Is This the Reason Your Team is Not Raising Major Gifts?
Fundraising Strategy, Major Gifts All nonprofits want to excel at major gifts fundraising. Is this really true? In our 30 years in major gifts fundraising, we've seen familiar roadblocks crop up inside organizations. Roadblocks that somehow get thrown up to keep money…
How to Approach Your Major Donors for Year-End Gifts
Major Gifts, Year-End Fundraising CampaignsIf you don’t do anything else in your year-end campaign, you must do this; visit your major donors & invite them to invest in your cause.
5 Things Smart Fundraisers Do in December
Major Gifts, Year-End Fundraising CampaignsWith the holidays approaching & year-end fundraising closing out, we are all stampeding towards our goals. Here are 5 things smart fundraisers always do in December.
Gail Perry’s Q&A About Major Gift Fundraising
Major GiftsWe’ll answer all your questions about major gift fundraising challenges during these challenging times.
Thanking Donors – How to Show Your Donors Some Love
Major GiftsYou might already be thanking your major gift donors for their contribution & support during the holidays, but what about all the others?
What You Can Expect from a Full Scale Major Gift Program
Major GiftsDiscover the motivations of high-net-worth donors and get effective strategies for successful donor outreach.
How to Have a Super Successful Visit with a Major Donor
Donor Cultivation, Major Gifts Major donor visits can be nerve-racking. Here you are with a golden opportunity—you've obtained a meeting with an important capital campaign prospect. It’s exciting but it is also high-stakes – because, of course, you want to…
7 Tips to Create a Wildly Successful Donor Cultivation Event
Events, Major Gifts Why do we hold major donor cultivation events? These types of gatherings happen everywhere, and they happen often in the fundraising world. We find that a lot of major gift fundraising happens in these types of quasi-social situations. Here's…
Tour Experiences Are Great Donor Cultivation Tools
Board Members & Fundraising, Capital Campaign, Donor Cultivation, Major GiftsOne of our favorite donor cultivation tools is a carefully-designed tour. But we are not talking about just any tour - this is a special, scripted, step-by-step tour. A Misson-Focused Tour can help you spread the word in your community --…
A $5 Million Capital Campaign Ask that BOMBED
Capital Campaign, Major Gifts I wish you could have been there. . . . It was a hot summer day in Virginia. We were seated in a small conference room with one of Virginia's top business kingpins. There the successful businessman sat -- so smart and so together…
The Advice Visit: Opening the Door to Your Major Donor
Major Gifts Advice Visits are one of our golden tools to get to know prospective major gift donors and discover what’s on their mind. They are a key step in the qualification and cultivation process for major donors. Advice Visits are based on the…
Suspects vs Prospects
Asking for Donations, Board Members & Fundraising, Capital Campaign, Major Gifts Today, we want to talk about two critical terms in major gift fundraising: suspects and prospects. These terms are often used interchangeably, but they have distinct meanings and huge implications for your fundraising efforts. Here’s…
The Backburner List: A Major Gift Fundraiser’s Top Secret Strategy
Major Gifts One of the biggest challenges for major gift fundraisers is in the area of prospect management. When you have a whole list of projects in your portfolio, how do you prioritize your assigned prospects? That's where the concept of a Backburner…
Even More Major Gifts Fundraising Mistakes!
Major Gifts Yes, there are many more major gifts fundraising mistakes to discuss! The activity of engaging with a potential donor, face to face, or person to person, can create fear and anxiety in many people. At best, it can feel terribly awkward. On…
Top Major Gifts Fundraising Mistakes and Bloopers
Major Gifts Major gifts fundraising mistakes are everywhere! Dealing with major donors can be so challenging - and the entire effort is subtle, full of nuance. You're trying to make friends with someone who expresses interest in your cause, but what to…
How to Reconnect Major Donors Who Have Drifted Away
Major Gifts Have you ever tried to reconnect with major donors who have lost touch with your organization and your team? Here’s a quick video we posted to Linkedin yesterday, where we discussed success stories from the Major Gifts Intensive. Our guests…