Donor Growth

Does your nonprofit have a community advantage?  Almost all organizations talk about their community of supporters. But few have a true participatory community.  Most simply have an audience; a list of people they blast communications to. Then again, some nonprofits have a competitive advantage in that they naturally have engagement opportunities that tend to create community. What types of nonpro...

What if our fundraising problems don't stem from the ‘technicians’ not being good enough? What if our fundraising problems aren't fundraising problems at all, but organizational and cultural problems that stem from us not having healthy organizations—and healthy leaders. On today's podcast, we argue that fundraising technicians aren’t enough to be successful and grow a sustainable n...

Are nonprofits putting too much stock into attributing where each gift came from? It's never been easier to measure as many things as we're able to quantify now. And yet, in our omni-channel world, it's never been harder to truly measure the things that matter. That's why on today's podcast, Mike and Louis get into why focusing too much on gift attribution could be causing...

McKinsey built an $11B brand by leaving nothing to chance. Not even building trust. Can nonprofits learn from their model? Here's the formula they've distilled:  TRUST =  (CREDIBILITY x RELIABILITY x INTIMACY) ------------------------------------------- SELF-ORIENTATION On today's episode, Louis applies the trust formula to formula—and goes through a scorecard of the nonprofit secto...

It's true that every nonprofit CEO is different—and every leader plays to their strength. Many are great operators. Others are fantastic visionaries. And some are charismatic fundraisers.  But on today's podcast, Mike argues that regardless of personality, skill or talent, every CEO has one main role.  It’s something that cannot be delegated.  What is it?  To create future value. Future...

Have you started planning your next fiscal year?  Chances are you're running into some common challenges:  It's hard to align the whole team around a shared vision It's easier to focus on trivial issues than to  make the hard decisions Your plan ends up sitting on a shelf, only to be re-visited in a year before the next planning session Wherever you are in this process, Louis shares...

Successful fundraising appeals are 20% the strength of the appeal, and 80% how you treat donors in between appeals.  At least that's a point of view we find helpful when developing fundraising and stewardship strategies for effective donor communications.  So what's the work savvy fundraisers do between appeals to have deeper relationships with more donors?  On today's podcast, we w...

The donor development continuum is dead. Discovery -> Cultivation -> Solicitation -> Stewardship This framework was based on the premise that you have control over the relationship. That’s no longer the case. Instead, here's what's happening now: ❗ Donors are DISCOVERING you and forming their own opinions through social media and other digital or in-person gathering places. ❗...

Time and time again, nonprofit leaders makes sales analogies when it comes to fundraising.  They draw parallels between the commercial world and the nonprofit world, as if the two were one and the same.  This we know is true:  “Fundraising is different. Fundraising is different because charitable decisions are different. They’re different at a fundamental, neurological, chemical level.” -Dr. Russe...

Many organizations run engagement scores on their supporters to identify the right people to reach, at the right time. At least that's the premise. But often times, engagement scores are used as an internal tool to justify department budget—or activities we want to do rather than strategic directions that might serve our organizations better in the long term. And at that point, it's just...

We all wish it wasn’t so, but there’s no way around it: our world is a mess. For some of you, giving has levelled off after a season of overwhelming generosity. We’re facing record inflation. The housing market is unpredictable. The stock market is a mess. Supply chains are broken. Society seems to be more polarized than ever before. And the ongoing war in Ukraine is ever-present in the public con...

Are giving days the right strategy for your nonprofit?  They're fun. They create a lot of excitement.  They get people to act. They produce a lot of social proof.  But are they the best use of your time and resources?  Louis and Mike get into the pros and cons—and provide a bit of a framework for how to think about the business decisions behind participating in Giving Days at your nonprofit....

If you want to grow your nonprofit, you're going to have to pay some debt. You can't avoid it. But you can choose what kind of debt to pay.  On this week's episode, Mike and Louis get into the 6 different types of debt every nonprofit that wants to grow will have to struggle with.  GET CONNECTED Follow Louis Diez on LinkedIn   Follow Mike Duerksen on LinkedIn  Join the Donor Partici...

Is it time to disrupt traditional nonprofit conferences? Louis and Mike get into the pitfalls of our sector’s conferences—from thinly veiled infomercials for vendors and sponsors, to the secretive speaker selection process—and what the future of nonprofit conferences might look like. GET CONNECTED Follow Louis Diez on LinkedIn   Follow Mike Duerksen on LinkedIn  Join the Donor Participation Projec...