Tag Archives: philanthropy

NextGen:Charity Interview With Rachel Sklar

Rachel Sklar, Editor-at-Large for Mediaite.com and the founder of the social microgiving site Charitini.com, encourages nonprofits to think about birthday-driven fundraising. Everyone has a birthday and your friends, family and supporters can use theirs to raise money for your work or an organization that you support. Watch our discussion about this novel fundraising avenue.

And, Rachel’s birthday is tomorrow, December 8th, so click over to her chosen charity, DonorsChoose, and make a donation.

Happy Birthday, Rachel!

Get Promotion Value From Your Charity Registrations

Girl Dropping Coin into Piggy Bank

Your nonprofit has to register in each state where it solicits. That’s the law in every state and D.C. Why not get extra mileage out of the work you put into your compliance?

Standard mileage

  • keeps your officers and board from paying fines
  • gets your IRS Form 990 filled out accurately (it’s signed by an officer under penalty of perjury)
  • protects your organization’s reputation
  • avoids civil or criminal penalties
  • minimizes the likelihood of a gift challenge
  • puts you on the right side of the law

These are important reasons for following state laws, but they’re in the background–which is where you want them. If one of those is all of a sudden front-and-center and capturing your attention, you’ve got a crisis.

To gain extra mileage from your registration work, put it out front on a “We’re Compliant!” web page. List all the states you’re registered in so you get some promotion value out of being on the right side of the laws, operating legally and ethically. Compliance shows you’re protecting your donors from fraud and insuring charitable donations go to charitable purposes. Those are the stated rationales for the web of regulations. So boast about it.

You can’t claim endorsement by states or their officials, that’s crossing the line. But you can certainly brag about your compliance, especially when so few charities are on the right side of the registration laws. You can use the page your organization creates (or one linked to it) to make the mandatory disclosures required by some states.

So shake your tail feathers, flap your wings and crow: “We’re Compliant!”

Nonprofit Radio for Nov. 12, 2010: Gail Perry and Fired-Up Fundraising

Big Nonprofit Ideas for the Other 95%

Compliance. Board relations. Fundraising. Technology. Volunteer management. Accounting. Finance. Marketing. Social media. Investments.

Every nonprofit faces these issues and big nonprofits have experts in each. Small and medium size nonprofits have Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio. Trusted experts throughout the country join Tony to take on the tough issues facing your organization.

Episode 16 of Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio for November 12, 2010

Tony’s Guest:

Gail Perry, MBA, CFRE, best-selling author of Fired-Up Fundraising: Turn Board Passion into Action (Wiley 2007), and her Passion-Driven Fundraising approach, developed over the past 22 years as a non-profit philanthropy expert, has helped organizations raise hundreds of millions in gifts and support. You can learn more about Gail on her website.

Topic: Fire Up Your Board Fundraising: Gail Perry will reveal proven techniques to motivate your board to step-up to their fundraising responsibilities.

Here’s a link to Gail’s Free Fundraising Tools.

Here’s a guide: 12 Ways to Liven Up Your Board Meetings – and Your Board.

Here is the link to the podcast: 018: Fire Up Your Board Fundraising.


When and where: Talking Alternative Radio, Friday, 1-2pm Eastern.

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Nonprofit Radio for November 5, 2010: Pass the Cup to Corporations & Fund Accounting Software Review

Big Nonprofit Ideas for the Other 95%

Compliance. Board relations. Fundraising. Technology. Volunteer management. Accounting. Finance. Marketing. Social media. Investments.

Every nonprofit faces these issues and big nonprofits have experts in each. Small and medium size nonprofits have Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio. Trusted experts throughout the country join Tony to take on the tough issues facing your organization.

Episode 16 of Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio for November 5, 2010

Tony’s Guests:

John W. Hicks, CFRE, President and C.E.O. of J.C. Geever, Inc. Mr. Hicks shares techniques to develop your corporate sponsorship strategy and build relationships so you can ask for corporate support with credibility and confidence

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Scott Koegler, editor, Nonprofit Technology News. Scott, our regular tech contributor, returns with product reviews for this back-office necessity. Those in the know recognize that proper accounting is critical to keeping your board, IRS and others looking over your shoulder, satisfied. He’ll review packages like FUND E-Z, AccuFund, Quickbooks and others.

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Here is the link to the podcast: 017: Pass The Cup To Corporations & Fund Accounting Software

When and where: Talking Alternative Radio, Friday, 1-2pm Eastern.

You can subscribe on iTunes and listen anytime, anyplace on the device of your choosing.

Sign-up for show alerts!

“Like” the show’s Facebook page.

Here is a link to the podcast: 043: Pass the Cup to Corporations and Fund Accounting Software Review.
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Fundraisers Should Not Piss Off Women

Women outlive men. Unmarried women give more generously than unmarried men. These two facts have big implications for nonprofit fundraisers.

Before looking at the implications, I should substantiate the facts. I think it’s well known that women live longer than men, but the gap is considerably narrower than it was a hundred years ago. This charming 1912 New York Times article put the gap at 20 years. About.com puts it between 3 and 4 years today.

Earlier this month, The Chronicle of Philanthropy reported unmarried women, irrespective of why they’re unmarried, give more to charity than similarly situated men.

Interesting to me, the article quotes the director of the Women’s Philanthropy Institute to say, “The conventional wisdom is that women do not give a lot of money.” I must be uninformed, because I’ve never heard that and don’t believe it’s true. The director continues, saying the conventional wisdom is wrong. Sometimes it pays to be uninformed. I save myself a lot of back-and-forth.

The implication for fundraisers: don’t piss off women. If that colloquialism offends your sensibilities, and you prefer my admonition more genteelly, don’t evoke the ire of women. Especially if you do planned gift fundraising.

Where the principal relationship to your charity is with the male, and there’s a female he’s close to, involve her. Send invitations to the couple, if appropriate. Do the same with gift acknowledgements. You are snubbing someone important when the gift is from a married, or partnered, couple and you address your thank-you letter to the man. You’ll probably never hear the objection. It has been quietly noted by the one who will likely live longer.

Angry Young Woman

At events, do you engage the wife or female significant other? Are you introducing her to your CEO, or asking for a moment of her man’s time while you pull him away?

Making (off color) inside jokes that marginalize women is a sure way to shoot your long-term fundraising in the foot. (You’ll hurt yourself in other ways, too, but I’m sticking to fundraising.)

Wives outliving their husbands, on average, means significant wealth will transfer to wives from their husbands’ estates. If you’re in Planned Giving, you’d like the best shot at having the wife remember you in her estate plan. So be good to her while her husband is living.

Where the husband is the primary donor to a nonprofit, I’ve always thought it a mistake to presume, upon his death, the widow has no interest in continuing the relationship. She may very well have her own charitable interests that don’t coincide with her husband’s, but nothing is lost in inquiring by polite letter–after many months have passed since the death–whether she would like to be kept on the mailing list. If you get no response, or a negative one, you know where you stand.

You have the best chance of maintaining a relationship with a woman–including a widow–if you treat her courteously at all times, according her the same respect, professionalism and friendship you show a man, whether she’s attached to one or not.