay, they gave, but like, I don’t know, it’s six months pass, and I don’t know what my excuses to go talk to him again, Right? Well, say, here’s what you should have done. Or here’s what you could do when they give a guest. You know, I’ll thank them. I’ll have it toned Exactly what they value have it tone to our relationship we have with them. We know what they’re interested in. And then there’s this line. I’ll put it the end. And I’ll say, Hey, um, I’m not hey, but, uh, I make it. I make it a policy to report back to people in in 90 days on just the impact that your gift is having on the lives of those we serve all be in touch. What did I just do? I just told him I was calling him in 90 days. Then I’m gonna stop in and tell him what your gift is doing. And I just got back on the path for next year.

[00:38:16.22] spk_2:
That’s excellent.

[00:38:29.55] spk_5:
Yeah, when I say you have more control of the size of the timing, you have more control. You know, when you’re really leading the donor. So hold that. Hold that. Hold that control. Like you know, I love that question. Tony, I’m gonna research that and I will circle back with you next month when I felt when I figure that out or no one’s ever asked me that. But I’m certainly gonna look that up. I’ll shoot. You knew that Back on what I find. Tell him what you’re gonna do next. Hold the control. A huge part of leading your donors through great experiences in getting them in that annual rhythm that we meet all of our donors giving it.

[00:38:52.78] spk_2:
I’m not satisfied with just one thanking tip. I need another tip from Sherri Quinn Taylor. So what’s another insider pro tip for for thanking and exceeding expectations

[00:39:53.71] spk_5:
yet So sometimes sometimes I’ll say things like, um, you know, our question I get often is, you know, what about the donor who says they’re too busy to meet with me? This is I get this all the time. Um, here’s what’s been working for my clients, you know that. Let’s kind of play this out. It’s that, you know, kind of business person. CFO, Super busy. Doesn’t have enough time running around dragon, but we want to get in front of him, right? So I’ll try to mix it up a little bit. I’ll try to do things like, Hey, Chris, um, I wanted just to stop it and share with you and just share something with you on about what your gift is doing. I’m so busy. You know what? Totally cool. I’m gonna be near your office. Do you come in early? Great. Why don’t I just buy you a cup of coffee in the corner? I’ll take 20 minutes of your time before your work day, and we’ll just chap priestly and then keep it to 20 minutes.

[00:39:55.57] spk_2:
Oh,

[00:40:19.11] spk_5:
I do the same thing at lunch. Do you take a quick lunch hour? I’m happy to be on your door stop. And just to share this with you. Because here’s the thing. I think they’re avoiding us sometimes because it’s like, Oh, my goodness, it’s going to be an hour and 1/2 lunch and I’m the busiest person on the planet. And what are they? Are they gonna ask me again? Sometimes I’ll say even say to them Hey, not asking you for a thing, but it’s really important for us to share with you what your gift is doing. So make it easy for the donor to have a meeting with you. Tell him it’s 20 minutes and gets what stick to it.

[00:40:42.02] spk_2:
Sure, timer. Thank you. Thank you. We need to keep. We need to keep moving. My heart is racing time against goal. So, uh, Okay, we’ve got our 30. We’ve got our however many it is. We’ve got our cultivation. So station plan. Let’s do this one briefly before the next break, which is about a man and 1/2. What do we need to have in hand for a solicitation?

[00:41:58.89] spk_5:
So here’s my biggest tip. Oftentimes when we don’t know how to pivot into a financial conversations were talking mission. We’re talking story all heart. I will often say, Hey, get a really casual, but I I used I call it a conversation prompt. Put it on your iPad. Just a few exhibit nothing with 100 words on it. A few exhibits that actually prompts you to start moving into a few slides that talk about how you’re growing, show how you’re funded, show your program and been fundraising percentage. Because if you have something really easy breezy that you’re just using in a conversation that is such a nice tool used to pivot into what I will call investment level conversations because I find that that like? Okay, we’re talking about this wonderful story about, you know, this family who was homeless, and now they’re not how I pivot into a money conversation. So sometimes you need tools on hand that actually are just a helper and kind of a crutch to you in the conversation that move you into an investment. Little conversation. So when the time’s right, you can say, Could I share with you how we’re planning to grow this year? I love your feedback on this. And to be able to talk a little

[00:42:04.86] spk_2:
bit through these tools are a couple. So these tools are a couple of slides that lead to the conversation. And what out? What else you got? You gotta be gotta be brief.

[00:42:11.80] spk_5:
Yeah. Leave it breezy and on an iPad. Nothing. Nothing like this is not a presentation. It’s a

[00:42:16.57] spk_2:
conversation. I’d

[00:42:18.08] spk_5:
like to use a gift chart. I have all my clients using give charge, and it’s how they’re raising their four figures to five figures and five figures. Six.

[00:42:30.30] spk_2:
This is the gift pyramid that is ubiquitous. Is that what you mean about your chart? Okay. All right. So what? The bottom it says we have our $50 gift and we need 1000 of those or whatever. And then we have our 50 to $250 gifts and we need 700 of those that set or however your top

[00:42:44.70] spk_5:
30 focused on

[00:43:44.99] spk_2:
your top 30 gift. Oh, thank Top 30 gift chart. Okay, I gotta take this last break turn to communications their former journalists so that you get help building relationships with journalists so that your call gets answered when there’s news that you need to comment on so that you stay relevant in your work you want to. You want to be heard from journalists. You gotta build a relationship. What is sharing wegner, Sherry and I talking about relationships? You build them when you don’t need them, so that when the breaking news happens and you want to comment, it’s more likely than not that they’ll pick up the phone when it’s you. Turn two can help you build those journalists relationships. They’re a turn hyphen to dot CEO. We’ve got butt loads more time for get to the next level. I say that, but I’m hesitant, but I don’t want shared commonality thinking we got 25 more minutes, so I’m I’m watching the clock for you.

[00:43:47.70] spk_5:
Thank you.

[00:43:49.84] spk_3:
It’s my job.

[00:43:51.40] spk_5:
Quickly, Quick, quick.

[00:43:52.27] spk_2:
All right. So, um, what’s next? After that, we know what we’ve got. We’re prepared for Russell Station. We’ve got our gift chart we’ve got are a couple of slides. Not a lot. What’s next?

[00:45:29.49] spk_5:
Yes. So now I wanna I wanna push back or I want to go back to this concept, which is this Step five. Because what happens if you are the person who Okay, well, I have nine, but I gotta find the rest of them, right. So in addition to what we just talked about, the next step is, But hold on. I need to find 10 times as many donors, right? I need to be moving into more strategic conversations. So my my my step here would be, Let’s also have a dual strategy running on the side where, um we are also sharing our plans, our programs in our need, with those in the community who are our networkers. There are most connected individuals. And so I cannot if you’re a person who’s trying to level up and trying to really move into mid major level gift activities. I cannot stress enough how much of an educator you need to be to anybody who will listen to you, right. And so sometimes when, um, I’ll say. But I don’t I don’t know anybody who who does who gives major guests. Let’s say that’s fine. Who is the most connected person in the community? You know, who is that person you call when your friend needs a job? That’s why I want you to go talk to, and then they a first they’re gonna be like, Oh, my cash, because this is amazing. I didn’t know you guys were 850. Does our organization. That’s fantastic, eh? You’ve raised their sights, right? So maybe they will become a donor. Right? But then the next step is No. Hey, hey, Chris. I know. I’m sure this was today. Who are two people in your world who would really be interested what I share with you today and who might have the ability to invest at the level that I’ve shared with you, Right? So I want to make sure you are running a solid donor pipeline strategy right along the prospect strategy.

[00:45:48.51] spk_2:
What’s the board’s role. What’s the board’s role in helping build the pipeline?

[00:46:03.83] spk_5:
That’s my next step here, so but I’ll go right into it here, tony. So this is where the board is. This is where it’s key for the board, right? And so I have some specific board advice. But, um, often times it’s a board member who says, Oh, I don’t know. Maybe I don’t have any large donors in my network. I don’t say I don’t believe that Everybody does. We just may not know it. It’s also not a big deal. I just need to talk to your connectors. Then I’m

[00:46:17.62] spk_2:
not gonna

[00:47:40.53] spk_5:
ask them for money. So great. So let’s talk about who are the people in your world who are those movers and shakers and know everybody in the community. And so my my approach with the board and I’m gonna give some advice here, too. A lot of people will come to me in there, excuse for why they are the reason I should excuse. A reason for why they haven’t grown is well. My board doesn’t know they’re supposed to fundraise or I don’t have the right board members on on hand and hear me say I want your board to be engaged and thoughtful and you know, in the pocket with you and helping you do all of this fundraising. Ay dio and I work with that work with toward that all day long. But I’d also say to the executive director or development director who’s listening, Don’t wait on your board. Don’t sit back and you’re I don’t know. I don’t have any major guest because I’m waiting for my board to bring names to the table. You know, you still have to be carrying a great amount of the load, and I wish it weren’t that way. But it’s the truth. And so my biggest device and getting the board engaged, you know, 20. We talked about creating great donor experiences. If you have a board who’s kind of like I don’t I don’t I don’t know how I would introduce you. I don’t know what this looks like. You know, many board members, most most board members, I have never had to sit down and ask somebody for $25,000. They don’t know how to do it,

[00:47:41.75] spk_2:
right? So what do we do?

[00:48:28.47] spk_5:
So model it. I would say, I want I want you soliciting each one of your board members every year. And I want you to create a donor experience cultivation plan for each board member and show them how it’s done. Serve each one of your board members so they can see it. Because when you do this, it will be amazing. Still safe. Oh, well, okay, so that’s like I didn’t I didn’t know that’s what you were going to. D’oh! And so they’re not introducing you to their network because they’re afraid you’re gonna walk in and it’s gonna be a stick up high. Give me $10,000 so you have to model it to them. And when they see that, you actually served that you’ve created this warm and wonderful donor experience. And actually, the solicitation wasn’t that painful and scary all the sudden It’s like, Oh, okay, well, that actually is really well done. You know, maybe I can introduce you to my network, So model it for them because they don’t know how to do it either.

[00:48:42.67] spk_2:
Yeah, they don’t know what it is you’re asking. They just have an image. Imagine somebody

[00:48:43.95] spk_5:
had scary things happened before they don’t want those happen again,

[00:48:46.39] spk_2:
right? Some of your top prospects, maybe board members.

[00:48:49.27] spk_5:
Yes,

[00:48:50.17] spk_2:
of course. I mean, that’s not that’s not presume that they’re mutually exclusive. All right, all right. You wanna make explicit? Okay?

[00:48:57.21] spk_5:
Absolutely. And we want we want to be getting their their best.

[00:49:01.32] spk_2:
I like your idea of if you don’t know anybody who’s ah, potential major donor, who’s who with connectors that you know. Who do you go to when you want to get your child an internship? You know, let’s introduce me, those people, because they’re the They’re the influencers in the community. Okay, what’s next?

[00:49:19.44] spk_5:
Yeah, so here we were. Really? I’m We’re at the left. Step here.

[00:49:23.08] spk_2:
Solicitation. Solicitation.

[00:49:41.06] spk_5:
Here’s Here’s the big thing. So So yeah. So we’re soliciting. I know. I want us moving into solicitations. Um, here’s the thing. Using a gift chart really does help, you know, because I want us to be able to invite them into investing, And we might say things like, You know, I don’t know if you can, but I loved it. Invite you to be one of our top three donors are our top 10 donors.

[00:49:49.32] spk_0:
What do you do I? I got

[00:49:50.27] spk_2:
a I got a question out of the box of that. You’re pointing to the gift chart, and you’re pointing up near the top are at the top, and they say, I’m I’m down here.

[00:50:52.92] spk_5:
That’s okay. That’s okay. So let’s pretend it’s somebody who we have No clue, but we actually don’t know they’re given capacity, so we might be having a very exploratory conversations. You know, Chris, I don’t I don’t know if you can, but I’d love to invite you to be one of our top 30 donors, you know, until the bottom box might be five k. And then my biggest advice, tony, is be quiet. Let them talk, right? Like we don’t have to fill the silence. They’re going to say something like, Oh, yeah, yeah. Certainly could do that. Yeah, well, let me let me talk to my spouse, and we certainly could do that. Or if they say I don’t I don’t know if I’m gonna be the top 30. You know, I certainly could, you know, maybe think about it, but that would be that would be one of our largest guests. That is wonderful information to know and we’re not asking. We’re offering way. Don’t know if they can, but we’d love to invite them to be. They are a donor who’s been giving maybe every year, every year. 555

[00:50:54.70] spk_2:
You

[00:51:21.42] spk_5:
know, I may have a line at that Top 10 and maybe the top 10 is a 75 $100 gift. And I’ll say you’ve been giving so faithfully like we’re so thankful. All these things. No, I don’t know if you can, but would you would you think about being a top 10 donor, Right? So we’ve just asked them to up their gift until my point of all of this is, you can move into a conversation about the gift. No, it doesn’t. It’s not a scary thing.

[00:51:22.36] spk_2:
And it’s

[00:51:22.79] spk_5:
okay if they say it

[00:51:24.08] spk_2:
shouldn’t be.

[00:51:24.56] spk_5:
That could do that yet,

[00:51:52.00] spk_2:
right? Don’t be afraid to talk about the talk about the gift, right? That’s what that’s work. That’s why we’re there, just they say x and you say, Oh, thank you so much. No, no, that, you know, I say six knows and you’re halfway to a Yes. So, you know, keep the conversation going. No, I couldn’t possibly Well, uh, there’s the future, and there’s the need. And, you know, don’t don’t. This is what I could do. Okay. Thank you. You sold yourself out.

[00:51:55.96] spk_5:
Yeah, totally. And here’s one, and I’m watching the clock here to tony. But, like, here’s one that’ll give people. You know, sometimes you’re

[00:52:02.94] spk_2:
so time conscious, Sherry. Okay. Don’t. She’s content. Geez,

[00:52:06.76] spk_5:
now I’m watching

[00:52:08.30] spk_2:
you going, listeners,

[00:52:34.53] spk_5:
you’re asking. I got to get this kid knows I’m like, I gotta say this, Um, if you just asked and they’re not ready to give you a yes or no. Here’s my remember I said, I want you to leave your donors and hold that control. The worst thing you could D’oh. Sometimes with my early Astor’s, I’ll say, Oh, my gosh, You asked. Fantastic. Congratulations. How’d you leave it with? Um they said they’d get back to me, right? Oh, no. The worst thing ever, because it’s like you

[00:52:39.02] spk_2:
by the balls. You said you said earlier. Use your power. You know, you want to be that you want to be following up, not waiting for them,

[00:52:45.29] spk_5:
right? Make sure you’ve said you know what? Totally fine. Let’s look here and I kind of pretending to pick up my phone. Um, you know, are you in town in two, maybe two Fridays? Yeah, the 17. Great. I’ll reach out to you the morning of 17 C. Look, questions. You have to see if you’ve made a decision. We’ll have another conversation about it, Right? What did I just do? It picked up the control against

[00:53:05.79] spk_2:
exactly

[00:53:12.25] spk_5:
so often. It’s like I asked, I shared. I just didn’t hear from him. We didn’t hold the control. Super. Super important?

[00:53:36.95] spk_2:
Absolutely. Yeah. Yes, you need to. It’s a relationship, but it’s not 100% mutual. You need to You need to keep your control. Absolutely. You need thio because that’s the progress. You know, you need to move this relationship along your earlier relationship, your earlier hypothetical relationship, but, uh, tomans, whoever they were, the hetero company. You know

[00:53:40.01] spk_0:
you have this, Angela, you got to get to this couple. You gotta talk to

[00:53:46.64] spk_2:
these people and move them. And not just once, probably before they make their gift in November. So things need to move along. You can’t rely on other people too, to manage the timetable for you because it doesn’t matter to them. It

[00:53:56.88] spk_0:
matters to you.

[00:54:04.31] spk_2:
These are your needs. You gotta absolutely. You got to keep the control, the power out where you want to define it. Label it. You gotta move the thing along the relationship along.

[00:54:49.51] spk_5:
Yeah, and part of the last step is really you know. Okay, so this this always good planning and we have our tools in hand and we’re ready to do this. But at the end of the day, most fund raising an issue fail When? When the time is not allocated to do this. So even if your top 10 if you think of well, I’m gonna sit with him 3 to 4 times a year, that’s 40 meeting, right? And so if you are not planning out all those meetings all year long, you will not hit them all. You will not. And this is when I get calls in October, with their fiscal years ending in December saying, Oh, no. Oh, no. I’ve only I’ve only brought in 30% of my revenue. And how do I make it up in the last three months of the year? And my answer is it was what you did between January and October like That’s how you would have would have made it up. So you’ve got to move into the discipline and regularity of these activities to pivot up into these larger get

[00:55:11.74] spk_2:
Cherie. We gotta leave it there. It’s perfect. A CZ you said at the end of the day. Yes, you gotta perfectly said, No need to repeat it. Sherry Kwame Taylor Sherry can tell. You’ll find her at kwame taylor dot com And at Sherry. Cute Taylor. Thank you so much for sharing Sherry. One.

[00:55:22.17] spk_5:
Appreciate it.

[00:55:23.06] spk_2:
My pleasure.

[00:55:23.61] spk_5:
Eight weekend

[00:55:26.07] spk_2:
Thank you Next week, Peter Heller, another innovator on keeping the fund inboard fundraising, will dive down into that drill into that bit. Plus, Maria Semple returns. If

[00:55:37.27] spk_0:
you missed any

[00:56:05.80] spk_2:
part of today’s show, I beseech you, find it on tony-martignetti dot com were sponsored by wegner-C.P.As guiding you beyond the numbers wegner-C.P.As dot com. But Cougar Mountain Software Denali Fund is there complete accounting solution made for nonprofits tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant Mountain for a free 60 day trial and by turn, to communications, PR and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission. Turn hyphen to dot CEO. A

[00:56:46.09] spk_0:
creative producer is clear. Meyerhoff, Sam Leibowitz is the line producer shows Social Media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our Web guy, and this music is by Scott Stein. You’re with me next week for not profit radio. Big non profit ideas for the other 95% Go out and be great talking alternative radio 24 hours a day.

Nonprofit Radio for November 15, 2019: Music To Major Gifts

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My Guest:

Mitchell Linker: Music To Major Gifts
No One Dreams of Being a Fundraiser.” It’s a nonprofit truism and Mitchell Linker’s book. He and his music are with me for the hour. (Originally aired 12/1/17)

 

 

 

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[00:00:14.64] spk_1:
Hello and welcome to tony-martignetti non profit radio big non profit ideas for the other 95%.

[00:00:22.54] spk_2:
I’m your aptly named host.

[00:00:24.08] spk_1:
Oh, I’m glad you’re with me. I’d be thrown into exile,

[00:01:20.84] spk_2:
Fauria. If I saw that you missed today’s show music to major GIF ts No one dreams of being a fundraiser. It’s a non profit truism, and it’s Mitchell Lincoln’s book. He and his music are with me for the hour. This originally aired on December 1st 2017 on Tony’s Take to I’m Looking for Innovators were sponsored by wegner-C.P.As guiding you beyond the numbers wegner-C.P.As dot com. But Cougar Mountain Software Denali Fund is there complete accounting solution made for nonprofits tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant Mountain for a free 60 day trial and by turned to communications, PR and content for nonprofits. Your story is their mission. Turn hyphen to dot CEO, and here is music to major gif ts. What a pleasure. Welcome Mitch Linker to the studio. He is a professional fundraiser in education and author of No one Dreams of Being a Fundraiser. My unexpected journey from music to Major gif ts

[00:01:30.28] spk_1:
Welcome studio, Mitch, Thanks a lot. I’m grateful to be here. That’s a pleasure. Yes, I’m a fan of the show. Thank

[00:01:37.57] spk_2:
you. Thank you. Well, that that’s a prerequisite to being get now. It’s actually,

[00:01:39.77] spk_1:
uh, it helps. It helps. Sucking up definitely helps. Don’t Don’t suck up to them. And you look great today. Yes. Thank you. I got a lot

[00:01:46.21] spk_2:
of crushing questions for you. Don’t worry.

[00:01:47.54] spk_1:
Okay. Um, all right. So music to major gift. That was That’s Thea. That’s York. That’s your story. Yeah. Story so far at least. Okay. Oh, so there may be another career. Well, given

[00:01:59.05] spk_4:
my track record, there could be several. Yeah.

[00:02:00.90] spk_2:
Oh, I see. All right, so there may be, like, fundraiser to French

[00:02:04.57] spk_1:
teacher. Okay, I think

[00:02:05.78] spk_4:
I’m I think I found my found like Okay,

[00:02:14.48] spk_2:
cool. All right. So, music, young age. Yeah. I’m talking to a former professional musician that you

[00:02:19.33] spk_1:
professionals, a little charitable, much money song made money to defend, not a living

[00:02:22.97] spk_2:
by are barely squeaking. No credit cards were important to you.

[00:02:28.20] spk_1:
Wake up to some of that. All right, But, you know, we got to start with the early days. So the kiss concert 1979. Yeah, very important to you. And

[00:02:40.39] spk_2:
your brother. Um, you pleaded pleaded with your dad. He took you. Why? Why? What happened while I was still big to you?

[00:02:42.34] spk_1:
You know? I don’t

[00:02:43.07] spk_4:
know. It was at a time in my life there was some personal turmoil going on, you know? And so I think it became something that I could cling to some transitions going on. And what

[00:02:53.72] spk_1:
about kiss? Kiss? I was the makeup, the makeup. It’s funny, The music.

[00:02:57.71] spk_4:
Not so much. It was the makeup I just remembered. Like tracing their faces on that old tracing paper.

[00:03:01.98] spk_2:
Yes. I don’t have a trace of

[00:03:03.01] spk_1:
onion skin. Yeah, exactly. You traced over it with a pencil? Yeah. Became obsessed with them. And who’s your

[00:03:08.47] spk_2:
favorite in the band?

[00:03:13.03] spk_4:
It was Gene. Gene Simmons had to be late. Was I should say, Was it waas?

[00:03:19.80] spk_1:
I don’t have a favorite, and you know, he’s around. Back in the day,

[00:03:24.52] spk_4:
he was the guy. There was something just so you know, demonic and terrifying about you weren’t loved.

[00:03:26.62] spk_2:
You had never seen him live.

[00:03:27.81] spk_4:
Never seen them live.

[00:03:29.40] spk_2:
Dad took you And your impression. What can you remember?

[00:04:00.10] spk_4:
Well, the problem was which I talk about in the book was that I got sick. I think I was probably too young to be on the show. I was seven and I just didn’t feel well. I think the noise, the just the overall stimulation of it all. I just remember sitting there kind of crying and upset the whole time. And I remember seeing it. I remember seeing Jim Gene Simmons flying and I I have vivid memories of the experience, especially considering how long ago it was. But it wasn’t a happy memory on that. I want it getting sick and I went down health.

[00:04:00.76] spk_2:
All right, so So I mean, that’s all right. That’s not a great memory. So why, Why Continued in music or what? Well, you’re only seven, then

[00:04:12.59] spk_1:
you’re still doing your still dabbling in music a little bit at a young age. Obviously it

[00:04:17.34] spk_4:
was obviously, it’s part of sort of the tableau of how I became a musician, because I mean, and I continue to be fascinated with them for years and years, So that was sort of my gateway. Um, so

[00:04:23.95] spk_1:
yeah, it was very formidable. For whatever reason, I’m sure

[00:04:27.21] spk_4:
a lot of people have that story or some variation cause kiss spoke to young kids during that era.

[00:04:40.99] spk_2:
All right? Yeah, but you got sick, and then you’re still continue to you know, you’re well, everything is Everything is life or death. When you’re seven years old, it’s so important to you. Everything is you know, the red wagon was important, but all right, but all right,

[00:04:48.08] spk_1:
you continued on. Um, so your music career was kind of like I

[00:04:52.54] spk_2:
see, like, 3 to 1. There were three people in the dent. Yeah. Then you were down to two with the day traders.

[00:05:00.70] spk_1:
Man, you did your home Any whatsoever, the ball. I appreciate what you remembered it. I do have it written down, but I do remember I’m looking in his eyes. I’m saying, now, that was the dent and the day traders and then ends and then solo eso

[00:05:15.79] spk_2:
and the day traders was too. There was a to person to person act. All right, Um, the

[00:05:18.36] spk_1:
dent was important to Yeah. Now. All right. I just want to set the scene. Now. You grew up in you Grew up in West Hartford. No, no, I was originally New

[00:05:24.17] spk_4:
York City. When I was very young and I moved to Connecticut. My family moved to connect, okay, and I’ve

[00:05:29.64] spk_1:
been in Connecticut. Everyone’s not West Hartford,

[00:05:37.13] spk_4:
no Fairfield County, Fairfield, Fairfield. And that I’ve been in the central heart, Central Connecticut region, like West Hartford since the year 2000.

[00:05:38.26] spk_1:
Okay, now I know

[00:05:41.73] spk_2:
West Hartford. I mean, I guess as I was growing up in North Jersey, I don’t know if this is still true. Um, what started? It was very wealthy community because a lot of insurance companies were based in Hartford, right? And then a lot of senior executive lives in West Hartford, right? That was a pretty exclusive place. And in fact, I remember when I was, ah planned giving director, visiting a potential donor who was a retired insurance executive in West Hartford. And he had a huge house. I don’t know. It was hard for

[00:06:05.35] spk_1:
you when you were growing

[00:06:06.32] spk_2:
up. Was it still that way?

[00:06:07.45] spk_1:
What’s offered is

[00:06:08.00] spk_4:
a great place there. There are a lot of really great quality of life sort of suburban towns in central Connecticut, glass and very Avon and West Hartford. Certainly. Probably the top.

[00:06:16.75] spk_2:
Okay, but that’s not where you grew up

[00:06:22.02] spk_4:
in Fairfield. Careful, County. If you feel count well, fearful

[00:06:23.10] spk_2:
of the town. The town in Fairfield County knows that Southern at Southern Connecticut, near New York City, that it’s a good place for commuters to live. But there is also a town named Fairfield

[00:06:32.20] spk_1:
and felt very

[00:06:33.06] spk_4:
far like when I moved to central Connecticut. Like the only time I ever went to Central Connecticut was to go to the Hartford Civic Center to see things like kiss concerts when I lived down in Fairfield County. Okay, so it was.

[00:06:42.92] spk_1:
Even though it’s a small state,

[00:06:44.30] spk_4:
they’re two very distinct areas.

[00:06:46.11] spk_2:
All right. And

[00:06:49.40] spk_1:
you were You were a musical act in Connecticut. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, you made something

[00:06:52.81] spk_2:
of a name for yourself in Connecticut.

[00:07:01.11] spk_1:
I like to think so. The hostess joking. Excuse me. Yeah. Okay. Um, starting with the dent. You and two friends? Yeah. Tell us about the dead. Yeah,

[00:07:15.92] spk_4:
Boy, man, do we go back? I were talking Jeff and I My God, we would play with tennis rockets before we could actually play instruments when we’re positive way. And then we segue way too real instruments. As we got older in high school, and and then we met Dan. So, yeah, the

[00:07:22.27] spk_1:
three of us

[00:07:25.81] spk_4:
go way, way back to, like, 15 years old. And, um And then as we got older, we got more serious and started actually writing songs and obviously playing our own instruments. And then it just became

[00:07:32.76] spk_2:
all right. You want a karaoke band

[00:07:33.98] spk_1:
now? You actually did play instruments? Yeah. We actually played instruments. And yours. Yours was originally

[00:07:39.13] spk_4:
I was a drummer. And then I was, ah, demoted to lead singer.

[00:07:44.14] spk_1:
Okay, I play piano

[00:07:45.75] spk_4:
took for writing purposes, but I’m not good at have never been proficient.

[00:07:49.18] spk_1:
Okay, That shows that such a

[00:07:50.27] spk_4:
difficult question for me to answer. I say I’m a musician. People ask what I do, and I get this 10 minute answer.

[00:08:01.54] spk_1:
Well, it just depends how detailed you want to do anything ridiculous. Well, all right. All right. That’s okay. But you played okay. All right, let’s go out. Let’s go out for

[00:08:39.24] spk_2:
our first break. Sure. Um, Well, uh, yeah, with which is me, um, speaking. And, uh and so if you stand by, um, Central Brick. Okay, it’s time for a break. Wegner-C.P.As. Does your accountant return your calls and e mails. Do they keep to their deadlines? Do you like them? Are they nice people toe work with? Are they keeping mistakes to a minimum? If these aren’t all yeses, then maybe it’s time to look for a replacement. You know, a partner at wegner-C.P.As euh Doom. But on the show many times. Gonna be coming back early next year. You start at wegner-C.P.As dot com, check them out, and

[00:08:42.15] spk_1:
then ring him up. Give him a call,

[00:09:13.14] spk_2:
Talk to eat, See if wegner can help you wegner-C.P.As dot com Now back to music to major gif ts Now back. Too much liquor and his book. Um, nobody dreams of being a fundraiser. All right, so the dent was, uh it took time. I mean, it was hard to get traction. Yeah, you didn’t have a book or you don’t have an agent, right? You were recording doing some gigs. What

[00:09:13.67] spk_1:
happened? Funny, I would

[00:09:16.33] spk_4:
recommend that everyone write a book because for me, even if very few people read it, it was like therapy. And I

[00:09:23.17] spk_1:
learned a lot

[00:09:23.69] spk_4:
about my started process. And to your question, one of the things I realize in hindsight because we struggled so much. We were so focused on this dream but had difficulty, as you say, getting traction.

[00:09:34.71] spk_1:
Part of it

[00:09:35.14] spk_4:
was in some sense, we weren’t all in, and I realized about that about myself. You know, I wasn’t the type of guy who’s gonna live in a van for six months in total squalor like I loved writing songs. I loved music

[00:09:47.45] spk_1:
and I did love traveling, but I just never was able to

[00:09:49.61] spk_4:
kind of make that full life commitment. And I

[00:09:53.22] spk_1:
only realized

[00:09:53.93] spk_4:
that in retrospect, I guess that’s sort of an aside. But

[00:09:56.87] spk_1:
that’s one of the 50

[00:09:57.91] spk_4:
things I learned about myself in the process of writing this thing. And so it’s

[00:10:01.78] spk_1:
sort of helped me realize Oh yeah,

[00:10:16.47] spk_4:
that’s that’s that’s what happened to an extent, maybe we didn’t commit as much as we should have. We committed to the writing and, like the dream was there. But as far as what you actually need to boot to d’oh, it’s so difficult and unpleasant.

[00:10:17.60] spk_2:
Yeah, maybe you over romanticized

[00:10:19.57] spk_1:
it. I

[00:10:19.83] spk_4:
think so. Yeah. Yeah. Now how

[00:10:24.34] spk_2:
do you feel about your commitment to fund raising today?

[00:10:25.38] spk_4:
0 100%. Okay? Yeah. No, I feel like this is my do over.

[00:10:29.29] spk_1:
So here. Okay, that’s what I’m trying to get it. But as you were a musician is still

[00:10:33.98] spk_2:
with the Dent. You felt like you were committed. Then Did

[00:10:36.00] spk_1:
you feel committed then, Do you think? I mean, is it possible to look back and say,

[00:10:45.20] spk_2:
You know, there were times when I just really wasn’t sure I should be doing it, but I kept kept on or did you feel like you were all in then? But now, looking back, you feel like you weren’t.

[00:10:49.04] spk_4:
That’s a great question. That’s why you’re good at this.

[00:10:51.18] spk_1:
Cool. I got scored one, Okay. Initiating host. Because I think to

[00:10:55.97] spk_4:
some degree, I probably always knew and

[00:10:58.51] spk_1:
part of

[00:11:02.32] spk_4:
it. And this is another epiphany. I kind of wondered why I think the dent we just kind of stayed with each other out of familiarity, familiarity and comfort were best friends.

[00:11:08.18] spk_1:
Maybe that

[00:11:36.58] spk_4:
wasn’t the best sort of trio. Maybe that wasn’t the best partnership for over all of us. And perhaps if I had not, I was just so so committed to these guys. Maybe if I had gone solo earlier or met someone else or one of them met someone else. Maybe I would have sort of hitch my wagon to a different thing and momentum would have occurred. There was just something about the dynamic of the three of us that, in a way held us back. And I think on some level I knew that. I really do know now in hindsight, so great, much

[00:11:44.34] spk_1:
interesting. Okay, now Ah, there’s a lot of hard

[00:11:59.82] spk_2:
work. There’s a lot of there’s some overlap between being a struggling musician band, right? And fundraising, right? You point out Rejection. Networking? Yeah. Um um And you have 1/3 1 too? Oh, well, a thick skin. I guess that’s partly right. Partly that’s affiliated with rejection. Do you feel like some of what you faced negatively with the dent And then the day traders, you know, actually helped you in fundraising?

[00:12:15.65] spk_1:
Yes. And that’s

[00:12:34.34] spk_4:
a thing. Well, I well, despite what I just said, you know, in my mind I was generally all in and it was all I thought about. And as I talk about the book constantly pounding the pavement, trying to get gigs, trying t o get a record deal. That was really that was that was the fingers. And so,

[00:12:35.59] spk_1:
you know, there was a real

[00:12:36.66] spk_4:
commitment there, and yeah, it was just constant rejection, like anyone Good thing would happen and it would be almost a surprise

[00:12:59.29] spk_1:
radio. You want us to know exactly what was wrong with you? Sure Got a judge to make it a little hasty. Take the weekend to think about it, and then let us know if you actually wanted to play next Friday. References of people who protected us. So that did

[00:13:15.96] spk_4:
inadvertently trained me. And I talk about that a lot in the book, which is how you came to the question. But, um, yeah, I was used to rejection. I was used to things being difficult, used to the struggle. And when I started to have success in something that that wasn’t music, which was the fundraising, it

[00:13:18.22] spk_1:
was just

[00:13:35.37] spk_4:
amazing. It was like this incredible epiphany. And that’s the ironic thing is there were so many periods of time in the early days and music days when I thought, Am I wasting my life? Certainly people in my life probably thought I might be needing to make a pivot, but it turned out to to be great training what I encourage anyone to do. What I did is their path to fundraising. Not necessarily, but

[00:13:41.83] spk_1:
everybody’s got some path to it. And

[00:13:44.81] spk_2:
rarely, as your title suggests, Is it linear

[00:13:52.67] spk_4:
right? I don’t know that I sort of have the confidence in the fortitude and the desire that I have now if I hadn’t gone through that, so I have no regrets, though there is a period of time where it felt dark.

[00:13:59.98] spk_1:
They have a day job during the transition. 3 to 1 drink. Maybe that’s part of

[00:14:04.21] spk_4:
the commitment thing. I never just quit that job and completely did it. I was getting a little too scared. That’s probably what I mean. When I say, like, was I fully in? I think I’ve always had a little too much of a fear factor,

[00:14:33.73] spk_2:
actually, even interesting. Now, your second band, we’re not gonna really dwell on the second band. Yes, two of you, But day trader I mean, that’s not they’re not all day traders. I don’t consider being all in. It’s not like they’re invested in a Wall Street career. I mean, they’re in a stock for a couple hours, and then they’re out. So, yeah, maybe there was something pressing it about that name of nose. I don’t know what I’m saying.

[00:14:53.20] spk_1:
Yeah, it was. Now that I’m not being very impressed by perceptive, I think about this. Joe doesn’t just come together. Country popular, believe. Get email. Like, you know, this is a slapdash Oh, I love it. But I know it’s not that, you know, it’s not true. All right, So the day job was you were you were involved in nonprofits eventually

[00:14:53.91] spk_4:
landed in non profits for a while. I had a dalliance is with several different random things on, and eventually I stumbled upon non profits. I know awareness of the nonprofit sector.

[00:15:03.40] spk_2:
Alien says good work. Thank you, but I’m sure not probably radio listeners will know that we’re but it’s good work.

[00:15:16.40] spk_4:
Every now and then, I’ll pull one out. But that was probably the only time in this show. So when I first started in development, who wasn’t conscious really was more just a job,

[00:15:21.70] spk_2:
he needed a justice in their life, right? My love of

[00:15:24.72] spk_1:
exactly. Exactly. And it worked well for a

[00:15:26.43] spk_4:
while. It was very, uh,

[00:15:33.52] spk_2:
there was a time when you became a lot more intentional about a career in development. Starting to music. Music was not paying off, right? I was getting old. Yes. You’re getting older.

[00:15:39.41] spk_1:
How would you know? I think we should set the contact. How do you know

[00:15:41.45] spk_4:
I am? Wow. This is

[00:15:55.40] spk_2:
gonna come. I mean, you wrote a book about your life held 45 0 k. 45 Much anger. I get 10 years on you. All right. That’s a good thing. This is a podcast. Nobody contest that assertion that you just made. Um, you could go on the website making tony-martignetti dot com make your own decision about whether which looks younger.

[00:16:04.03] spk_1:
It was saying that I was indicative. I think people should draw that conclusion on the run.

[00:16:11.62] spk_2:
I think it is a self serving pathetic, you know, sounds presidential Almost. Okay, We don’t do politics. I’m not profit radio.

[00:16:13.84] spk_1:
So you became a little intentional? Uh, yeah. Things were not

[00:16:17.65] spk_2:
going well. Money tight music, floundering. Really? Your own gig. You’re on your solo career. You said you canceled. You cancel every gig. You’re in your music and your solo career, right? Literally canceled every gig. That

[00:16:30.29] spk_1:
Yeah. And then the whole thing

[00:16:31.61] spk_4:
is that when I think I feel like I actually started to find my voice and got better at music, I was at a point where I was too late. Like I said earlier, I was in these bands and I was felt beholden to these other people. And

[00:16:42.17] spk_1:
then when I

[00:16:42.42] spk_4:
finally went solo, I felt like I gotta groove. But at that point, I had a lot of debt. I was getting older, and and then what really happened? Was he The economy tanked out, and I don’t. So yeah, I felt so vulnerable. And I thought, Well, I’m already in development. I’m gonna make this my thing. And I just completely abandoned music at that time,

[00:16:59.99] spk_2:
Okay? Now And that you were doing database management. And then you moved into Prospect Research. Yeah, around this’ll 87 4008

[00:17:07.92] spk_1:
recession time or a little bit earlier. I was doing well.

[00:17:15.64] spk_4:
You said advancement surfaces. Then I was broadening it a little, but it was still not I was doing major gifts, you

[00:17:18.02] spk_1:
know, So but generally

[00:17:19.02] spk_4:
I was sort of the research guy

[00:17:24.60] spk_1:
back. Still back office? Yes. Something you talk about. Two bosses

[00:17:35.42] spk_2:
were discouraged. You and one who encouraged you. Um, discouraging ones. What we wantto little cautionary tale. How did they discovered you in your, uh Because you had expressed an interest to them in right of career and fundraising and furthering your working fundraising and two people discouraged you. How so?

[00:17:42.23] spk_1:
Well, I think in an

[00:17:44.94] spk_4:
in hindsight, maybe I would have discouraged me, too, because I was still kind of like a young punk. You know, I guess I still had an air of

[00:17:53.21] spk_2:
I mean, they would you respect him? You worked for them?

[00:17:54.94] spk_1:
Yeah. I mean, when it was never malicious.

[00:17:56.67] spk_4:
But I think I just I didn’t look the part at the time. You know, our act, the part. Probably. I probably acted young and,

[00:18:03.45] spk_1:
you know, I was very

[00:18:20.03] spk_4:
vocal about my love of music. So I’ve sort of had me compartmentalized. I write eso then to suddenly say, I want to do this very serious, very diametric opposite you. Another good word of trick.

[00:18:20.52] spk_2:
Oh, that’s not a good word.

[00:18:21.40] spk_4:
I don’t know. Did he use it wrong?

[00:18:23.75] spk_2:
No. It depends what you mean. We’re not gonna flush it out, but I don’t think it’s good. Okay, now I’m

[00:18:30.44] spk_1:
gonna move on, okay? So that I’ll point out the vocabulary. You have got to stop myself. You really do. I’ll point out that I don’t. Who will? I’ll

[00:18:46.66] spk_2:
point out the high points, and we’ll let listeners make most of the decisions on their own. Okay. Um, So ah, so

[00:18:47.55] spk_1:
let’s talk about the guy

[00:18:48.23] spk_2:
who are the man or woman who inspired you. Somebody believed in you. Yeah. What? That person,

[00:18:53.32] spk_1:
a few people along the way just sort of

[00:19:02.99] spk_4:
recognize that I had, um ah, personality. That might be, um, suitable. Yeah. Thank you. Um,

[00:19:05.36] spk_1:
that. And I

[00:19:06.16] spk_4:
guess I I was always

[00:19:10.25] spk_1:
conducive. That was good, E. I think part of it

[00:19:18.18] spk_4:
was just I had a lot of different ages. Yeah. Okay. Okay. I think I was, um, that I had an energy and a zeal, and and so, um,

[00:19:27.41] spk_1:
it’s a man or a woman. It was a few people long encouraged me, and maybe we

[00:19:49.73] spk_2:
should be seeing people beneath the surface and look at what traits they possess and how those might actually uh, transform into a fundraising career or anything in no profit so that, you know, we peel away the layer. Let’s not judge a book by the cover. And there are There are traits that people have that could be valuable to non profit.

[00:19:52.48] spk_1:
And yeah, we should try to see

[00:19:53.71] spk_2:
that if if we’re ever in this kind of situation,

[00:20:10.73] spk_4:
I agree. And I’m deeply grateful for that for that encouragement, cause at that point in my life, I hadn’t had much encouragement. You know, I’d sort of just been on my own trying this thing, and it wasn’t really working out. And then, um, it goes such a long way. And yeah, I agree that it was sort of a raw skill energy. Whatever I had that had sort of a few people had noticed. And I was grateful for that. And I would have never really come to that on my own.

[00:20:58.81] spk_2:
You say that you perceived fundraising as the guys in Glengarry Glen Ross, which happens to be a favorite movie of mine. But you know, if those who may not know it it is excellent. Um uh, Al Pacino. Ah, Walter Matthau. No, no, Jack Lemmon couple Al Pacino. Alec Baldwin. Very, very small but very pivotal role. Al Pacino. Jack Lemmon, Alan Arkin. Excellent. Ed Harris. Excellent. Kevin Spacey. Yep. Excellent. Yeah. Um okay, so these are these are shyster real estate people. We get the I didn’t get the idea for a movie that they’re spending selling marshland in Florida people. Um and that was sort of your perception of

[00:21:07.95] spk_1:
gifts, of asking people for money and, you know, part of

[00:21:24.70] spk_4:
it’s funny. I remember I went to this conference early on, and I was I was doing research at the time, and I went to this. It’s very funny nights. I went to this, um, dinner, and it was basically major gift people. I don’t even know why I went to it. Um, you may have been that it was for everybody, but was predominately major, give people and like, the volume of that room was so loud, it was just a bunch of what I perceived as extroverts. Just really sort of out there confident people,

[00:21:35.44] spk_1:
and part of

[00:21:58.67] spk_4:
it from he was a jealousy, because I had been so just estranged from that world order. I was just a very small world, and I wasn’t very confident. And then I saw these people in these personalities, and I just thought, Man, that’s what fundraising must be. You’ve got to be this big, outgoing person. I can’t do that. That’s not my personality. And I know where you’re going with this, but basically, I came to realize you don’t necessarily have to be that way. Um, but it was just It was so intimidating to me. And then when I unpeeled back what I thought a major gift officer does and what they do Dio it just seems so scary. And it just I sort of pigeonholed. You have to be a certain type of person who is outgoing and brave and frankly, all the things in many ways you do need to be. But it was so different from how I perceive myself.

[00:22:25.21] spk_2:
I don’t know how you know where I’m going, because I don’t know where I’m going.

[00:22:27.38] spk_1:
Okay, great. I’m sure I’m not sure how you’ve mastered that thing. Seems like a good place. We’re gonna play one of Mitch’s song.

[00:22:32.65] spk_4:
Oh, my gosh.

[00:22:33.27] spk_2:
Um, it’s Ah, it’s better. This is the dent. Is that this? Is

[00:22:36.44] spk_1:
this is me. So this is a solo. I’m sorry. Okay, Is the last thing I don’t know things air. You know, he’s making his transition now.

[00:22:49.39] spk_2:
Getting serious about, uh ah. Career in in fundraising. So things are looking up. It’s Ah, Mitch linker. Yeah. So low.

[00:22:52.66] spk_4:
So low.

[00:22:53.08] spk_2:
Better. Anything else you want to say to lead

[00:22:54.56] spk_1:
into it? Well, this was never

[00:22:56.88] spk_4:
never It was recorded as a demo, but it never went anywhere. I never did an album, you know. I didn’t put it on iTunes or anything that this was right at the moment that I basically stopped. So this is the first time anyone in the world

[00:23:08.73] spk_1:
All right, so it’s a podcast, so you can play it back. You’re not gonna buy it anywhere. You cannot buy it. Give me a

[00:23:14.37] spk_4:
call when you got

[00:23:15.21] spk_1:
here. It is better.

[00:24:57.94] spk_8:
Which way to go? Wait. No way.

[00:28:36.99] spk_2:
Which linker better? You heard here on non profit radio. The only place you will when you take a break. Cougar Mountain software, This s o the musical interlude into musical segue Way into the break. Cougar Mountain software designed from the bottom up for nonprofits. What does that mean for you? It’s got what you are looking for, like fund accounting. Are you using spreadsheets to manage all those restricted funds that you have? That’s that’s not that’s not great. That’s not efficient, Cooler Mountain and also has fraud protection as well as the fund accounting. They have a free 60 day trial. You’ll find that on the list of our landing page at tony-dot-M.A.-slash-Pursuant. Now, time for Tony’s Take two. I’m still looking for innovators for our 2020 Siri’s. That might be you. Or is it someone you know who’s contrary to conventional wisdom and tradition? Are you tackling something differently and you’ve got some success to show added as well, then I’d like to talk to you because you might very well work out as a guest for the innovators. Siri’s in early 2020 And again, if it’s not you, how about a colleague? Somebody you know? Whoever it is, you can email tony at tony-martignetti dot com, or you can use the contact page at tony-martignetti dot com. I’d like to talk to you, and that is tony. Take

[00:28:37.83] spk_1:
two. Let’s do the live love. Um, right here in the U. S. of a We got Tampa, Florida, Brooklyn, New York, New York, New York and San Lorenzo, California Just a

[00:29:53.21] spk_2:
couple. Just a couple. That’s fine. And going abroad. Yeah. Mallika Mexico Buena Star Days, Republic of Korea and Seoul, South Korea. Get Republic of Korea is just the country. You can see the can see the city there. But that’s all right. But we do know soul is with us. So of course, on your house. Oh, I’m sorry. And also, uh, the Republic of Iran is with us. Live love to Iran Sham Do India, Bangkok, Thailand, Osaka, Japan Live love out to each of our lives listeners, whether domestic or abroad. Naturally. And the podcast Pleasantries to our over 13,000 listeners in the time shift. So glad that you were with us. Thank you for listening in whichever form live or archive. Um, let’s go back. Thio Mitch Linker and music to major gif ts. Okay, Mitch Linker, we’re back to you now. Thank you for standing by. Thank you for your minor contributions. Okay,

[00:29:54.42] spk_1:
So things are picking up and you start to self teach yourself. You, uh you got conferences? Books? You’re diving in? Yeah, self self education.

[00:30:10.51] spk_4:
Yeah, Yeah, I just immerse myself again. I completely abandoned music. Um, to this day, I haven’t, um and I just committed myself 100% thio fundraising, and yeah, I just I tried Thio Network as much as I could. And

[00:30:20.78] spk_2:
this wasn’t a cringe moment for you when I played better. Was it?

[00:30:23.80] spk_1:
Um, you’re dying inside. You’re dying inside where? It’s a little embarrassing. That’s okay. Really. No. I mean, I’m proud of you. I’m proud of it. Well, there you go. All right. No

[00:30:32.65] spk_2:
embarrassment. All right. You may feel embarrassed, but

[00:30:35.73] spk_4:
you’re gonna play the whole

[00:30:59.37] spk_1:
thing. But that sample here we were all in non profit. It was all a 100% in committed to the worst humor. But I committed to it. That’s that’s what distinguishes most people would cut their losses. Oh, no, not me. Oh, I’m in. I’ll be the joke to death till I fell. Either I get sick of it, Which that’s a very high threshold. And that’s happening right now you’re witnessing It. Says you says you you’re not one

[00:31:10.19] spk_2:
to judge. Uh, I don’t know why. I just I’m just declaring You sure you’re not. You’re not judgment worthy. All right,

[00:31:12.94] spk_1:
So you, uh you developed a cut. You Eventually, you you found a coach. You found a couple of coaches. Yeah, Mentors. This is

[00:31:20.34] spk_2:
important to you as your sort of rate moving your way into. Now you’re in major gifts and you’re blowing some things

[00:31:24.96] spk_1:
which everyone does. This is not an embarrassment. I have

[00:31:31.14] spk_2:
not as many as you, but I’ve blown things. Um, coach and mentor. Mentors. Coach is very important to you.

[00:31:34.27] spk_1:
One of

[00:32:23.47] spk_4:
the few key takeaways for anyone who’s might be interested in the book or maybe thinking about major gifts. One of them is for me was transformational. And, um, I just think everyone should probably, no matter what you’re doing in life would be great to have a coach and mentor. But for me, having that like one on one dialogue, having someone you can go to and runs situations by and sort of talk things out with someone who has experience and has been around the block and they’ve seen everything. It really changed my life because I was struggling. I again I educated myself. But when I was trying to practically apple apply what I had read or studied. I just wasn’t comfortable in this guy. And then a number of people who I met, I A long list of mentors really changed everything for me. And so again, anything in life you probably need people to look up to, but certainly with major gifts, I would definitely encourage anyone to just find someone outside of your environment outside of your job. Somebody doesn’t know the players who can objectively just sort of look at situations and talking through them.

[00:32:35.30] spk_1:
And if you are someone who’s experienced looks to take on, look, to help people, I mean, we need further the profession. Not only,

[00:32:41.78] spk_2:
you know, of course, yes, if you are new to the profession. Absolutely. Mitchell’s vice advice is very sound. But

[00:32:46.06] spk_1:
if you’re immortal, more experience. Yeah, look, to look, to help way gotta elevate the profession, whether it’s fundraising or whether it is one of the back office. Yeah, important back office functions give processing or reason process Prospect research, database management. You know, we gotta elevate you gotta elevate the profession. We all have a responsibility to bring up those of us who are, uh or newer Yeah, you know, and it’s and it’s so much fun.

[00:33:10.70] spk_4:
It’s fun. T. And I think most people want to give back and want to help. And, um, you know, the few times I’ve had the opportunity to kind of pay it forward, I found an incredibly fulfilling. So you’re right. It’s a two way street. And

[00:33:21.57] spk_2:
you tell some very good stories in the book about how just simple conversations. Get a 30 minute conversation, you know, huge sea epiphanies.

[00:33:28.11] spk_4:
Yeah, exactly. Exactly.

[00:33:39.12] spk_2:
Is that a mixed metaphor? See epiphanies having epiphany? Can you see an epiphany? I don’t know. You could see the light at the end of the tunnel. Let’s stick with that. I don’t know if you see an epiphany or you just Can you stand? Can you see an epiphany? Sam doesn’t know. Yes, crystals. He’s the man surrounded by crystals, but

[00:33:44.14] spk_1:
I think it’s happened. I thought about it.

[00:33:45.73] spk_4:
I think it’s having epiphanies that you haven’t.

[00:33:48.70] spk_2:
Okay. All right,

[00:33:51.52] spk_1:
um, us. Let’s Now. You’re

[00:34:15.20] spk_2:
a bona fide major gift officer. You’re getting over the hurdles, thanks to the coaches. Mentors. Um, you’ve got some practical advice that you like around. Um, let’s start with the donor. Now you’re in a solicitation, right? Meeting don’t preemption. That was a tough one for you. One guy. One guy wrangled you twice. Meaning, Go ahead. I’ll let you explain preemption in case someone’s not aware. What are you talking

[00:34:20.25] spk_1:
about? I don’t know. I don’t pretend that might be

[00:34:21.97] spk_4:
a term that I just

[00:34:22.88] spk_1:
you know, I don’t wanna fight. You have. You know,

[00:34:31.34] spk_4:
basically, when you have a number in mind or a gift you want to talk about and then the donor, they had you off the path

[00:34:32.12] spk_1:
early in the conversation. Oh, don’t worry about Yeah, I know why you’re here. I’m gonna give the $3000 I gave you. General, you’ve got 50

[00:34:38.39] spk_2:
1000 in your mind. Exactly. They’re committed to their $3000 from last year.

[00:34:42.20] spk_1:
That’s one of

[00:34:42.79] spk_4:
100 things that air the type of scenarios that are difficult to navigate. It really only know through experience and through having

[00:34:49.62] spk_1:
the experiences you didn’t fail. You have to fail, get some help from a coach mentor and go out and do it again. Exact Gotta You gotta keep taking bites of the apple. Right? So it’s a little practical

[00:35:00.45] spk_2:
advice around preemption. What do you do? You throw out

[00:35:03.95] spk_1:
what happened. Okay, Lets a hypothetical

[00:35:13.33] spk_2:
Well, from the book you’ve got. I remember I forget what number you had in mind, but let’s stick with my hypothetical, okay? Yeah, You’ve got 50,000 Your mind In the 1st 5 minutes of conversation, you agreed. The person he says, Look, I know why you’re here. Um, I promise you, I’m going to the same 3000 I did last year. And then he pivots to a different subject. Now you’re off that you’re off the giving subject, thanks to the right, the donor and the preemption. What’s your advice?

[00:35:30.39] spk_1:
Well, you know, it depends

[00:35:31.69] spk_4:
largely on the report. If you feel a comfort, that sort of eye for my experience will dictate how far you’re gonna push. Sometimes you just gonna say thank you and move on and hope the next time you can growing more prepared.

[00:35:43.09] spk_1:
You know, I think sometimes maybe thank you, but thank you.

[00:35:45.59] spk_4:
But which is sort of what I was

[00:35:47.39] spk_1:
going to

[00:35:49.11] spk_4:
say that you know, if you have a report, there’s comfort If you just sort of very authentically and genuinely and politely say, That’s great. I appreciate that. But, you know, I’ve really been looking forward to talk with you. I have a couple ideas that I actually wanted to share with you. Would it be OK to let you know we were thinking,

[00:36:02.23] spk_1:
You know, most times people are gonna say Okay,

[00:36:11.99] spk_4:
sure. We want to hear what you had in mind. And maybe it’s tied to a naming opportunity that it’s a zoo has a certain level That sort of dictates that love. Yeah, you know, sort of those things that are our scholarship at a certain minimum. So they’re these tools to kind of help you navigate that. But

[00:36:21.41] spk_1:
really,

[00:36:27.83] spk_4:
it’s having the boldness and then the comfort Thio continue that conversation. And sometimes it goes well and, you know, it really all depends.

[00:36:31.03] spk_2:
Yeah. Okay. You talk about, um, urgency, urgency and contacts. Yeah. You like those

[00:36:35.98] spk_4:
Those? That’s what I learned from my key mentor.

[00:36:40.98] spk_1:
Okay, push it out. Yeah. You know, context is just sort of explaining. You know,

[00:36:44.54] spk_4:
you have numbers in your mind when you’re talking to a donor, Basically sort of justifying the number and explaining why someone’s gift is important. and, you know,

[00:36:52.77] spk_1:
the end of the

[00:36:57.51] spk_4:
day when you’re raising money, it always comes down to a small number of people who are really bringing in. We’re giving the past majority the money. Whether you’re talking about ah, small campaign or very, very large campaign, it always comes down to a small number of people. And by context, I like to sort of convey that to donors and sort of let them know you’re in a small group of people that were going to help bring about real change, to save and change lives. There aren’t that many people out there, you know. You are one of a few, so

[00:37:18.99] spk_1:
that’s sort of the context. There’s

[00:37:44.84] spk_2:
actually some empirical research I was just reading, like within the past two months or so. Um, a report about someone had done some experimentation around different types of materials. What one printed said, You know, all together we can prevent hunger in the community or something. And the other was, You can be a change maker. You and so is the global or their full community versus targeting the individual. And that individual marketing piece did much better,

[00:37:51.38] spk_1:
right? I’m just saying you

[00:37:53.12] spk_2:
are the change maker. You’re this. You’re the you’re the pivot. You’re the critical link in this right in this problem in our community. You the solo. Yeah,

[00:38:00.89] spk_4:
that’s great. That’s

[00:38:02.26] spk_1:
so that’s so that’s the contact, The context

[00:38:06.79] spk_4:
based just sort of really just explaining how important someone is. Thio Urgency, then the difference that they can make and why. So

[00:38:13.37] spk_1:
that’s that. That was hugely

[00:38:15.11] spk_4:
helpful me and having those giving conversations so don’t like setting the table

[00:38:22.91] spk_1:
urgency. Urgency is, um, you know,

[00:38:39.31] spk_4:
just putting parameters so that so that there’s a reason to have a conversation at a certain time. Like capital campaigns are all about urgency. Oftentimes, it’s a very arbitrary timetable, but it gives you license to talk about giving at a certain time because there’s a deadline. You know, political campaigns. It’s more finite. It really is. You know, there’s Election Day,

[00:38:44.30] spk_1:
but other campaigns,

[00:38:57.71] spk_4:
often times it’s just sort of a random period of time, but it it’s a great tool. It helps gift officers. It helps fund raisers sort of justify why you’re having a conversation at a certain period of time. So it’s an instrument to help move conversations along.

[00:39:00.72] spk_1:
How do you deal

[00:39:08.58] spk_2:
with the rejection that being rejected in music helped you? All right, helped you, Ah, achieve in fundraising. I mean, you don’t get everything that you asked for now from donors. How do you process it? What are you thinking about? Help. People who are struggling with this.

[00:39:19.19] spk_1:
Here’s

[00:39:19.64] spk_4:
how I feel about that.

[00:39:21.72] spk_1:
There are

[00:39:39.67] spk_4:
many times when I come out of the visit or situation, or maybe after a follow up, and the gift doesn’t come through. But I still feel 10 feet tall. And it’s because I feel as though I did the right thing. You know, I feel like I asked for a gift that made sense. It was well received. You know, Maybe a doctor will say That’s the right number to ask for or I appreciate you coming to me. But now is not the right time or this isn’t the right project, but it’s very amicable. And it’s not a negative experience for for anybody. Yeah, you know, there’ve been plenty of times when I didn’t get the gift, but I feel good. I feel like I was brave and I had the conversation that need to be had, and it was the right one. But for whatever reason, to just wasn’t the right timing for

[00:40:00.31] spk_1:
the donor. Yeah, for the donor. Exactly. And oftentimes

[00:40:03.83] spk_4:
no, is Just know now. Yeah. No. For

[00:40:24.41] spk_2:
06 knows you’re halfway to ah six knows you’re halfway to her. Yes, I would like to say, um, what about when you walk out? You’re not feeling so good. Like, maybe I let the institution down, right? I didn’t know there was an opening, and I didn’t seize it. You walk out regretful. How do you process that? And then, you know, carry on because a couple days later, you’re gonna have another donor meeting.

[00:40:27.31] spk_4:
I do beat myself up about it. I As I get older, I feel like I’m still the infancy of my career. I’m gonna be learning to the day I retire, which hopefully will be decades from now. Um, and I’m trying to beat myself up less about it, but basically, I just try to learn from every experience. I literally will write down how something went. What I think I could have done differently. I’ll talk to my mentors. I still have my coaches, and I just try to learn from every experience. And most importantly, I hope that the relationship is preserved. I didn’t do any damage. And generally don’t. That’s key. The

[00:40:54.42] spk_1:
relationship is over absolutely long. Can always go back. It’s a long term relationship. Yeah, it’s long term

[00:41:02.79] spk_4:
based on trust. And absolutely. And it’s about the institution. Yeah,

[00:41:36.35] spk_2:
about the institution. Excellent. Let’s take a little break. It’s time for our last break. Ever wonder why some nonprofits are always mentioned in the news? It’s because they worked to build relationships with journalists. Who matter to them. Turn to communications can help you do that. Their former journalists. They specialize in helping nonprofits build meaningful media relationships that lead to great coverage there at turn hyphen to dot ceo. We’ve got butt loads more time for music to major gif ts. All right, Mitch, I

[00:41:40.95] spk_1:
almost called you much clinker beauty that it’s been known to happen. Yeah, sorry. Okay, I admit

[00:41:45.30] spk_2:
it. I mean, I applied myself for, ah, being being honest enough to say it. Congratulations. Thank you very much. Uh, small victories. Er you’re important to me. I amuse myself. If no one else. I amuse

[00:42:07.00] spk_1:
myself and the family is all right. Well, if you’re not, I still am. So And that’s what this is. The center of the universe is me. So, um, let’s see where we are. Okay? So, uh, you’re the the institution.

[00:42:08.89] spk_2:
Yes. You’re I mean, you’re sort of keeping in mind that it’s the institution that you’re asking for. Does

[00:42:14.69] spk_1:
that help you in de personalizing this whole process?

[00:42:18.89] spk_4:
Exactly. And I was going to say that Thank you for saying that because that’s something that I’ve learned. And I talk about this in the book with music. It was personal. When I was rejected, they were saying,

[00:42:27.83] spk_1:
We don’t like your in order that you’re I don’t like your voice. Go as your art. You’re right. We’re just that your art.

[00:43:00.19] spk_4:
It’s not about me. When fund, it’s not about the solicitor. It’s about the mission of the organization. And that’s how you can remove yourself too. And you just want to do the best thing on behalf of that organization because its mission driven you’re tryingto again safe and change lives. And so, you know, I lament of something doesn’t necessarily go well because I do, to an extent, feel so I’d like the organization down and hopefully to better in the future. But it’s not about you. It’s not about being a great fundraiser or having the magic words to say, you know, your career. It’s about the lives that your impact,

[00:43:17.59] spk_2:
you do have to keep going out. You know, you’re gonna have to get over the rejection and put on a brave face for the next meeting with the next donor a couple days later and for your next meeting with that donor that you feel like you didn’t do so well with. You’ve got to keep getting out. You got it. Builds your experience

[00:43:25.38] spk_4:
Absolutely. The more you’re out there, exactly the thicker skin you’ll get and the more experiences you have. Yeah, every experience you have, it’s like, Okay, that will never happen that exact same way again because I will learn from that moment. So there’s no it’s

[00:43:37.63] spk_1:
not. And this is a

[00:43:53.15] spk_4:
funny thing. I talk about the book. It’s like experience, but also being reflective and having people who are training you because I spend a lot of time out in the road and I wasn’t making progress because I was making the same mistakes again. And I didn’t have the tools to get beyond those mistakes. So it’s a combination of that experience and then really working at it. And I again I feel like I’m just starting. Um, I learned every day.

[00:44:00.55] spk_2:
How long have you been a major gift fundraiser

[00:44:03.29] spk_4:
I’ve basically been doing. I’ve been in major gifts

[00:44:06.97] spk_1:
over

[00:44:07.27] spk_4:
10 years now,

[00:44:12.56] spk_1:
but, I mean, I started in research, or I’ve been Yeah, I know, but I mean, Frontline fundraiser. Yeah, about a

[00:44:18.74] spk_4:
decade. 11 years, right? Yeah. 10 12 years. Yeah.

[00:44:19.71] spk_1:
You have a love hate relationship with travel. Yeah. Yeah,

[00:44:23.57] spk_4:
I and II romanticize it. I do enjoy travel, but it is. You

[00:44:29.01] spk_2:
romanticize it leading up

[00:44:30.07] spk_1:
to the trip. Yeah, right. It’s gonna be cool. Getaway hotel quiet.

[00:44:34.98] spk_2:
And then you’re on the trip. Not so much.

[00:44:37.02] spk_1:
Well, it’s just it’s

[00:44:52.61] spk_4:
a lot of work is a lot of work. A lot of things can go wrong, especially when you’re trying, uh, beyond dealing with the travel. Just navigating all these visits and meetings may change. It’s exhausting, but I feel like a conquering hero when I come back from a trip, you know, having been through. It’s very I think it’s a powerful experience and it’s

[00:44:55.09] spk_1:
so great

[00:45:06.25] spk_4:
when you have a trip and you get to see a lot of different people because this is a point I want to get to that. It’s the best job in the world, and one of the reasons for that is you meet so many interesting people you would never meet otherwise successful people, people who are doing great things in the world, people who’ve had extraordinary experiences, and you’re given this opportunity to talk with him. And, you know, if you go on a trip and you’re on the road for a week and you have 10 or 15 meetings, my God, what an incredible opportunity to to see the world through the eyes of these people who have done extraordinary things. It’s incredible the people I’ve met who I would never have met otherwise.

[00:46:04.94] spk_2:
You only travel tips for a long trip. Not just like a couple two or three nighter, but suppose you’re out for 10 nights. Ah, years ago, we used to have ah, what the heck to be called that Tony’s no style tips tony travel tips. Hard to believe it would be an alliteration, but Tony’s travel tips travel doesn’t fit. It’s not teacher know. So, anyway, we had started there years ago. I just used to plead with the regular contributors to give me a style tip or something. I were my formative years. Still trying master this podcasting still am, uh,

[00:46:05.39] spk_1:
travel tips for people on the road for, ah, you know, a week or more. Well, it’s funny. I actually I was gonna put this

[00:46:16.88] spk_4:
in the book, and I didn’t. So there’s, um there is more material out there. I wrote sort of things basically travel tips.

[00:46:20.78] spk_1:
All right, There’s gonna be a Volume two sequel, so I have many,

[00:46:21.83] spk_4:
many things. A lot of it is a really

[00:46:23.64] spk_1:
good one thing I’ll say for fundraising. Non

[00:46:25.80] spk_2:
non profit radio listeners

[00:46:26.68] spk_4:
always have backup meeting set because you’re gonna have cancellations, things you’re gonna move around. So that’s something I’ve learned. I would just be crestfallen when I’d have a triple set and then one by one, meetings with Lord that I find myself in a Starbucks just depressed. You know,

[00:46:39.28] spk_1:
you’re on the institutions nickel to exactly what am I doing in San Francisco? Backup trips back up visits, visits is key. What are

[00:46:53.78] spk_4:
some other good tips that I have? Do you have

[00:46:58.18] spk_1:
any, right? Well, yes. When, um you do? That’s what I like to do. Is a

[00:47:05.68] spk_2:
sort of, I guess, these air backup. Um, I’m in town. Then I call people who have always said no. You know, I don’t want you to come just to visit me. Yeah, I get that. So, actually, sometimes I would go just to visit them, and then I would build a trip around them. But

[00:47:16.66] spk_1:
I’d say, you know, I’m gonna be in town to see somebody else

[00:47:42.64] spk_2:
in a couple days or depending on the person. I’m not even spring it on them like the night before or day before because a lot of people plan giving and giving consulting, right? Mostly retired, you know? Now they do Have, you know, if you get him out of there without a doctor’s appointment 10. AM That wipes out the whole day. Sure. Now I have a doctor. Appointment 10. Now. Four o’clock. Didn’t know dinner. Now I won’t be. I’ll do that. I have a doctor appointment. 10 o’clock. I can’t make the dinner so you run that risk. But, you know, if you’re in town for another couple days, you can still say no. So people don’t like to know that you came for them. Yes, there are. There’s a cadre of people who like to visit you. We’ll take the visit yet as long as they don’t feel that you’re there. The reason you came?

[00:47:57.53] spk_4:
Yes. Absolutely. And as, uh, related to that, I’ve found that sometimes it is. Usually they’re easier to get the meeting on very short notice. You know, you plan these things far in advance, but there’s a real magic. Sometimes I think I’m gonna be around tomorrow. You know, just so happens I’m in town. Someone looks at their schedule. They have an opening. Sure. You know, it’s not something that you would. You wouldn’t plan a trip

[00:48:22.87] spk_1:
that way. He wouldn’t, but But there is. You have some Anker visits, you know, pretty solid

[00:48:24.74] spk_2:
ones. You know, we’re not gonna very unlikely to bail, and then you

[00:48:28.06] spk_1:
can build the other ones around. Yeah,

[00:48:31.60] spk_4:
and sometimes a short notice actually is convenient for Bianca and works out.

[00:48:40.44] spk_2:
Um, just remind listeners, of course, that the name of the book is no one dreams of being a fundraiser at Barnes and Noble. It’s an Amazon. Find book. Retailers near you. Well,

[00:48:45.33] spk_1:
you know, live listeners. You could check it out right now. Go to Barnes. I happen to

[00:49:11.07] spk_2:
like Barnes and Noble. Okay, um, check it out while. Well, uh, while I continue the chat with the while, we continue the chat with with Mitch channeling you, channeling you trying to think, What would you do with that person? Asked Course. I don’t know who the person is, but amusing myself. Um, opening yourself up to donors, you talk about some donors, you’ll share your music past with something long. But the

[00:49:11.78] spk_1:
personal connection means a lot, right? Yeah, it does. It does, um, to an extent, because generally my philosophy is I mean, you need that

[00:49:58.81] spk_4:
personal connection because you want trust, and you want a real genuine report. But at the end of the day, it’s about the donor. And that’s something that I’ve learned is that generally I find that if I’m talking too much on a meeting, it’s probably not going that well because they’re not opening up. I’m not learning from them. Right So it’s like you need that human connection in that, hopefully a long term relationship. But it’s it’s it’s about their experiences, as I say in the book there. Ah ha. Moments. You know how they really feel about the organization kind of getting to that understanding and then that that their emotional connection to the mission of the organization you’re representing, that’s what it’s all about. So it’s both.

[00:50:00.59] spk_2:
Yeah, I’d love to end there, but we have another minute together,

[00:50:16.05] spk_1:
okay? Something I want to say. OK, say it in a minute. In a minute. Yeah, okay, from now, four minutes for a minute. I’m just not that smart When I was going to say

[00:50:22.92] spk_4:
was getting back to it when I was saying earlier that I looked in major gift officers like they were another species of human. If

[00:50:23.12] spk_1:
there’s anyone out

[00:50:49.49] spk_4:
there who’s thinking about the fields working as a gift officer, I just I see myself in part of the reason why I wrote The book is to be a champion for the field because I think it’s the best job in the world again, as I was saying, and it’s so powerful to be able to help make a difference for a cause and to meet wonderful people. And it’s, I feel very grateful that I stumbled upon this, and even if you think you couldn’t do it, you should still try it. If there’s an

[00:50:50.96] spk_1:
inkling

[00:50:51.42] spk_4:
of the suspicion you might want to do it, give it a try. Pursuant. Dip your toe into it. Maybe ask someone you work with to take you on a visit and experiment. And you might surprise yourself because I never would have thought 1,000,000 years. I’d want to do this. Now I feel like I’ve found my calling.

[00:51:07.92] spk_2:
That’s a great place to wrap it up. Great. Thank you so much. Miss Linker, professional fundraiser in education and author of No one Dreams of Being a Fundraiser. My unexpected journey from music to major gifts. Thank you again.

[00:51:16.38] spk_4:
Thank you very much.

[00:51:18.16] spk_2:
Next week, I promise I’ll talk less if

[00:51:21.22] spk_1:
you missed any part of today’s

[00:51:22.46] spk_2:
show, I beseech you. Find it on tony-martignetti dot com were

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[00:52:49.06] spk_1:
creative producer is Claire Meyerhoff. Family. Woods is the line producer shows Social Media is by Susan Chavez. Mark Silverman is our Web guy, and this music is by Scott Stein here with me next week for non profit radio Big non profit ideas for the other 95% Go out and be great talking alternative radio 24 hours a day. Do you

[00:52:49.45] spk_6:
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[00:53:18.48] spk_2:
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[00:53:47.84] spk_5:
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[00:54:09.67] spk_7:
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[00:54:55.74] spk_5:
You’re listening to Talking Alternative Network at www dot talking alt dot com. Now broadcasting 24 hours a day. Do

[00:55:15.92] spk_2:
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[00:55:26.09] spk_1:
You’re listening to the Talking Alternative network.