If you are a successful gift officer, you might view your role as a bit like a conduit – a connector that weds donor interests with the needs of your institution. The best gift officers have carefully crafted questions and strategies designed to engage prospective donors so that deep understanding of values, beliefs, and interests…
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Making the Invitation
If there is one word in our work that captures people’s imagination and interest more than, “asking,” I don’t know what it is. Gift officers are conditioned to talk unremittingly about “making the ask,” presidents and CEOs wonder if they are “asking” enough and for enough, Board members want the development team to “ask” more,…
Do Not Solicit
Recently, I was with a client and we stumbled upon my donor record in their database. “Do Not Solicit,” it read. “That’s interesting,” I observed. “Why would you have me classified as a “do not solicit?” “Well,” came the response, “we didn’t want you to receive all our phonathon calls and direct mail solicitations. ….
3 Differences Between Nonprofit and For-Profit Boards
Nonprofit organizations, including colleges, universities, and schools, seek financially-successful, influential, and generous individuals to serve as governing board members. In seeking individuals who fit this profile, nonprofits will regularly pull from a pool of successful for-profit leaders. Not only do many leaders in the for-profit world have access to significant financial resources, they also can…
Getting Ready. . . To Ask – A Professional Development Opportunity
There are two questions consistently asked by serious advancement professionals: “How can our institution get better prepared for our next campaign?” and “How can I get better at asking for major gifts?” These questions, of course, are linked. Consistently soliciting gifts effectively will help ensure that an institution is well-prepared for a campaign. However, there…
Seeking Strangers vs Delighting Friends
Strangers usually won’t invest significantly with you or your mission. They don’t know you well enough to trust you. Friends, though, are much more apt to invest with you. They know you well, are invested in their relationship with you, and they believe in you and your mission. When institutions plan for ambitious campaigns or…
Board Members and Major Gifts
If you are a regular reader of my blog, you know that engaging people – wholly, gracefully, and artfully – is a primary theme. Philanthropic investment is, most often, an action that succeeds (not precedes) other forms of engagement. Major gifts, then, begin with those who you know best, your institution’s closest friends and…
.001 Seconds Do Matter. . .Sometimes
It seems that Bode Miller, one of the winningest downhill skiers of all-time, is focusing on becoming a thoroughbred race horse trainer. In making the transition from ski slopes to horses, Bode made an interesting observation. To his mind, the field of horse racing is not as technologically-advanced as skiing. And Bode understands technology…
Why Prospects Don’t Respond
Recently, I served as a faculty member during a Gonser Gerber Institute webinar entitled, “Five Effective Strategies to Secure Visits.” This was a webinar I had long wanted to present as the issue of securing visits can, in many instances, be the most challenging facet of prospect engagement. I know many advancement officers – beginning…
Why You Shouldn’t “Close” Your Next Gift
I listened over the last few days as speakers at a conference talked about “closing gifts.” I’ve never been fond of that phrase – “closing the gift” – but I’ve never went out of my way to find particular fault with it either. And then one speaker made the following statement in reference to the…