298: Bring Joy To Your Donors – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guest this week:

Marcy Heim, frequent speaker; major gift fundraising coach and consultant; and The Artful Asker.

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

282: Lead and Matching Gifts & Corporate Matches – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guests this week:

Professor John List, chair of the economics department and founder of the Science of Philanthropy Initiative at University of Chicago.

Also, Chuck Longfield, chief scientist at Blackbaud.

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

231: Bring Joy To Your Donors – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guest this week:

Marcy Heim, frequent speaker; major gift fundraising coach & consultant; and The Artful Asker.

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

214: Shift Happens & The Event Pipeline – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guests this week:

Angel Aloma, executive director of Food For The Poor.

And Patricia Clemency, president & CEO of Make-A-Wish Metro New York and Western New York.

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

096: Motivate Your Board For Major Giving & Revisiting Your 2012 Prospect Plan – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

Tony’s guests this week:

Jennifer Herring, president & CEO of The Maritime Aquarium at Norwalk.

Maria Semple, The Prospect Finder, consultant in prospect research and
author of “Panning for Gold: Find Your Best Donor Prospects Now.”

Read and watch more on Tony’s blog: http://tonymartignetti.com

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Zoho hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio for friday, june fifteenth twenty twelve we’re talking about big ideas, big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent of your aptly named host it’s good to be back in the studio have been away for a couple of weeks. Last week i was at fund-raising day got about ten interviews for the show, one of which we’re goingto listen to very shortly today, but great fun meeting everybody on the exhibit floor got some sponsorship enquiries good to see everybody there about fifteen hundred people at the conference and good busy booth we had on the exhibit floor this week it is motivate your board for major e-giving and revisiting your twenty twelve prospect plan from last week’s fund-raising day conference. Jennifer herring has advice on motivating, working with and supporting your board to help them step up to their fund-raising duties she’s president and ceo of the maritime aquarium at norwalk in connecticut and also revisiting your twenty twelve prospect plan. Maria simple, our prospect research contributor and the prospect finder those a midyear checkin of her new year’s ideas on your twenty twelve prospect plan that was back. On our january sixth show have you hosted those cultivation events that she recommended and used them as prospect research tools? Do you have your free google lorts set up? We’ll recap a few of those ideas from january and between the guests. Antony’s take two nearly one thousand new york city charities lose their tax exemption. I’ll explain what happened to their exempt status and that’s not limited to new york. You can use the hashtag non-profit radio to join the conversation on twitter. Andi i very much hope that you were with me last week when it was got women donors from last year’s fund-raising conference and also maria semple was on last week sharing strategies for using linked in. Right now we take a break, and when we return, i’ll have the first of my interviews from fund-raising day this year. Stay with me. They couldn’t do anything, including getting ding, ding, ding ding. You’re listening to the talking alternative network, waiting to get you thinking. E-giving cubine money, time, happiness, success, where’s, your breakthrough join me, nora simpson, as i bring you real world tools for combining financial smarts with spiritual purpose. As a consultant to ceos, i’ve helped produce clear, measurable financial results while expanding integrity, passion and joy share my journey as we apply the science of achievement and the art of fulfillment to create breakthroughs for people across the world. The people of creation nation listened to norah simpson’s creation nation fridays at twelve noon eastern on talking alternative dot com oppcoll are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three that’s to one to seven to one eight one eight three the conscious consultant helping conscious people be better business people. Dahna you’re listening to the talking alternative network. Welcome back, it’s time to motivate your board for major giving. This is the first of my interviews from the fund-raising day conference hosted by association friendraising professionals new york city chapter just last friday. So this is the first of the ten that i got years. Motivate your board for major e-giving with jennifer herring, welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of fund-raising day two thousand twelve, we’re in the heart of new york city in times square at the marriott marquis. My guest right now is jennifer herring. Jennifer is president and ceo of the maritime aquarium at norwalk, and her topic is major gifts two point oh, straight talk for your board, jennifer. Welcome to the show. Thank you very much, tony. I’m glad to have you on dh. Thank you for taking time in a busy conference day. A pleasure. Why don’t you acquaint listeners with the work of the maritime? Aquarius. Ah, the maritime aquarium is a regional aquarium located in fairfield county, connecticut, that serves primarily connecticut in westchester. But the whole tri state region it’s focused on long island sound. In fact, it’s, the only aquarium focused on long island sound our mission is to inspire people of all ages to appreciate long island sound and protect it for future generations. We have a wonderful collection of long island sound animals and a lot of ability to touch and directly experience animals. It’s a very intimate aquarium. Okay, we also have a very large education program that reaches out primarily to underserved students around the tri state area. And how long have you been there? I’ve been there for going on eight years now as the ceo. Okay, let’s, get into your seminar topic. Major gifts two point oh, straight talk for your board. You’re encouraging gift officers to be change agents around board fund-raising way. We’ll have plenty of time for detail, but generally what’s what’s the problem that you see, i think that the challenge with boards is to keep them engaged. Getting them on the board is on ly step one all fund-raising especially major gifts. Fund-raising is about personal relationships. And just like any friendship, personal relationship needs to be cultivated and maintained on a continuous basis so you can get getting people on the board is the first challenge and talk a little bit. We want we want talk? A little about recruitment will get sacked, right? But once they’re on the board keeping them engaged, challenging them with meaningful ways to be connected with your organization, it’s an ongoing challenge and the strategy behind that is something that the development officers can and should play a significant role in. Okay, let’s, let’s talk a little about the recruitment of board members. How do we make plane? What the fund-raising expectations are at the recruitment stage? I’ve done that for many, many years, no there’s always a conversation, you know, once you’ve i met, the person cultivated the person enough so that your at a position to have a conversation about whether they want to join your board. And of course, that person has to be somebody who’s passionate about your mission and somebody who is going to bring something either some expertise or capacity or preferably or a network of contacts are preferably all three two the nexus of issues that the organization feeling you have ensured that the person you’re recruiting is bringing something, what one one to a little three of those? Absolutely because, of course, the ideal boardmember brings wealth, wisdom and work. And we want to engage all three. So you’re having the conversation and it’s almost always conversation, at least in my current job between me, sometimes with another trustee and the perspective person and i just lay the expectations out on the table. Now we have kind of a sliding scale of expectations, depending on the capacity of the person the board has voted. This is a small organization, it’s, about a ten and a half million dollar budget and how many trustees are there there at the moment? Thirty one that’s large could be that’s a lot that’s. A lot of trustees, partly because in a cultural institution, being on the board or on a committee of the board is the only way you have a connection there. No grateful patients. There are no alumni. You have to create a connection and keep it going. Okay, and the board is a very important way to do that. So getting back to the recruitment conversation, i always put a specific number on the table. Um, and it can be as little as the minimum annual gift that the board has voted. Should be the minimum, which is twenty, five hundred. Dollars uh huh. Often i will say site a larger annual gift if i know the person has more capacity plus either giving ah, e-giving or selling a table to the gala. And then we’ve been in a campaign mullet for the last five years. I usually say, you know, once you’ve gotten involved in and been a member and really gotten connected, we will be coming to talk to you about a major giff ok? And the first number that’s an annual number that’s an annual number. Okay, so you’re very clear about the expectations, do you? Do you do this in writing and let the person take it home to take it to the office and considerate or this is really all verbal well, what we give them in writing, we don’t give them the expectation and writing, okay, we give them the role of the board. You know what? What our expectations of them are in terms of their responsibilities and what they can expect of us in terms of response. Civilities, we give them a lot of background material about the organization would let them see who they’re colleagues on the board would baby give them. Aboard list, but we don’t have, you know, a pledge form that they have to sign beforehand. We figured that the verbal conversation is enough, and then we solicit them ah, at the at year end or calendar, you’re a fiscal year, and we have a june thirtieth fiscal year for what we’ve talked about. All right, now you have a new boardmember they’ve they’ve accepted based on the expectations, what is ah, board training look like for brand new board members around? Fund-raising well, we don’t have a really formal training for us it’s on the job, maybe they go on other calls, outgoing calls with others or what we mostly do. We have a pretty elaborate committee structure, one of which is this is a campaign committee, but a marketing committee of finance committee, education committee and exhibits committee, so we use those committees to get them connected with the meat and the program of the organization we use the gala committee very actively to engage people in soliciting tables for the gala. That’s in some ways, the easiest kind of fund-raising to do because it’s very transactional, then there’s a a certain small kadre of leadership volunteers. Who have made major gif ts and who are in powerful positions in the board that i work with personally to develop specific ask strategies that they participate in to go on called fund-raising calls with terrorism that’s sort of on the job it’s on me. Okay, so it’s on the job training because i’ve i’ve found i’ve worked it now for non-profits and i in none of them has there ever been, you know, you get the whole board together and you have a little fund-raising training thing. We tried to do that, actually on a retreat in two thousand eight, the week that the stock market was falling apart when we were about to launch our campaign and had a little role playing about how you ask, but that contrived, right? So everybody knew everybody knew was staged its quite trust, and i found that it’s much better to work directly with the person who’s agreed to go on a call with you, and what i do is write a script for that person, and i do it for myself too about you know what the objective is, how much we’re going to ask for what the background. Is the, you know, the background, research, the relationship with the person to the organization, and then what each of us is going to say, e-giving lending, e-giving e-giving, ding, ding, ding, ding! You’re listening to the talking alternate network, get him. Cubine money, time, happiness, success, where’s your breakthrough join me, nora simpson, as i bring you real world tools for combining financial smarts with spiritual purpose. As a consultant to ceos, i’ve helped produce clear, measurable financial results while expanding integrity, passion and joy share my journey as we apply the science of achievement and the art of fulfillment to create breakthroughs for people across the world. The people of creation nation listened to norah simpson’s creation nation fridays at twelve noon eastern on talking alternative dot com. Are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three that’s to one to seven to one eight one eight three the conscious consultant helping conscious people be better business people. Oppcoll you’re listening to the talking alternative network. Treyz i’m ken berger of charity navigator. And you’re listening to tony martignetti non-profit radio. Big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. Yeah, so you actually rehearse since you have a school to do, you practise the meeting in advance? Well, i practice myself. I mean, i sit in my office and speak the script, and i often will have a telephone call with the person who’s going with nato to go over it, and they used these scripts. They work really well to shape the the conversation and, you know, it’s sort of various whose mouth, the actual ask is going to come out of it most often comes out of my mouth even if we’re going with a peer, but it doesn’t matter, really, because the presence of the pier there makes all the difference. And why don’t you say a word about that? For people who may not recognise what what’s the value of having is someone someone alongside with you, who’s a a peer of the of the person you’re soliciting. So having somebody who’s involved who’s already made a major her gift who’s giving their time and and treasure to the organization validates the organization for the person that you’re asking the money for and sets a bar down four for what they’re doing, especially if it’s a trustee because the trustees are supposed to be the ones who care the most were the most invested and therefore need to be the biggest investors in the organization. That somebody on the outside of the organization is always looking. Two how much trustees were doing and how much in particular that trustee who’s asking has done to help scale their level of gift thinking. So so here’s an example. Actually, this isn’t a trustee is somebody whose son is a trustee. And who i’ve tried to get a trust to be a trustee for years has taken on the project of raising money for a new research vessel, which is a two and a half million dollar project. He’s in the shipping industry. He’s. Very passionate about it. He cochairs the committee he brought in the person who’s. Um, project managing the project. Who’s built many boats. He helped move us to the decision away from retrofitting an old boat to building a new boat from scratch. He agreed to raise the money. He gave a half million dollars lead gift. And i took him to see ah, prospect that’s been in our family at about the ten. Thousand dollar level for a number of years. Who we honored it, our gala, who we’ve cultivated pretty thoroughly and whose connection to the aquarium was around our existing research vessel. So we went and sat with him right before christmas in their kitchen. Sam uh, the gentleman who’s leading this project talked about it very passionately talked about what he’s done, and that is instance, the actual ask came out of my mouth. We left them with materials. But then the leader that the head of this effort played golf with the prospect in florida continue to cultivate him on his own separately from anything that the institution was doing. And this gentleman stepped up with a half million dollar gift, matching the lead gift for matching the lead gift. So it was a long cultivation effort, probably going on for five years before we got to the critical moment where we found the right project that connected to this person’s passion. And i’m sure that the fact that he was being solicited by somebody else who had made a gift at that level was one of the things that determined no, his i mean, this is somebody with a lot of capacity. Who’s named things all over town. This also speaks to the value of the long term relationships that you mentioned now that may not have been a long term relationship, but it was the beginning of it was the beginning of a relationship between those between those two between those two. Absolutely and and there is the long term relationship with the institution. Find this gentleman the person who made the five hundred thousand dollar gift had been involved with the institution for at least five years. But between these two people, right, a developing relationship, correct? See each other’s piers on dh makes it tougher for the person solicited to refuse. The other thing usually is that when you’re going to have a solicitation call, the person that you’re soliciting knows why you’re coming to see that it’s not a surprise way don’t want toby blindsiding people you want them to know, right? I mean, you basically set up the meeting in a way that says, i want to come and talk to about this project for this campaign or so that they know what it is and if they don’t want to be solicited. They won’t take the meeting mostly right? Let’s talk about the role of the professional fundraiser in supporting lord fund-raising what do you see as the the role? Well acquaint people with the structure at the aquarium? Do you have? Ah, vice president, director development? Yes, there are some gift officers or we have it, but we have a very small development, as we have in highly experienced director development who’s been doing university development, heading university development departments for thirty years. We have a person who does foundations and ah latto the patron program and various other many aspects of fund-raising is sort of the director of the annual fund, but he’s also doing major gift so it’s not very good at everything that it is typical of a small shop. We have a person who does the gallas and corporate fund-raising we have a person who does membership and the acknowledgment of gif ts and some fulfillment of patron level gift, which is a thousand dollars for us, we don’t have very many patrons and and that person has an assistant so it’s basically five, five people in there, other things that are being done out of this. Opponent who eyes the liaison to the board for fund-raising assume it’s, the it’s, the director of development and to some degree that the person who manages the gala because the board is so involved in the gala so and and also the personal i would say that there are three of our gift officers that that have relationships, not with every boardmember but with some board members, and then since you’re giving your your topic is major gift, right, what’s, the what’s, the support that the director development probably is the one providing to the to the board around around major, gifted director, director of development it’s mostly providing support to me around major gift activities and that’s possibly because i have such a strong fund-raising background was the ceo. I mean, that’s what i’ve been my career has been for thirty years, so we talk about strategy. He identifies prospects, does the research. He does a lot of personal cultivation with these people, too. So he makes friends with them. He talks about his travels there, travels. He fixed us up with theater tickets. He does things that just brings them closer to the organization. He’s very active. In working with the board on small, intimate cultivation dinners, that’s something you ask board members to do? We asked members events and not in the way host them right in front of our biggest exhibit, which is a shark tank. So you’re you’re having dinner with the sharks swimming around in this elegant table. There’s, you know, a maximum of twenty of you there’s, some interesting intellectual guest, either professor from yale or the principle of our partner school that’s closing the achievement gap or somebody like that, you’re there with a bunch of peers that the board members bring to the table and that’s part of the cultivation effort that’s proven very successful and really important in moving people into major gift relationships with us. What do we do with or four board members who have a reluctance to do fund-raising now, even at the so even going back to the er, teo bringing them on, bring them on the board, the recruitment if they express our reluctance, they have skills that you need and they’re willing to do their own giving maybe a maybe a much higher level than the twenty five dollar minimum, but they have a reluctance to do to be asking people for money, what can they be doing around fund-raising we just don’t bother with them because we don’t have time, frankly, so you wouldn’t accept that kind of a boardmember no, no, we just leave them alone to what they’re doing, okay? And don’t try to make them do something they can’t d’oh. But even if they can’t ask there not comfortable asking, they could, for instance, host the hosting events so that’s were constantly, uh, trying to get people to bring their friends to our events to our friends of his are exhibit openings introduced people to us, and every year when we have aboard retreat, they all the people there pledged that they will do that and every year on ly a few of them do it word definitely working very hard to get boardmember sze to agree to host or co host thies, small dinners are shark tank dinners and bring with its great they’re called struck thank dinner. Yes. Oh, isn’t that great? I just read something online that if there was one drop of blood in one million drops of blood or something like that, sort of sense that consensus was that on npr’s website or something it could be but that’s something that that one of our education programs that demonstrates two kids very interesting how they do it with a little drop of tomato juice, being deluded and deluded and deluded, and and they figure out when they can taste it and okay, yeah, so your shark tank dinners so we’re constantly trying to get boardmember is to bring their peers to shark tank dinners, which is very difficult to do, and only a few of them are really able tto leverage those kinds of relationships. It’s, you know, we have in some ways a naive for this is not new york city, and this is not new york city fund-raising with the kind of power boards that i’ve worked with at the new york public library and the wildlife conservation society it’s a very different kind of bored, maybe many of these people are being our board members for the first time, some of them are, you know, business people may be in the upper middle management of the bank, and there they don’t have that kind of reach into rich people community that um, that is common in new york. On the other hand, fairfield county has a huge amount of hedge fund wealth and a huge amount of maritime wealth, although in this economy, that’s less than it, wass. And we’re getting more and more of those kinds of people on our board who do have a network and are able to to bring us at least to get this us in a room with them. Okay, then the challenge becomes how two convince the sector. That is more and more about venture philanthropy that has measurable impact. That there’s something for them at the maritime aquarium? Yeah, on dh. Well, we want to stick to the board fund-raising topic, but i know that impact and outcome assessment is very here for lots of charities. And yes, it is a struggle for cultural institutions to do that. Although it sounds like maybe around your education in this job we do. We are able to do that around our education on shifts and initiatives in some very interesting ways about closing the achievement gap, and one of our trustees made a very strategic a gift to us that allowed us to do a case study about a partner school that we’re working with and what impact our partnership has had in their achievement there. Rising achievement of school that’s almost all inner city kids. Jennifer way have just about a minute left. And i want to talk a little about the case for support on dh analyzing that case for support again in just a minute. So what’s your advice around scrutinising that you need a strong case for support. You need your board to be able to deliver it in an elevator speech s so that they can be great ambassadors for you. The case for support is what’s going to make people give? They have to understand that you have to teach them through your case for support that you are an institution that can help them change the world, that they can change the world through your institution, and get the joy and satisfaction of doing that through their philanthropy. The the elevator speech for board members, do you help them write it? First? Talk about what we have definitely done that, and we’ve done it in various ways. The elevator speech should have a certain set of statistics, and i’ve actually gone so far as to take a business card and write him out that they can keep in their pocket this citizen. But the elevator speech also has to connect to the passions of the boardmember so that they can talk about the institution in a way that that communicates the passion that they bring to it. So every boardmember doesn’t have the same elevators, no every boardmember doesn’t and shouldn’t have the same elevator speech. Excellent advice. Ok, it goes to what? What? What moves them the most. What moves down, right? We have to leave it there, but thank you so much, tony. My pleasure. Jennifer herring is president and ceo of the maritime aquarium at norwalk in norwalk, connecticut. Pleasure. Thank you very much for joining me, jennifer. My pleasure. Thank you, toni. This is tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of fund-raising day two thousand twelve marriott marquis, hosted by association of fund-raising professionals, new york city chapter. My thanks again to the folks at fund-raising day and jennifer herring. Right now, we take a break, and when we returned, tony’s take two, and then it’ll be maria semple revisiting your two thousand twelve prospect plan. So hang around. You’re listening to the talking alternative network. Are you feeling overwhelmed in the current chaos of our changing times? A deeper understanding of authentic astrology can uncover solutions in every area of life. After all, metaphysics is just quantum physics, politically expressed hi and montgomery taylor and i offer lectures, seminars and private consultations. For more information, contact me at monte m o nt y at r l j media. Dot com are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three, that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. Hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business? Why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com welcome back, it’s. Time for tony’s, take two on tony martignetti non-profit radio my block this week is nearly one thousand new york city charities lose tax exemption the new york city department of finance ah revoked the property tax exemption from nine hundred twenty five city based charities because they failed to demonstrate a legitimate charitable purpose. They lost their property exemption for what? For property that they owned. And, as i say in the blogged, something similar to that was reported in the new york times last year and and the block post has a link to that coverage, i think the lessons for charities are you need to stay true to the charitable mission that got you. The irs is designation of tax exempt however, many years ago that was and in the case of one of the charity’s sighted, but you’ll see in the blogged from new york city, that was nineteen, thirty four and but now, obviously, new york city is challenging that. So you need to stay true to that charitable mission that got you that original tax exempt designation and i think, also need to stay in compliance with state and local regulations. And laws because i could see compliance being linked to keeping your tax advantage at the state and local level. And that’s all we’re talking about. We’re not talking about federal tax exemption. These were ah, this is all state and local tax advantages also want to remind you well, that’s on the block and my blog’s is that tony martignetti dot com and that’s, this week’s post. I also want you to remember that we have a linked in group and on the linked in group. You can tell me what you ah, i have as ideas for future shows. Or give me feedback on previous guests. When if you’d like to say, please check us out on linkedin. And that is tony’s. Take two for friday, june fifteenth the twenty fourth show of the year. The year is almost half over. How is that possible, maria? Simple. I know your air right in here. Hello, maria. Simple. How are you? I’m doing well. Maria is the prospect finder she’s, an experienced trainer and speaker on prospect research. Her website is the prospect finder dot com. Her book is panning for gold. Find your best donor prospects now and most importantly, she’s, our regular prospect research contributor, and this month we’re revisiting the twenty twelve prospect plan maria from the january sixth show. You had some ideas back then, i did absolutely so i came up with kind of a list of things that people could do, and i thought i’d be a good idea to revisit it now that we are hard to believe midpoint in the year of twenty twelve already, i know, um, so not to revisit the entire show, but some of the tips that we had, we brought to the table at that point we were talking about, you know, prospecting from within your database in-kind of mining that database and tips for how you can keep up with some of your top prospects. But we also talked about proactively identifying people outside the database and bringing them into your organization to learn more about your missions and by hosting by hosting some cultivation events, right? Right. So we did, you know, talk about cultivation events. My suggestion had been to in the first three months of the year, really trying to identify people from within the database and proactively identified people outside your database that you might invite some cultivation events and then try and hold those events in second quarter. So let let’s assume that people may have taken our advice hosted one or two cultivation events, but if not, we have some lessons or we have some ideas to get started. The year’s not over and it’s only half. So you can still, you know, implement all of these and just think about shifting the tips into the second half of the year. That’s even we have even more than half. This is only the twenty fourth. So twenty four, twenty four, fifty seconds have passed. So what is that? Twelve. Twenty six and then it goes down even further. Teo six, six, eighth goes from all right. Well, you have more than half the year left. Yeah, just a little over half the year. So all is not lost. But anyway, let’s, let’s talk about some of those. Those tips that we talked about, we mentioned identifying maybe the within your database. Who were those top ten to twenty gifts that you’d received in the past year. And also your top ten prospects in terms of lifetime giving to your organization and, you know, inviting those people to attend a cultivation event. Now, you know, sometimes people refer to these parlor event. You know, whatever terminology want to use, the event can be held at your facility. If you have a facility you want to showcase or outside in somebody’s home. So in particular, if you have somebody you’re affiliated with with your board or another volunteer who’s willing to open up their home, particularly if they have a lovely home. And really, the setting would work very nicely for us. A small, intimate gathering. The key to remember here, there’s no. Ask at that. You know, that could also be on site. You might have. You might have a very interesting place for people to gather on site i in the interview that everybody heard earlier in the show. Jennifer herring is president of the maritime aquarium at norwalk in connecticut. And they like to host things in front of the shark tank. Right? So it could be a small gathering. If you have a small shark or maybe have a gecko or, you know a hamster, you could host a small group in front of a little aquarium. With, you know, eight or twelve people watching the hamster go around in a wheel, i mean, that could be compelling. Yeah, certainly if you have a facility that lend itself well to that type of gathering that’s great. I attended something recently at the liberty science center here in jersey city in new jersey, and it was a fabulous event, and so, you know, just get creative and think about what would draw people in. Is it the space? Is that this person’s home on dh? The key is to really be able teo stick to the time frame that you tell people it will be, particularly if you’re going to do it around some sort of a breakfast event, people need to get on with their day, be a little bit more lax if it’s an end of the day event, but from a prospecting or prospect research point of view you want to think about while you’re attending that event, listening for, you know, some of the general interests now, you know, i’m assuming that a lot of the people that are listening to this show may be from a smaller to midsize non-profit so the person taking on the role of prospect researcher is either the executive director is the development director, maybe a communications director. Whoever that person is that also does some prospect research at the organization should be in attendance at this event with the so purpose, really, to do a little bit of intelligence gathering. Yeah, you want to be you want to be making sure that people are that staff, if you do have multiple staff, you don’t want them huddled together over in the sort of the room, even if it’s just two or three of you, you know, huddled in a corner, chatting or all seated at the same table if there are multiple tables, that’s, a that’s, a big mistake, you’re not you’re not going to be out talking to people as much as you could be, right? So this is an opportunity for you to showcase your non-profit but also to elicit a lot of wonderful information that, quite frankly, a lot of instances you may just not be able to find this information online. So so what type of information might that be that you’d want to elicit as wearing your prospect? Just general interest just engaged the person in conversation on and be a good listener that is just so very keys just to really put your listening ears on. And we’ve talked about we have talked about that in the past. Thie radical listening, which came from a previous guest. Melanie schnoll begun. And then you picked up on radical listening and recommended it as prospect research vehicle. Right? Total cultivation event is a great place for you to become a radical listener. So gent general interests that they have any family information that you khun gather sometimes there might be information about children, ages of children just to get kind of get an idea of where they are, what point in their lives that they’re at. Um, are they you know, more of a plan giving prospect for you? Are they really just starting out in their lives, their careers, and have very young children? Just you want to be genuinely interested in in their lives? S and and what? What it is about your work that appeals to them, right? And one way to find out about that is, well, obviously to directly ask them. But it’s also interesting to try and gather where else? They’re volunteering their time. You know what other charities air they particularly interested in so that you can try and figure out? Well, gee, just, you know, the programming and then services that we offer does it a line at all with what this family has in terms of their general charitable interest. So in the case of the maritime museum, they might be thinking about, you know, china, find out what you nowhere else these people are are spending their time. Are they interested in other maybe water conservation efforts, other charities that really address water quality in the long island sound? You know, things of that nature, and so for sure, you’ll know that you’re on the right track and engaging this person in additional conversation. So, you know, that might be a great way to find out where they and their spouse volunteered their time also vacationing. You know, this is a great opportunity for you to say so, you know, do you have any exciting vacation plans for this summer? Uh, so, you know, be listening for responses like, yeah, we’ll be spending, you know, the entire month of august in our home. In the hamptons, you know, they say that nature good to know just just generally find out what type if they say no, we’re doing this stay cation thing this year, you know, pick up on that cue, um, and then really, really important the circles back to something we talked about in the january show is to be able to really create some sort of contact reports on capturing critical information that you’ve been able to glean from the, uh, from the cultivation events. Right now, we have a great dahna database right now, back in january, we talked about we encouraged i think it was the eleven percent that didn’t have a computer database to look at the clouds packages that available, and you went into detail and on that in the january six show, so hopefully some of those people have converted teo computer databases, right? And if they’re still in there, sort of in the shopping phase, i’ll just remind them real quickly that the two websites that that might be something for them to check out that might give them some additional info on what’s available out there. Idealware dot or ge talked had a kn article about how to select a database and tech soup dot or ge is a good place to find some low cost and free tech advice. So, you know, check those out if you’re still in shopping mode. Andi, i you know, i truly believe that cloud based is the way to go it’s just going to give your staff and your board the most flexibility on dh then your point about saving that valuable information that you that you learn at a cultivation event in that computer database or if you’re not computerized yet, i guess you know, you you print up a contact report and put it in a person’s folder, right? Exactly and, you know, it’s really important, like, just just like you don’t want that staff to be all congregating together in the corner, it’s going to be very important after the event post event very quickly thereafter within a day or two to have a debriefing if it’s not a meeting, get a conference call going, you know, there’s free conference services out there there’s no reason why you can’t just say, you know, knowing in advance the date of the event, let’s say it’s a thursday evening by by friday midday, you could be having a conference call in have that scheduled way in advance that you’re going to have a debriefing call, you know what were the important point? Somebody found out from speaking with some of the people, and you may want to actually pre-tax fine people, right? So if we know in advance that mr big bucks is going to be there, why not do a little pre advanced research on him and find out a little bit of information? And so that a boardmember can be assigned to perhaps be the person to you know, just have a discussion and you can even try and figure out who the best four person would be, that you’d want to make sure cultivating that individual during the way we’re going to take a break. I want to emphasize before we do one thing that you said, which is in terms of inviting people, look a tte donors who have give been giving for the lifetime large donors over their lifetime, so individual gifts may not be so large, but they’re giving history over the life over their lifetime with your organization. Is quite large. Those air also good people to invite. We’re going take a break, and maria simple will still be with me after that break. And i hope you will, too. Talking alternative radio twenty four hours a day. Hi, this is psychic medium. Betsy cohen, host of the show. The power of intuition. Join me at talking alternative dot com mondays at eleven a. M call in for a free psychic readings. Learn how to tune into your intuition, to feel better and to create your optimum life. I’m here to guide you and to assist you in creating life that you deserve. Listen every monday at eleven a, m on talking alternative dot com. Hi, i’m carol ward from the body mind wellness program. Listen to my show for ideas and information to help you live a healthier life in body, mind and spirit, you’ll hear from terrific guests who are experts in the areas of health, wellness and creativity. So join me every thursday at eleven a, m eastern standard time on talking alternative dot com professionals serving community. Hi, this is nancy taito from speaks. Been radio speaks. Been. Radio is an exploration of the world of communication, how it happens in how to make it better, because the quality of your communication has a direct impact on the quality of your life. Tune in monday’s at two pm on talking alternative dot com, where i’ll be interviewing experts from business, academia, the arts and new thought. Join me mondays at two p m and get all your communications questions answered on speaks been radio. This is tony martignetti, aptly named host of tony martignetti non-profit radio. Big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. Technology fund-raising compliance. Social media, small and medium non-profits have needs in all these areas. My guests are expert in all these areas and mohr. Tony martignetti non-profit radio fridays, one to two eastern on talking alternative broadcasting. Talking. Hi there and welcome back we’re revisiting your twenty twelve prospect plan with maria simple maria just teo wrap up that topic on cultivation events. Was there anything more you wanted to say about that before we get to one of the other topics from from january? I would say in terms of pre imposed cultivation event, there are a couple of websites that you might want a bookmark to be able to do some of that general research on an individual that might be attending or might have attended anay event. I outlined some of these in the going beyond google article that i have on my website, and maybe what i ll do, tony is at after the show go ahead into your lincoln page as well as your lincoln group as well as your facebook group on dh post there about what where they confine that exactly, but it’s a suspect finder, dot com and it’s on the resource is paige, so some of those things that you can do is obviously run the person’s name through google. Now the big tip with google is that you want to put quotation marks around a person’s name, so that you’re finding their name as a phrase in google if is so, certainly you could do that. You can set up a google alerts again on the top ten donors we had recommended back in january that you look at the top donors that you have in your database and set up an alert on their name that’s free google will push the information to you so you could find out if something new is happening, especially in somebody’s business career. Now, last time we talked about alerts, i think you had set one on me or we talk about something and you used me as an example. I was lousy results was a wealth indicator. Was that that wealth indicator? What? What, you know, what’s interesting about setting up. Stop using me as an example, right? Google and google alerts is if you google plus now is actually influencing, and we talked about that on one of your shows it’s influencing your search results. So if you are on google plus and you are logged into google, the results are actually going to be skewed more toward social results. So if you’re doing this purely as a prospect researcher. You may want to actually log out of google. Um, your google plus account before commencing your prospect research. Just a tip. I think you might get a little bit more of objective results, if you will. It’s not gonna be so much skewed toward just social sector social media here. And you had you had examples on of other alerts that that people could set beyond the free google lorts, which are which are outstanding. I use them a lot for for my work, right? But you had some examples of others specific newspaper alerts. A lot of the newspapers out there permit used to set up alerts on specific phrases. If you and also the news sources in your state here i track in new jersey, i track and jay is, uh, they send me daily alert just generally what’s going on in the business community. I get those alerts twice a day here in new jersey. So that’s, something you want to consider looking into. What is that publication that covers your state? It might present from interesting opportunities for you because they tend to not only highlight, you know, negative news that’s going on, but also some real positive news and then one of the fee based services that some of your listeners maybe currently scribed, too, for doing foundation research is called foundation search dot com and as paid subscriber, one of the things that you have access to is a new foundation alert service. So if you are subscribed to that service, definitely set up the alert for yourself. They’ll let you know anytime a new foundation is formed on registered with the irs in your state or whatever states you decide to set up, as you know, the alert service and you will be pushed the information through email, then you can check it out a little bit further waken set these alerts up not only for individuals but companies and foundations. That’s, right? Yeah, you can definitely do that as well. Cos and foundations, you want to set up those alert so, you know, whatever it is that you’re looking to track for certain, you want to set up the alert there? Um, lincoln is a great place to research. Somebody pretty opposed an event. Also, they have free alerts that you can set up within lincoln. So let’s say you’re always, you know, prospecting for somebody who holds specific in a certain industry. Let’s say the accounting industry or something like that. Ah, and you want to always be notified anytime somebody new joins lincoln who’s in the accounting field and also happens to be within a certain radius of your zip code, you can set those types of alerts up up to three of them, actually under a free lengthen account to take advantage of that. And have lincoln pushed the information to you, maria, is that using the advanced search? Yeah, yeah. You can do with the advanced search page just to do the search initially and then? Ah, once you set those, you see the search results, you can actually save that search and you’re allowed to save up to three searches. Particularly useful. Okay. Okay, so the cultivation events, the alerts i’ve calculated now the year is six thirteen ths of the way through. So you have you have seven thirteenth remaining to take advantage of these ideas that maria originally recommended back in january. But don’t feel bad, maria. We have just about thirty seconds left. What do you want to leave people with in? This mid year checking this revisiting of the prospect plan i think it’s really just the idea of getting proactive on dh getting their delve into your database proactively trying mine it proactively look for people who are outside of the database that you need to bring in and learn about your organization and really help them stored them along said that they will feed knew names into your organization and be willing to host their own cultivation event. Maria simple you’ll find her at the prospect finder dot com our regular contributor, maria pleasure talking to you, thank you very much. We’ll catch you next month and my thanks again, of course, to jennifer herring and the folks at a f p for ah, letting me be on the exhibit floor last week at fund-raising day in new york city next week, what happened in two thousand eleven? Well recap the years fund-raising with bob evans of giving yusa and returning rob mitchell, the ceo of atlas, of giving we’ll compare and contrast they’re two methods and what their findings are for last year’s fund-raising also scott koegler, the editor of non-profit technology news, returns with going mobile he and i will talk about mobile aps and your mobile website a few weeks ago on tony’s take two i talked about my core beliefs that charity’s need to do better and that they deserve the help that they need. Lynette singleton, from singleton consulting group, is a good friend to the show and she’s, a frequent re tweeter of the show on twitter and she’s offering to help the charity’s need she’s hosting a ninety minute webinar on marketing on thursday, june twenty first, you’ll learn what marketing really is and how it can help your non-profit had a position you’re non-profit conduct a marketing and communications audit and develop a marketing plan to achieve your goals. I have talked to lynette and she’s, a smart lady, and you’ll learn a lot from this webinar non-profit radio listeners get twenty five dollars off registration used discount code non-profit radio that’s two words it’s on thursday, june twenty first at two thirty eastern and you register at s c g the number four non-profits dot net cg four non-profits dot net to register for lynette singleton’s marketing webinar you can keep up with us on the facebook page like us. On that page, you know where to find us live. An archive non-profit radio dot net is for the archive. That’s. Our apple page are apple, itunes, paige. The show’s hashtag is non-profit radio on twitter. Use it often. Our creative producer is clear, meyerhoff sam liebowitz is the line producer, shows social media is by regina walton of organic social media, and the remote producer of tony martignetti non-profit radio is john federico of the new rules. I hope you’ll be with me next friday went to two p m eastern at talking alternative dot com. You couldn’t do anything to get good ending. You’re listening to the talking alternative network, get anything. Thank you, cubine how’s your game. Want to improve your performance, focus and motivation than you need. 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070: Fundraising Throughout Your Lifecycle & Marrying Major and Planned Gifts – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

Tony’s guests this week:

Jeff Sobel, principal of Jeffrey Sobel Consulting

Charlie Gordy, director of planned giving for Harvard Law School & Margaret Holman, principal of Holman Consulting

Read and watch more on Tony’s blog: http://mpgadv.com

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Welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio for friday, december ninth, two thousand eleven we’re always talking about big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. I’m your aptly named host. I hope you were with me last week for so me. For pg social media for planned giving kristen schultz, senior vice president for crescendo, shared her research on the best use of social media properties to support your plan, giving program videos, testimonials, blogging, technical information and more. And emily chan, half of our regular legal team from the non-profit and exempt organizations law firm in san francisco, talked about political campaign activity and election earing what can your non-profit do? And how does the irs decide if you’ve crossed the line? What can your employees say under the first amendment this week? We’re fund-raising throughout your life cycle. What does fund-raising look like in these stages of a non-profits life brainchild, startup, adolescence, maturity, stagnation and declined? How do you avoid the last two jeff sobel principle of jeffrey sobel consulting shares his insights. This was recorded at westchester, a f p s national philanthropy day and then marrying major and planned gif ts are these two? Compatible. What does their courtship and marriage look like? Charlie gordy, director of planned giving for harvard law school, and margaret hohman principle of home and consulting, reveal how to make this a match made in heaven. This interview i pre recorded at the national conference on philanthropic planning at tony’s take to roughly thirty two minutes after the hour. My block this week is the next-gen charity interviews from craig newmark, the founder of craigslist and craigconnects to neil strauss, who went undercover in a secret society of pickup artists. There are takeaways for your non-profit from all these interviews, and i’ll talk about a few of them on tony’s. Take to live, tweeting the show this week. Use hashtag non-profit radio to join the conversation on twitter. Right now, we take a break, and then right after the break, we’ll start the pre recorded interview fund-raising throughout your life cycle. So stay with me. Dafs you’re listening to the talking alternative network. Durney are you suffering from aches and pains? Has traditional medicine let you down? Are you tired of taking toxic medications, then come to the double diamond wellness center and learn how our natural methods can help you to hell? Call us now at to one to seven to one eight, one eight three that’s to one to seven to one eight one eight three or find us on the web at www dot double diamond wellness dot com. We look forward to serving you. Is your marriage in trouble? Are you considering divorce? Hello, i’m lawrence bloom, a family law attorney in new york and new jersey. No one is happier than the day their divorce is final. My firm can help you. We take the nasty out of the divorce process and make people happy. Police call a set to one, two, nine six four three five zero two for a free consultation. That’s lawrence h bloom two, one two, nine, six, four, three five zero two. We make people happy. Oppcoll hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business? Why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com. Welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of national philanthropy day with the edith may conference centre in briar cliff manner, new york, hosted by the association of fund-raising professionals, westchester county chapter. Joining me now is jeff sobel. He is founder of jeffrey sobel consulting and his unconference topic is non-profit life cycles and culture development strategies for each stage. Jeff sobel, welcome. Thank you. Happy to be here. It’s. A pleasure. What is? What are the development life cycles? Oh, sure. Well, there’s non-profit life’s like, well, just like sort of for-profit business non-profits also have ah, very natural life cycle to them. I have to say, over the last couple of years, those have sped up because of technology. So we’re seeing a compression exactly time compression. So really, the first life cycle is the start of phase or the not to start it, but the brainchild phase or the creation on dh for many people, it’s something that never comes out because it’s something they think about, they think there’s a great issue that they can tackle, but they never verbalize it, and he never sort of formalize it. But for the few people who do yeah, and there’s more, more people who were doing it, they put that out there on because of technology and the ability to get people together and formalized people. And also the back office stuff can be done much quicker. So that’s why? Quicker and cheaper? Exactly. The expenses is almost never minimal. The amount of stuff did you khun doing? Cloud and social media? You’re going, you’re going your office running in a week. Exactly. It’s it’s, it’s amazing. So what happened? You know, you don’t even need an office. You’re doing it out of your bedroom. Exactly. Okay? And the other the beauty of it is is that you can learn quickly whether it’s going to take a hold or you can say okay, we can move on from that idea. Okay, the brainchild let’s move on and then we’ll come back. So after you get through the idea and you verbalize it, everybody you get to the start up phase where you say, okay, now i’ve got a sort of developed by-laws i’ve actually got a file for a five twenty three i’ve got to get the board members together usually boardmember zehr close friends at this time people, you know what friends and family have been recruited exactly? You bring everybody on and in the close network what’s inside your tent on, and then you start figuring out, okay, programmatically how well, you know, the idea that the social impact that we want to bring or the particular idea that we’re developing what’s the program we’ll look like. So this also can happen a lot faster. Now you have to sort of do your research to figure out. Are there other groups doing what you’re doing in that space? We’ll talk about that, you know, we’re talking about some of the trend analysis and doing your own research, but let’s, move on to the next phase short fired-up once you once you get past the startup, you’ve gotto sort of get into what we call the adolescents and growth rays, so you basically become a teenager, you sort of. Now you’ve got beyond just your friends and family on the board, you’re not usually your first funder and multiple funders at this time. Most organizations, fifty percent or seventy percent is coming from either one or two major funders, which again, family and friends exactly where a big foundation who loves the idea wants to be in that space wants to develop a model. Usually these things are still in the model face, so i’m going to develop something they say is going to work here. Westchester, if it takes off, will branch out to new york and new jersey embarrasses identity after after adolescence and growth. So then you become what we call a maturity middle age. You’re already sure there’s a thoughtless growth phase is something that then you become a mature agency. You’ve got your legs. All right, you’re actually operating. You usually got an office of used nowadays? Not necessarily, but you have a space that people can sort of connect to. People know about to program fund-raising looks very different fund-raising you start have staff, you organize more like structurally, actually. But you actually have an organizational chart that you can live by and actually is reality. The founders usually probably still involved in the early part of this, but usually that person’s phasing out or somehow still connected, but bringing on more of ah non-profit professional to be the executive director someone who’s had a career in non-profit um and then you grow in your boards are you know you have professionals on your board. Okay? People have different skillsets let’s. Go so let’s, go back to the early the brainchild way. Have ah, this business. You mind if i just mentioned one real quick thing? No, i don’t mind. Okay, go ahead. Uh, the next phase and what isn’t face-to-face? Oh, i thought it was true. And act like you actually four faces. One phase we never like to talk about. But then the last phase is what we call stagnation. Sure, agencies fall backwards and they go into what we call stagnation phase for whatever reasons could be a funding reason. It could be because their programs are not needed anymore, and they have to sort of reinvent themselves. Probably the most famous example of this is the march of dimes. They were started and they solved the issue of but the disease that they were trying to work on. And then they reinvented themselves specifically around early childhood and birth defects in various things like that. So, you know, agencies at that point, the last piece is, unfortunately, agencies can decline and shut down if they go. Down to the piece, this is when we don’t like to talk about it when we don’t like to talk to happen, but it does happen and there’s a way to do it appropriately. Okay, so let’s, just see what we have time for now, because i i do get a lot of enquiries about from people who are i have an idea, they’re passionate, they want to do something burning that isn’t a ce far as they know isn’t being done or isn’t being done well there, so we’re back in the brainchild phase. What’s your advice there around development strategies. Well, i think there’s a couple different things. One to do your homework and research to see who else is in that space. If there’s nobody else in that space, obviously, then i think you can move forward. If not, you want to go talk to those other organizations. You might be able to collaborate and they save yourself enormous. Exactly their enormous administrative and fund-raising i know everybody. There’s, there’s, sort of an eagle at play and everybody wants that sort of be the founder and head of a new five o once i can do it. Better exactly, and if you don’t have the personal wealth to fundchat in a very difficult thing to do and the first i find the first thing that can sort of temper that enthusiasm is the irs thie application exactly non-profit exempt status after you’ve been through the right, the state inc exactly, the irs will help you put the brakes on right with their twelve to eighteen month process. Probably the best thing that you could do early on is have a strategy session, bring in experts on people that you know, that you trust that will be as honest as they can with you. People are our objective outsiders as well, sort of a focus group ten to twelve people bring the idea to them, get their feedback. What did they see? Do they talk about other organizations who are doing the same thing? Are they you know, they see this as something that’s funda ble people will like isn’t needed, you know, obviously, just because you think it’s needed doesn’t always messes and everybody else is going to see thie importance behind it. So doing an early focus group, you know, not keeping the ideas if you’re proud of the idea, or you think the idea really has can resonate, then vocalize it as soon as possible, share what as many people as possible, see what i guess they hastily used the phrase, but see what sticks to the wall and get that out as soon as possible, because then you’ll learn you’ll. If it’s going to take off those early conversations in those early strategy sessions, those of the people are going to help you formalize it. Not everybody, but some are going to hell. Wow, i love what he’s doing or she’s doing. I’m going to lend my support. We couldn’t do anything to get independent thing. You’re listening to the talking alternative network, waiting to get you thinking. Cubine are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three, that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. No. Hi, this is psychic medium. Betsy cohen, host of the show. The power of intuition. Join me at talking alternative that calm mondays at eleven a. M call in for a free second reading learned how to tune into your intuition to feel better and to create your optimum life. I’m here to guide you and to assist you in creating life that you deserve. Listen. Every monday at eleven a, m on talking alternative dot com. Are you feeling overwhelmed in the current chaos of our changing times? A deeper understanding of authentic astrology can uncover solutions in every area of life. After all, metaphysics is just quantum physics politically expressed. I am montgomery taylor, and i offer lectures, seminars and private consultations. For more information, contact me at monte m o nt y at r l j media. Dot com talking alternative radio twenty four hours a day. In this brainchild phase, we do need to put ego aside exactly it’s it’s a hard thing to dio it’s only human nature, but i think the way, the way i always preface things that people says, i personally think this would be a great idea. I’ve thought about it. This is my thinking’s, but i need everybody else to tell me what what is reality and have you if you’re good about listening to reality from others, it’ll save you an enormous amount of time because everything else that we’re going to talk about you could avoid if you don’t start a nonprofit but end up collaborating with with one that already exists that doing something related or close, right, i given example just real quickly, we just got contact we could contacted about this all the time, and i would say ninety percent of the time we get contacted, that person should be talking to another non-profit and they could bring that energy to that non-profit already created, and it could be a program developed within that and often running in. Lots of people are being helped and of that night, so go ahead, just everyone, some other is something new on dh? It has merit to wanting to develop a new organization. We’re working someone contest the other day who is a volunteer firefighter who happened to be very successful in business on wanting to develop something very specific for firefighters prevent heart attacks. It’s a highest rate of lye fire fighters die. Okay, so there’s a whole new program. He’s developing he’s. You know, within his first six months of the developing the idea he’s doing that, you know, we’re trying to counsel him through the right steps to see if this will resonate. Will it work and various things like that? So more times than not, though i would get back to your initial point is, if you put your eagle to the side and really get down to the facts, you could really decide whether it’s something you should be working with someone else or setting up that new non-profit in your experience, that ninety percent that ought to be talking to another non-profit how many of them actually do go talk to another non-profit about collaborating? I would say about half of those. Alright, okay, but it’s not that bad. And i would say unfortunately, most of them continue forward no matter what, i try to talk him off, go do what they’re supposed to do, and then they stop doing what they’re supposed to do, and you go off on their own anyway. Well, i think there’s something convinced them, you know, if someone lets give example, if it’s an entertainer or let’s say, it’s, somebody who’s been very successful as a hedge fund manager on investment world or some other business, right? They always feel like, hey, what we did in the business world, we could bring that expertise in the nonprofit world, and that was something that i could definitely say it was somewhat true, let’s say fifteen, twenty years ago, but the way non-profits operate now, you know, it’s very hard for someone who says, hey, just because i ran a successful coat company or some others hyre business doesn’t mean i can run a successful non-profit and have, you know, huge impact and changed on my own there’s just so much around compliance and regulation, you’re you’re starting a corporation. This is a non profit corporation, but it isn’t. It is incorporated, it has to adhere to a lot of those corporate rules as well as go find money. Well, the money parts really hard, you know, there’s so many non-profits in the space of trying to raise money. So you’re just, you know, you think your idea will cut through all that cloud and all that clutter of everybody else, but it won’t there’s ego and impossible. All right, let’s, move on. If we haven’t persuaded people that the brainchild faces really where they should stop and maybe ah, latto ally themselves with another non-profit if we haven’t persuaded them of that let’s, move on to the start up phase when your and your i know the focus of your talk is really around fund-raising in development strategy. So at this start up phase, what does fund-raising look like? Well, it’s a combination of things once again, it’s still going to be very close and that we’re friends, you’re going to develop a board, you’re gonna have to base it on by-laws and legal regulations and things like that. So those people are going to be you’re going to have to convince them in an early age, to want to be fund-raising on your behalf, you could be an early age of the organization really don’t don’t go recruiting five year old no that’s not fair, because they’ll come on five year olds will come, my love, you’re not gonna be like i know my eight year old, but they’re not going to reach adolescence by the time you do your organization does, they’re going to be exactly they’re gonna hold you back don’t don’t recruit the five year old no, i think the other pieces that you’re going to depending on the program and depending on the idea, what you’re also going to need to do is you have to harness technology. So between the social media, the youtube twitter than facebook’s of the world, you have to bring in an enormous amount of people who are going to learn about what you’re trying to do, connect to it early on, not that everybody’s going to move forward with it, but whatever whoever connect. So i guess you need to use the term, but you’re able to take it viral, then have some mechanism in the back to say ok, up to people who learn about it, who are the people that i need to go? Talk to the top fifty who are the top twenty five? You can’t be worried about that. One thousand people know about his thousand when early face of a startup, you have to find major donors early on, you have to find people who were going to buy into the concept take a chance they’re basically becoming investors in your idea of a philanthropic investor, and they’re going to take that that’s what’s going to be successful later on, you can build all the other traditional fund-raising ideas, but in the early start up phase, if you don’t do early on and get to capacity. Like i said, it goes back to also some people get started because they can fund it themselves. You know, michael bloomberg decides he wants to do something he can, he can throw his own a couple million teo. But aside, people can’t aside from from from being able to self fund, then this is really a marketplace test of your ideas and your marketing too, right? Right. And and that’s that’s going, you’ll never get to the mature phase of an organization if you can’t get major donors. All right, well, we’re gonna get people to adolescence before, before we get to mature. But how do they do something that you just mentioned? Identify the top twenty five or fifty out of the thousand people that are now, like, you know, like the facebook page and and r and r on the email list, how do you find those? The the top, right? Well, they basically had to use the tools that are provided for you from from a technology standpoint. So there’s a lot of research information out there that you confined on particular subject, whatever subject matter you are doing, even though if your programs unique there’s still people out there who have funded something in that arena. And so you have to find those people and find a way to connect and had those conversations with those foundations, corporations and major fund and potential individual donors. So most that information’s public knowledge now and you can create your own without spending a lot of money for fancy researcher you confined, you can create your own top twenty five prospectors. You can also listen to tony martignetti non-profit radio because we do have a regular prospect, research contributor maria semple, who comes on once a month, maria’s fancy socks you know what i do in the prospect finder? She comes on once a month. I’m with jeff sobel he’s, a founder of jeffrey sobel consulting, and we’re talking about the life cycles of a non-profit and different development strategies within each cycle, let’s go from start upto adolescence and growth. What does fund-raising look like now? Well, if this phase what you’re going to have a big change in your board, this is where you move away from your traditional friends and family board you’re actually recruiting people who have given to you connected to the agency professionals from other arenas, people you probably never met until you teo developed a non-profit so those trustees and you had to bring them on with the right expectations, too many matured agencies have they don’t have e-giving get policy, they don’t have a fund-raising component for their boards, and they try to integrate it afterwards. That’s the biggest mistake you can make what you have to do is in that early phase, when you move from start upto adolescents, you’ve gotta integrate the expectations of fund-raising for those who are connected, the board and volunteers because the only way you’re going to be successful in the fund-raising aspect is that i have a bigger network than yourself another people you know, the next. This is sort of a phase where you start moving into a traditional event, whatever that is e-giving example, agency we’re working with his only their foundation only has been around since two thousand five. This year, they did their first five k walk run on people connected to the walk run like you prior to the walk, when they had about a hundred people on their database after the walk run, they have over ten thousand people, not a smaller donors, the twenty five fifty dollars who donate to someone who walking and running into cause put down that now they have a database, that’s, actual prospects, people that take in mind and then move forward with. So you have to do something that’s going to increase that database, you’re going, you’ve got to really you can’t you can’t fund-raising without a database, but interesting, though you don’t, you know you didn’t start with event fund-raising back in the in the start up phase, you weren’t saying, have a gala. We’ll do a walk run, thie, but i do think a lot of people think of events is the only way to do fund-raising but so i think i’m just emphasizing all the message that you’ve said before this before you got to the events from the event was not the first way to raise money, right? Well, the biggest reason why lots of groups start that way is because most people connected to these ideas don’t have a non-profit background and most likely definitely don’t have a fund-raising background, a professional fund-raising background. So the only thing that they know is the traditional galas, golf outing, dinners and those types of things they don’t know the sophistication around major gifts and the moves management and the ways that are going to attract foundations and corporations, so they go to what they know that’s why i said that in the early stages, you’ve got to bring on some expertise, that’s going to help you sort of sort of figure out the best mode and bringing that money and get to the traditional type of stuff you need resource is it’s it’s it’s unless, like again, unless you have two dollars. To pay the caterers and the event and all the other stuff a front you can’t just do an event, events have a lot to cost to them and you don’t want to run a one something that’s not going to get you any profit, and they’re also incredibly labour intensive, very labor intensive, very labor, and i think a lot of people don’t realize what goes into making sure that the bunting matches the flowers. Well, the worst part about is they don’t realize that the real work for fund-raising happens after events, you know, it’s who attended, what did they get out of that event and who in that room has the potential to do something much beyond right? The price of the two hundred dollars ticket? You’re follow-up your follow-up on dh that’s directly now gets to what you said earlier when we were in the start up phase. You’ve got to find the people who come to the organization of those thousand or so that you found online who were the top ones that you need to follow up with same thing after you’re after your event. Who were the top attendees thatyou need to follow-up exactly in a strategic ways and maybe more personal ways than you’re following up with the other many hundreds who came, hopefully right, let’s move to maturity. Sure fund-raising here, what is our fund-raising model look like? Well, the fund-raising at this point, you should have ah, probably have a head of development, a director of development, smaller staff, some depending on the size agency. Much bigger staff, it’s going to be much more sophisticated. So your your development operations actually starts now breaking into two operations, you have your annual fund where you have to raise a certain amount of money to to need to keep the agency moving its programs, the staff paying everything that supplements all the other revenues of the agency. The other piece is creating the strategic longer term campaigns, whether it’s an endowment fund building a reserve if you own a building what’s, you know, the capitol pieces far building a new building or fixing things, you know, all sorts of reasons why you need to be in a major gifts mode, and you had to be able to manage those operations at the same time. You can’t just be in one and and do the other i’m insured agency amateur fund-raising development department can do both on last minute at least is also don’t forget about the plan giving component, which is very important by that by despite you should have the ability to really start taking your donor’s through their life cycle of e-giving on and that’s really important piece. Yeah, and if you’re not familiar with plans e-giving it’s it’s essentially encouraging people to remember the organization in their state plan, somehow that could be life insurance or simple bequest in their will. It’s like, sometimes it’s going back to the original founders and going back to the original people helped start the agency and saying, hayden, you know, we need you to leave a legacy you made something that now is around thirty five, forty years, whatever the years are, but it wants to be around for the next hundred years in order to do that, we need a sound investment. We need the sound endowment that’s going to secure an anchor, the agency what’s, the what’s, the key thing in the mature stage that you think non-profits don’t do a cz well as they ought to, they had to. Say one thing that you wish mature agencies organizations would do that they don’t, what would that be? Well, from fund-raising standpoint, i think the plan giving component is a huge one that i think too many agencies, i hate to use the word ignore, but put on the back burner or don’t put enough effort toward, but more important is thinking more strategic long term. So i think a lot of agencies plot along and do really well on the campaign and then when the moment arises or the question arises about hey, we need a campaign to do x, y and z above and beyond for whatever needs those are it’s it’s, they haven’t been doing enough to cultivate their donors, so that face takes a lot longer. So if i had the hole in the roof and we need to fix it and it’s going to cost us the two million dollars for the capital campaign, we needed to do it, you know, in a year from now, but we haven’t matured our donor’s ready to do it and it’s going to take more like two and three years so never think that the annual campaigns the only thing that’s going on the too many mature agencies think about the here and now, but, you know, i always think about your donors about what they’re doing for you anally, but also cultivating them to think about, okay, when we are ready to have a major initiative and they could be helpful to that major initiative, are we will we be ready to ask them? That’s the next stage is stagnation. That sounds like something we should avoid. Exactly, hoping i don’t mature that’s not part of my life cycle, right? So how do we avoid stagnation? Well, that is everything that you just described is a combination of that it’s also being able to evaluate taking a hard look once again it’s strategic planning process. But i’ma call organizational eagerness. Okay, so as we talked about in the start of face having egos, organizations, whoever tour sometimes have their own ego to themselves because i feel like the importance of whatever they’re doing or what they have been doing for many, many years still remains. So you have to be evaluating your programs. You have to be evaluating what you’re doing and that impact on the community. Can you be doing something new, evaluating the market to what if, what if the need’s right, that should be in the community all the time assessing whether your work is still relevant? Exactly. I mean, if you’re running let’s, say, youth program at a particular school and you know, when you first started about that, you had a waiting list and kids were climbing to get in there and in the last two years, you know, you go on visited in the half, the room’s half empty something’s not resonating there, so you can’t rest on your laurels and your funders will quickly get to that piece they’ll start seeing your outcomes. Obviously anybody who’s ever written the grant know is that at some point you have to write a report, and at some point, if you’re going to renew, you’ve gotta prove those outcomes, and when the numbers are not there, they’re not there, and so that will quickly. So you you can’t sort of live in that mode. You’ve gotta kind of always say, hey, we’ve got to be evaluating ourselves. What can we challenge ourselves with? It doesn’t necessarily meeting creating something off mission, because that’s what a lot of agencies, right is staying on mission, but creating something that will continue, you know, reinvigorating, reengage, you know, there’s various things, and the other thing is, obviously your volunteers, you got to be consistent with your board. Ah, there’s, nobody out there does that i’ve ever met who could be on a board for more than eight, nine, ten years and still be assed valuables they were from the beginning boardmember can leave, can moved often agency and still connect to the agency and still be important. But there’s a huge value, bringing someone new to fill that seat, new energy and many organizations, you know, they hold onto boardmember fearful to ask them to step down. We have just thirty seconds left. Jeff decline is the last stage what one piece of advice for avoiding declined? Well, usually that’s a hard thing if your agency the biggest thing that you can do to avoid declining a za non-profit is probably when you get to the stagnation phase, realize it quickly and devise a plan quickly usually it’s a deficit that you’re dealing with and never be afraid to cut a part of your program or your agency, because it could be the detriment of your entire agency, don’t hold onto something to to know in the long run we’ll put you out of business, even though you just hold on it because of legacy or just something you’ve always done. You have to be willing to cut your losses. Jeff sobel is founder of jeffrey sobel consulting and his conference topic at national philanthropy day is non-profit life cycles and culture, the development strategies for each stage. And i think this is jeff very interesting conversation, very relevant for people who are thinking about a non-profit there at that brainchild phase, they really should know what what lies ahead. Oh, yes. Is that there’s a lot? Thank you very much for being a guest. My pleasure. This is tony martignetti na non-profit radio coverage of national philanthropy day, hosted by the association of fund-raising professionals, westchester county chapter that was my pre recorded interview fund-raising throughout your life cycle. I recorded that with jeffrey sobel at westchester county chapter of the association for fund-raising professionals national philanthropy day in november two thousand eleven. Just last month. Right now we take a break and after the break it’s, tony’s, take two and then marrying major and planned gif ts. So stay with me. You’re listening to the talking alternative network. Are you feeling overwhelmed in the current chaos of our changing times? A deeper understanding of authentic astrology can uncover solutions in every area of life. After all, metaphysics is just quantum physics, politically expressed, i and montgomery taylor and i offer lectures, seminars and private consultations. For more information, contact me at monte m o nt y at r l j media. Dot com are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three, that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. Dahna hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business? Why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com lively conversation top trends, sound advice, that’s, tony martignetti non-profit radio and i’m ken berger from charity navigator. Welcome back to the show, it’s time now for tony’s take to my block this week is my next-gen charity video interviews last month at the next-gen charity conference, i interviewed about eight of the luminaries who they had a cz part of their program. It was a pretty exciting conference close to a thousand people were their very jazzed up audience heard from a lot of very interesting people, and i got to interview a bunch of them. We were media sponsors for that conference. One of them is craig newmark he’s, the founder of craigslist, and now more recently, craigconnects craig and i talked about consistent messaging and knowing when to stop talking peter thumb and i talked about perseverance in the face of disappointment. Peter is the founder of ethos water aria finger, chief operating officer of do something dot org’s, which is a site devoted to getting young people involved in volunteering with non-profits joined me to share ideas about how to motivate teenagers to support your work market echo of eco enterprises, the well known clothing lines talked about his board service. Um, i talked with charles best he’s the founder of donors choose dot or ge and he and i talked about connecting donors to the causes they support. You may know donors choose that’s the site where teachers post their needs in the classroom, and then individual donors devote money to those to those needs. Neil strauss uncovered lessons for non-profits from his undercover work in a secret society of pickup artists. He infiltrated this society when he was on assignment for rolling stone magazine. You can learn what eric sapp kristen learned from taking two hundred of our nation’s thought leaders and entertainers out for a cup of coffee. He traveled the country in a volkswagen microbus and cold called about two hundred of our nation’s leaders and entertainers on dh people you know, from the arts and politics and invite him out for a cup of coffee, including jimmy carter, don rickles, henry winkler, let’s well, in the interview, i brought out some lessons that he learned from talking to all those people, and disney made a film about his his journey, and the movie is the journey so links to these and a lot of other next-gen videos are on my block mpg a dv dot com, and that is tony’s take two for friday, december ninth. Now we have a pre recorded interview marrying major and planned gif ts you’ll learn about how these two could be compatible from charlie gordy, director of planned giving in harvard law school, and margaret hohman principle of home in consulting see whether this could be a match made in heaven between major and planned gif ts and here’s that interview this is tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of the national conference on philanthropic planning. We are in the heart of san antonio, texas, on the river walk i guess now are margaret hohman and charlie gordy. Margaret is principal holman consulting in new york city and charlie gordy is director of planned e-giving at harvard law school. Margaret charlie welcome! Thank you. Thankyou, tony. Good to be here. It’s. A pleasure to have both of you your your session topic is job fusion or confusion marrying major and plant gifts. Charlie, let me start with you. What what’s the possible confusion. Well, as a lot of organisations respond to what’s going on in the economy, the pressure for outright current e-giving has led to a de emphasis on plan giving deferred e-giving and individual playing, giving officers or having to respond to that looking at being merged into a major gifts rolls, and that is causing some confusion for them, i think, personally and also institutionally in what the best approach is to overall fund-raising into their donors, okay, but is it not a good idea to be breaking down silos between major e-giving and plan giving? I think breaking down the silos is absolutely critical and the structure internally you should be very flat. Margaret pointed out in our first session that what she sees and obviously let her speak for herself, for what she sees in the future is a very flat structure. The silos should be broken down, and major gift and plan giving officers should work very, very closely together with donors, but they are different techniques of fund-raising they’re different processes you think differently when you’re focusing on on plan giving versus major e-giving, um, and all playing gifts are major gifts essentially just depends on how you get there, okay? We’re going to talk a little about what the different thoughts might be and margaret, we will get to what the future looks like, but before we get there. I just, you know, sort of leading into the topic too. Your your session description suggests that changes in the economy changes in the tax law are impacting this issue. Indeed, the more complex, constant and confusing change is that there are with tax laws right now from the charitable deduction that proposed change in the estate law. State tax law it coming it going? How do i plan for a bequest? Should i die this year? Should i die next year? Those are all things that are confusing not only to gift officers but also to donors and that is really driving a lot of the expertise surrounding both major gift work and planned gift work. Thie economy obviously has an effect to when the economy stumbles, major gifts go down. Plan gifts are not as affected by the economy because they are future gifts. They’re more long term on many organizations. If they have a plan gift program that has been working that will be the bridge between the bad economy and staying alive is because i’m getting bequests. I might not be getting major gifts now. Are you seeing in your consulting practice some regret among charities that don’t have a plan giving probono yes, wishing, wishing they started ten even five years ago maybe yes, and many organizations who said, hey, listen, our plan give program is just going a million miles an hour, we’re getting millions of dollars, so we don’t have to do anything now on then all and then it starts this gradual decline for about five years, and somebody in the finance office says, oh, my gosh, how come our be question come is going down it’s because we haven’t been doing anything well, let’s put some money into doing anything now they’ve got another five year wait, so you got a ten year trough s o that the name of the game is consistent, it needs to be this consistent effort indeed, from oh planned gift and go ahead, charlie. Yeah, tow follow-up on what margaret said, i worked with an organization a few years ago on a consulting basis, and the cfo there said, look, i could shut the plan giving program down tomorrow, and i wouldn’t see it, i wouldn’t see any impact for five years, and i’ve got a budget problem right now that i’ve got it solved. So, isn’t that a a good solution? And i had to tell him that no, in fact, it’s absolutely the wrong thing to do because you are going to hurt the long term financial health of your organization for a short term gain and, uh, our listeners, i want to point out charlie has a terrific bowtie on, and for those who are on the videos were doing videos is not a clip on i want to make it very clear, it’s clearly not a clip on much, much classier guy than then those clip on men. So what? What are some practical solutions, margaret, for breaking down the silos and bringing the two together? Well, one of the practical solutions is to train cross train land, gift officers and major gift officers in each other’s areas of expertise, so that in essence, you become a generalist. And i find now that my clients, when they do have an opening for a major gift officer, are looking for somebody who can talk plan gifts. We want two for the price of one. When i started in the fund-raising world nineteen seventy six, there weren’t planned gift officers. There weren’t specialties because of the way the economy went and democratic demographics of donors it caused institutions to create silos. Teo, answer that need the demographics are changing the old that big group of older folks who are prime plan gift prospects are dying off now. There aren’t very many of them left, and we’re entering this age of the boomers and the silence who can both make a major gift and a plan gift. And now we need to have people who can talk both things, but we also have to educate our boards, but more often than not, we really have to address the problem that charlie ran into and talk to our finance people and explain how this really works. Let’s, start with the first of the things that you mentioned, the cross training how how deep should the major gift officer’s training be implant e-giving are we talking about just the ability to open a discussion or that they could go further? Maybe even maybe even they can meet with donors? Advisors? I mean, how deep should that training b of the former plan gift officer now? Now cross training? Well, it is really is going to do for sort of the former major gift officer. Krauz right, it’s going to really depend on the individual and the institution? I like to make my major gift officers what i call dangerous going like for them to know when they’ve gotten to the point where they don’t have the answer and and can say confidently, i don’t have the answer that let me get back to you on and that way you accomplished two things when the donor gets the right information, but you have another contact with the donor, thus getting the relationship continuing our good relationship on. So i like to get them as dangerous as possible. They need to understand the basic concepts and know when to say i need, you know, i need to call charlie, okay, so now, charlie yeah, yeah follow-up on that i work with major gift officers att the law school that are are really exceptional a cz you’d expect, and they still aren’t very comfortable talking about plan giving on on a regular basis. I have one that asks me a couple of times a year again to explain the difference between a gift annuity and trust. And that’s fine, and i’m happy to do that and that’s a great role for me. What i like to do is educate them to know what to listen for. You know, i have a house that i’m no longer using very much. I’d love to give, but and then to follow on what margaret said when the donor says that, but i like them to say to no be comfortable saying, well, you know what? If we were able to show you a way that you could still make your gift and take care of those other financial concerns that you have, they don’t need to know how the gift annuity payments are taxed or how the charitable deduction is calculated, but that their their methods that the organization can present that will allow the donor to still make their gift and take care of those other financial concerns that have so that suggests that there there does still need to be an expert in planned e-giving at at the organization, we can’t all just be flat, absolute cross trained? Absolutely. I believe that one hundred percent. Yeah, well, the the other thing, too is well, i also believe that there should be a plan give expert on everybody staff not every organization can afford to do that is going to get there. So using expertise either if you’ve got somebody on the board whose attacks planning attorney or trusting a state’s attorney and you can use that and get some advice or there are a lot of consultants out there who would be more than happy to work with an organization on on an hourly basis or whatever other way you khun by the expertise you need, what you can’t buy is the donor relationship. Yeah, if you have the luxury of the budget toe, have somebody on staff that’s great, but as margaret points out in his, you point out, tony, if you don’t have that it’s available and you can find it and it’s it’s almost like the same link between the major gift officer and the in house plan giving person with more expertise and then thean house plan giving person in the outside consultant everybody knows how far they can take it and when to bring in somebody else to actually make the gift happen. Let’s, go into some of the little detail, charlie. About what you suggested earlier, what to listen for lets you know so that listeners can actually get some of the benefit of the of the training. What are some things that gift officers should be listening for? That would suggest a good plan to give prospect well, first in in, in doing the planning to visit someone looking at their history, their donation history, consistent gifts over a long period of time, maybe it’s one hundred dollars, maybe it’s, fifty dollars, over five, ten years, maybe it’s a thousand. So they have that that that philanthropic connection with the institution, when you’re meeting with them of and your goal, perhaps, is an outright major gift. And they say, well, i’m just i’m not very liquid right now, so they have assets, but they’re tied up, maybe in stocks or in real estate, and if they’re in stocks and real estate, those of the assets they have it’s, a perfect candidate for a plan, gift talking alternative radio twenty four hours a day. Hi, i’m carol ward from the body mind wellness program. Listen to my show for ideas and information to help you live a healthier life in body, mind and spirit, you’ll hear from terrific guests who are experts in the areas of health, wellness and creativity. So join me every thursday at eleven a, m eastern standard time on talking alternative dot com professionals serving community. This is tony martignetti aptly named host of tony martignetti non-profit radio. Big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent technology fund-raising compliance, social media, small and medium non-profits have needs in all these areas. My guests are expert in all these areas and mohr. Tony martignetti non-profit radio friday’s one to two eastern on talking alternative broadcasting are you concerned about the future of your business for career? Would you like it all to just be better? Well, the way to do that is to better communication. And the best way to do that is training from the team at improving communications. This is larry sharp, host of the ivory tower radio program and director at improving communications. Does your office need better leadership? Customer service sales or maybe better writing are speaking skills? Could they be better at dealing with confrontation conflicts, touchy subjects all are covered here at improving communications. If you’re in the new york city area, stopped by one of our public classes or get your human resource is in touch with us. The website is improving communications, dot com that’s improving communications, dot com improve your professional environment. Be more effective, be happier. And make more money. Improving communications. That’s. The answer. Talking. Durney okay, margaret, any any further advice on? Well, oftentimes i hear people say, i don’t think i can afford this right now, and i want to take care of my family so that that again gives us that opportunity to talk about some more unconventional ways, shall we say, to make those kinds of gifts? When i work with organizations toe to go out and talk to donors, i tell them often, teo, tell the donor to take care of themselves first their family’s second and us third. And there are ways that we can help you take care of yourself, your family and then us that don’t involve writing a check. Okay, what’s one of those ways. Let’s. Go into a little detail. Well, obviously, their life income gifts that can provide for your wife, your spouse, your elderly sister, whatever. You can still make a gift. That person is getting income gets it out of your state plan. There are a myriad of different ways that you can do this. I think baby boomers are going to be looking at life income gifts as good alternatives for retirement planning and that’s going to be the new frontier four. Major and plant gift officers and charlie. Those the most common life income gifts that we see, i guess, would be the charitable gift annuity and charitable remainder. Trust that that’s right gift annuity is much more common, usually for a smaller dollar amount less flexible in the planning process than a charitable remainder trust which can i usually take care of a need to have a growing income stream versus a fixed one. And the terms of the trust document can generally be varied. Mohr then a gift annuity, which is just a simple contract. Okay? And you also have a lot of state regulation around charitable gift annuities. We want listeners to know that it’s not it’s, not a lot of states. Most states it’s not something you can just start issuing tomorrow. No, there. There are a lot of things involved. I also sit on the board of the american council on gift annuities. And there are a lot of things involved when you decide to get into a gift annuity program. State regulations for sure need to be complied with, but also the liability, the contractual liability that you’re exposing your organization to has to be. Matched against the benefits of the program, you have tohave ah, the ability to assemble a pool of gift annuities fifteen, twenty, twenty five gift annuities so you’re diversifying the risk over the portfolio of annuities, you have to have an investment strategy that’s going to be appropriate to deliver that annual income. So there, it’s very simple to set up in terms of the contract and the gift, but much more complicated to maintain and run appropriately, since you’re on the board of the american council on gift annuities wanna give a little pitch just to give the web web? You know the girl for you? Www dot a hyphen, web dot or ge great organization has been around since the twenties recommending gift annuity rates, recommending not prescribing but recommending gift annuity rates that are really in the best interests of the donor and the organization over the long term. Thank you for that, and i want you to know that i didn’t know the girl in case i didn’t say i was happy to have you say, but i don’t want you to think, oh god, what if i don’t know what you’re on the board so i figured you’d be saying i told you there was a safe question. I hope that means i got it right. His hyphen web dot. Org’s that’s, right. Um, let’s see, margaret way talked a little about the future of this job fusion versus confusion. What? What were your points in the workshop? Well, the basic point is, is that while we continue to be donor-centric in all of our activities way we have to begin to understand that we’ve made these silos to define for ourselves as fund-raising professionals where we are in the hierarchy of our organizations, donors don’t care, they just want to deal with the right person at the organization and for some donors, learning that i’m going to be talking to the director of major gifts, paints a bull’s eye on my forehead, and that makes me uncomfortable. But if i was talking with margaret from the development office, who was going to help me make a gift externally, we have to be flatlined. We all have to look like we’re equal. We all have to be able to help our donors do what they want to do. So i see the future is that? That titles will pretty much be the same. Go away internally, we’ll have our organised beloved organization charts, but to our donors it will just be a flat line and that’s it extends beyond major and planned giving, though to visit, and you will giving corporate and foundation sponsorship and support work. I was at a event for a client recently, and everybody proudly was wearing their name tag with their job title on the front and the director of major gifts was walking down the floor, heading to see a specific donors and she could see the job title and she turned her back to talk to somebody else. You just bull’s eye, i know i’m going to be asked for a big gift, so i think this just continues to be donors and we have to pay a tent. We have to listen to what they’re saying, but we’ve been saying this for i don’t know at least a decade, but now i’ve been in play e-giving for fourteen years, not as long as either of you and i’ve been hearing donor-centric donor-centric put the donor’s needs first, but in terms of job hierarchies and descriptions, it hasn’t. Happened yet? Ah lot of that has to do with it coming from down from the top and how executive directors like to organize and how they manage on, and it takes a sophisticated executive director to understand how important it is the public perception of a donor to working with somebody, they really associate the person, not the title with the organisers. And i remember advice from someone i know you both know hyre robert sharps sr who used to preach that his preferred job title for everybody would be assistant to the president. Yes, because what don’t right, johnny, what donors wouldn’t want to talk to the assistant to the president? No, no, i think that’s right, and the the name tags that i like the most for me personally just say alumni affairs and development. They don’t say director of plan giving because i think margaret’s right? You get a very different reaction or when i send emails and i’m thinking about this as i’m saying it, i may change my email tag, take out the director of playing e-giving and just put in alumni affairs and development because people see that and the point about it. Being flat internally and donor-centric we’ve been hearing the donor center, as he said for about a decade, the flat internally i think it’s been less and less quick to come because organizations haven’t had to respond internally. Now, we’ve had the two budget crises over the last decade two thousand to two thousand eight organisations saying, you know hey, what are we doing in terms of how were structured and the danger is that playing giving gets lost in that shuffle in the in the flat, the flattening and it all becomes major gift focus with a loss on the play e-giving focus i think if it’s done right, you could do it both very successfully have a flat organization, somebody internally that has the plan giving expertise. I can work successfully without being siloed to enhance major gift officers success and still preserve the plan giving expertise and function and that’s the fusion in urine yourself in your workshop titled the job fusion i think that’s right. I want to bring these things together. Any closing thoughts, margaret? Well, we just want to say thanks again for having me us today and we, i hope, all of our listeners get one or two good nuggets of ideas that’s the idea. Margaret hohman is principal of woman consulting in new york city. Charlie gordy is director of playing giving at the harvard law school. I want to thank you both for joining us. Thank you. Thanks, tony. Pleasure to have you. This is tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of the national conference on philanthropic planning two thousand eleven. That was my pre recorded interview marrying major and planned gif ts from the national conference on philanthropic planning earlier this year. I want to thank jeff sobel and charlie gordy and margaret hohman and the organizers of a f p westchester’s national national philanthropy day that’s, where i talked to jeff sobel and the folks at the partnership for philanthropic planning, they were the hosts of the conference where i interviewed charlie gordy and margaret hohman next week. Social media inbound zombie is his consulting company, social media marketing for non-profits is his blogged john hayden will be my guest and also scott koegler, a regular contributor and the editor of non-profit technology news will share the latest on tech for your office. Keep up with what’s coming up on the show. Sign up for our insider email alerts on our facebook page. You know where to find facebook and then it’s just the name of this show. If you like the show like the page, please become fan. You can listen live or archive. Itunes is where you listen archive and you could get to our itunes paige at non-profit radio dot net. You can subscribe there and listen on your computer smartphone tablet the device of your choice. You can follow me on twitter. You can follow the show on twitter using hashtag non-profit radio. 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035: 50 Asks in 50 Weeks – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

Tony’s guest this week is:

Amy Eisenstein, Author, “50 Asks in 50 Weeks” and Principal, Tri Point Fundraising

Read and watch more on Tony’s blog: http://mpgadv.com

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Zoho! Duitz dahna welcome, this is tony martignetti, the host of tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent and as every week, the aptly named host what a coincidence that i found this very show it’s april fool’s april one, two thousand eleven are april fool’s edition this week we’re going to be suffering no fund-raising fools on this april first you may remember first, though, last week i had back office blunders, and i’m looking jeff marston, the president of resource centers for management, explained in back off his blunders how to stop squandering money on your back office costs, and he revealed tricks to save big money on supplies, phone, energy desks and other stuff that your office needs. Also, we revisited the i’m looking recurring feature last week, we checked in with our recruiter, paula marks, and our non-profit job seeker leonora scala paula’s advice last week and a zit has every month that we’ve checked in with them helps not only paula, but you with your help’s not only leonora, but helps you also with your own search, whether that’s going on now or a search for you in the future this week. As i mentioned, no fund-raising fools on this april first day, it’s ask awareness for small shops with amy eisenstein. Amy is the author of fifty asks in fifty weeks. A guide to better fund-raising for your small development shop, and she’s going to share lots of valuable insights for opening relationships, identifying prospects, cultivating, soliciting, talking about different responsibilities for fund-raising in your small and midsize shop, and at about thirty two minutes after the hour, as always, it’s, tony’s take two, roughly thirty two. This week, it’ll be six tips to mastering your fund-raising relationships, based on a block post of mine and also a style consultant, dubbed me a profile in awesomeness this week, and i’ll share. I promise just a very little bit about that that’s, all on this week’s show after the break, i’ll be joined by amy eisenstein, and i hope you’ll stay with me. You’re listening to the talking alternative network. E-giving. Nothing. You could. Is your marriage in trouble? Are you considering divorce? Hello, i’m lawrence bloom, a family law attorney in new york and new jersey. No one is happier than the day their divorce is final. My firm can help you. We take the nasty out of the divorce process and make people happy. Police call a set to one, two, nine six four three five zero two for a free consultation. That’s lawrence h bloom two, one two, nine, six, four, three five zero two. We make people happy. Are you suffering from aches and pains? Has traditional medicine let you down? Are you tired of taking toxic medications, then come to the double diamond wellness center and learn how our natural methods can help you to hell? Call us now at to one to seven to one eight, one eight three that’s to one to seven to one eight one eight three or find us on the web at www dot double diamond wellness dot com. We look forward to serving you. Hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business? Why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com welcome back to tony martignetti non-profit radio. I’m joined now by amy eisenstein. Amy is the author of fifty asks in fifty weeks a guide to better fund-raising for your small development shop and she’s going to be with me for the hour she is the principle of tripoint fund-raising, which you’ll find at tripoint fund-raising dot com before fund-raising consulting. She helped small and large non-profits raise millions of dollars as a director of development, and as i always point out, when this is the case, that’s, the kind of experience we love on the show she’s consultant now, but she has been buy-in the development shop shops in non-profits she’s, a frequent speaker and facilitator at board, retreats she’s, also the past president of the association of fund-raising professionals, the newjersey chapter, and i’m very glad that amy’s book fifty asks and fifty weeks brings her to the studio. Amy welcome, thanks, tony, glad to be here. My pleasures go got to have you. My voice is cracked. Have you sixteen, sixteen years old going on forty nine. Let’s, see so fifty asking fifty weeks when you wrote you wrote a book, so you must have seen a problem or a gap in small and midsize shop fund-raising what was that it’s? True, when i was a one shop development office, one person development office, i should say, i really found that i was elated and in a silo and could get so sidetracked and stuck doing grant reports database management thank you notes, planning events, writing newsletters all the things that have to happen in a one person development shop, but weeks and weeks could go by without actually making and ask. And of course, as a result, i wasn’t raising much money. So i looked at the development shops around me and saw that they were having the same issue, distractions, distractions and other work that’s urgent, but not as important. Not as important as making these solicitations actually making the ask um so in a small shop on dso, we’re talking as your book does too small and midsize shops so sort of how would you define those? Right? I’m talking about shops with one development staff person or up to three, maybe or an executive director who doesn’t have any paid development staff okay, and your book is all about encouraging? Mohr asks specifically fifty and fifty weeks, and i’m not going to ask you about the formulas for fifty what counts? What doesn’t count, but we are going, you know we’ll talk obliquely about things that that relate to getting two, fifty and fifty weeks, but i’m not going to hold you to a formula. So in a in a shop that’s that size who is responsible for fund-raising and what are the responsibilities? Sure, while fund-raising is always a team effort in any size shop and so the executive director needs to be involved, any development staff that hopefully an organization has is involved as well as board members have to be involved in order for the fund-raising to go well, so really everybody has their own piece of the puzzle to dio andi, everybody plays a role and tell me what the other question waas so just what the responsibilities are, but i think we’ll get to that. That and also hoping later, to talk about what happens if you have perhaps an executive director. Who’s not comfortable with fund-raising show so well, i think we’ll dive into that there’s this time. Okay, your book is mostly about individual fund-raising right, but so let’s, just talk about how individual fund-raising fits with other types of fund-raising sure. Well, the premise is that in small shops, often the organization is focused on its fund-raising in the past, on grantwriting and events, and focus really heavily on those types of fund-raising so my book encourages organisations to diversify their funding base and branch out to individual giving, which is a huge component of philanthropic dollars in the non-profit community that they’re not tapping and right, but typically a small startup non-profit begins its fund-raising with what people understand best and actually is probably a little easier in terms of fund-raising and that is the grant writing and research not that grants are easy but can be easier than individual asking on and then also events which i think people feel they have a handle on when they get started. That’s, right, and so it’s challenging non-profits to reach out and really tap individuals, which can be harder and take longer it’s about relationship building but that’s really where the big money is, so they have to get there if they’re going to grow their shop. Okay, so the importance of making this shift from the institutional to the individual, right? Okay. And so why event let’s explore just a little bit, like a minute and a half that we have before the break? Why is event fund-raising not such a stable way of continuing and growing your non-profit to the next level? Yeah, i think that having one or two events per year is a good way of fund-raising and cultivating donors at the same time and getting the word out about your organization. But something small organizations are inundated with events. They have five, six, ten, twelve events per year, and they’re just absolutely draining. The resource is time and energy of their volunteers of their staff, and actually, events are the most expensive way to raise a dollar in fund-raising so having more than one or two is just not efficient are effective, okay? And the return on investment is quite low generally for events correct it’s the lowest return on investment of all other types of fund-raising okay, and when we returned from this break, then amy and i will delve into making that transition to individual giving from the events and institutional giving. My guest is amy eisenstein, the author of fifty asks in fifty weeks. Stay with us talking alternative radio twenty four hours a day. Are you feeling overwhelmed in the current chaos of our changing times? A deeper understanding of authentic astrology can uncover solutions in every area of life. After all, metaphysics is just quantum physics, politically expressed, i and montgomery taylor and i offer lectures, seminars and private consultations. For more information, contact me at monte m o nt y at r l j media. Dot com are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future. You dream of. Two one to seven to one eight, one, eight, three that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. Dahna i really need to take better care of myself if only i had someone to help me with my lifestyle. I feel like giving up hyre is this you mind over matter, health and fitness can help. If you’re expecting an epiphany, chances are it’s not happening. Mind over matter, health and fitness could help you get back on track or start a new life and fitness. Join Joshua margolis, fitness expert at 2 one two, eight sixty five nine to nine xero, or visit w w w died. Mind over matter. Y si dot com. You’re listening to the talking alternative network. Durney durney welcome back to tony martignetti non-profit radio i’m with amy eisenstein, the author of fifty asks and fifty weeks, and while we’re on the break, amy made a point that i might have misstated, you know, sort of overstated the importance of individual giving in an overall development shop, and really, the point is that you should be diversified. So please, amy, expand on that a little bit, right? I just wanted to emphasize the fact that within a small shop, when organizations are so heavily focused on grantwriting and events, they’re not diversified, but the book is about making sure that you have a diverse fund-raising plan all year long that includes grantwriting a few events, individual giving and variety of bulk mail appeals, and so it’s really about diversification and making a solid plan and sticking with it. And so yeah, so i didn’t mean to say that you eliminate grantwriting and events, but you make a transition into individual and of course, keep the other components as well. So thank you, let’s talk about a case statement because i think that’s an important for individuals want to explain what? What that is. Why it’s important? Sure, a case statement is a written document that explains basically why people should give money to your organization and why your organization exists. Why it’s important and makes the case for your for supporting your organization and developing that case, though, could be quite a challenge. I know there’s some non-profits that will maybe do ah ah long term analysis of a strategic planning to help them to build their case statement. It’s not so easy sometimes to right? That is it? Yeah, it’s definitely challenging, and once you’ve written it, what you think is a solid case statement, you should take it out and test tested on the road with several of your most loyal donors have them look at it, read it, react to it, see if it that’s why they’re motivated to give to your organization and see if it really speaks to them and make tweaks and part of developing it, and we’re spending time on because it is so important with your fear individual individual fund-raising as part of developing it, we’ve had guests that have said valuable tohave outside people, you know, aside from your board and your your fundraisers contributing to your case statement. Absolutely, yes, you want community’s perspective and input when you’re developing your case statement so that it has wide appeal, okay? And and sort of flushing out why people, why they give on dh sometimes i think non-profits find that people are giving for reasons that the non-profit itself doesn’t really realize absolutely sometimes you can be too close to an issue, and it takes the outside perspective and people who are actually giving to tell you what mate motivates them to give and that should be reflected in this written document that you’re going to show to prospective new donors. Um, and the case statement is shown sort of in what respect? I mean, how how is how is the tool house that used once you do have it crafted? Finally, how is that used in soliciting gifts from individuals? Right? I think it can be used in a variety of different ways. You can bring it with you, certainly on a first visit or a second visit and with when you’re meeting an individual for the first or second time to tell them about the organization tto learn more about them and what they’re giving interests are why? They might be interested in your organization and let them have it as a take away so that it can re emphasize your conversation and fully explain and writing. Why your organization’s important? But you would never well, i’ll ask it this way. Would you ever just say male or email a case statement to someone in lieu of a meeting? No, i mean, that defeats the purpose of the relationship building component. I mean, i guess there probably are exceptions for an organization that’s fund-raising across the country and perhaps doesn’t have the resources to send staff for board members to visit donors, you know, in other states, yes, you could develop a long distance relationship in those cases, i would mail it, but usually you want represented in person, you know, because you want to be having a conversation with talk about those relationship building steps, but it’s a zoo suggested sort of leave behind, right? Tio personal conversation? Sure. Okay. Um, so, let’s, since we’re talking about those personal interactions, those personal meetings, how do you start, too? Develop the people that you’re going. Teo asked to meet for you. Meet with you. So if you are doing just events and an institutional grant grantwriting how do you start to develop a list of people that you can hopefully talk to her at least start, you know, start to ask to talk to right? Well, there’s four steps in the fund-raising process on the first one is identification identification of new prospects or potential donors, so when you’re starting out an individual giving program, aye, the first thing i have organizations do when they’re trying to do this is look in their database, and hopefully they do have a list of supporters and previous donors, and so looking for two things in that database, one is obvious to most people it’s, their largest donors, although i cautioned them toe look at cumulative giving all that over the course of the year because if you’re looking at one time gif ts you may have somebody who gives multiple times over the course of the year, and even though none of their individual gifts are large once you combine them, obviously they turn out to be a larger donors than some people who donate one time during the year, but also important is to look in your database for loyal donors if you have any longevity or history donorsearch history in your database, safer five or ten years of giving anybody who’s given for more than five years in the last five or six years, even if their donation level is lower, i would consider a high priority of somebody that you want to get to know so that those so your databases one way hope hopefully you have some donordigital records to look at other ways. Of course they’re going to your board members and finding out who they might know who might be interested in getting to know your organization. So so the board’s roll wait, why don’t we start to talk about that? The board’s role in fund-raising you’ve just touched on one important part of it bringing people to the organization absolutely a huge part of the board’s, responsibility and fund-raising is what we say call opening doors and introducing people to the organization boardmember czar, the ambassadors of the organization and there to sort of spread the word tell the community about how wonderful your organization is, really talk it up and introduce people to the executive director and development staff and the organization. In general, that wouldn’t necessarily have those connections if it weren’t for the board members. So if you’re going to make this shift no into individual giving, you need to have bored support, absolutely. And what if? What if you sort of get bored support for the concept? But then when it comes down to asking the board members who do you know who can you bring to the next event? Who can you bring to meet the executive rector there, then reluctant to do it? What do we do? Right? I think it’s a major challenge that lots of organizations face getting the board members bought in and involved and engaged, and so there are a couple of different things to do. Won is a lot of board training and coaching, board retreats and development and talking about it so that people start to feel comfortable with the idea of introducing people to the organization, but also making sure that they understand that this is donor-centric fund-raising and we are not going to be asking people for money who don’t show an interest in the organization it’s really about communicating their passion about the organ ization to their friends. And colleagues and neighbors. And if those people respond positively that they’re also interested in the organization, then we can take it down the road of a potential donation. But it’s not like every but name that they bring to the table is going to get asked for donations. Some people just aren’t going to be interested and that’s okay, so you have to raise that comfort level with your board, and you can do that in the way. As you mentioned. Yeah. Okay. In developing again. We’re talking about identifying the prospects. Can a list of people who have come to your events cannot be a place to start? Absolutely. And we would look at those people who have given they might fall into that category or people who’d come to other events, possibly fundraisers or non fundraisers. And they should definitely be added to the list. Do the records. You alluded a couple times to the donor database. Does it have to be a computer database? Suppose this is a small, really small shop, and they’re not that sophisticated, you know, maybe they have index cards or something like that. I mean, if you worked with that, what? Do we do? Yeah, this day and age, i think that everybody should be computerized at this point, even if it’s microsoft access, which is a perfectly fine database to start with, it does not have to be a fund-raising software database that you paid for that’s, right? And so actually was at a client yesterday, and they have their donordigital basin access and for right now, that’s fine that’s more than adequate for the size organization that they are, but i was concerned and ask them if they’re donorsearch files were in boxes in paper, and i was relieved to hear that it wasn’t and microsoft access which it should be computerized this day and age several weeks ago, on a regular feature that we have where scott koegler he’s, the editor of non-profit technology news, comes on and talked about technology for non-profits and many shows ago several shows ago hey talked about cloud computing and how there are there are companies that have cloudgood based fund-raising software with ad on modules, maybe for events and for finance. Obviously, security is a concern, but i was surprised to hear that the cost of those is quite affordable, even the smallest shop it’s true, actually, lots of those internet based or cloud based. I don’t really know the difference, but software programs they charge by the number of records, and so if you have less than five hundred records or thousand records, they’re very inexpensive and totally affordable. That’s identification. So what? What did you say is the next step after identification is cultivation, innovation and how often or what are what are some steps around cultivation? Now that we’ve got? We’ve identified some people, sure, so cultivation is the relationship building process in between when you’ve identified perspective donors and before, of course, you asked them for money so it’s getting to know the person on dh, educating them about your organization. But the important part about cultivation, i think, is that it’s not one way it’s, not just the organization or a representative from the organization telling the donor prospect all about the organization it’s really asking lots of open ended questions about that perspective potential donor to get to know them, too. So examples of cultivation activities would be going out to coffee, the executive director or development staff or boardmember with that perspective donor xero organization, if that’s appropriate, it would bring be bringing them to an event, whether it’s a fundraising event or ah graduation or something that your organization does on a regular basis. So those air, different types of cultivation activities, i’m with a b eisenstein, and amy is the author of fifty asks in fifty weeks and she’s also the principal of tripoint fund-raising tripoint fund-raising dot com. Amy, a lot of charities have really sort of heartstring missions, and so that if they can bring people in to see the work that they’re doing, i would think that that’s gonna be really valuable. Absolutely, i mean, if you can bring people on a tour that is some of the best ways to cultivate donors to really learn about them, but also have them learn about your organization. So if you’re a school or an environmental organization, or if you have something to show that’s a wonderful way, hospital is a wonderful way to show prospective donors exactly what you d’oh it’s a bit more challenging with other organizations, such as a domestic violence shelter. You wouldn’t have anything to tour because it’s a confidential location and you have to be a little more creative with your cultivation opportunities, but you can definitely do it for all different types of organizations and let’s, talk about the details of this so let’s say you had a willing board. Okay, so on the ah boardmember has identified let’s, say three or four people what’s the process for from getting that person from what we’re called, what you’re calling identification to cultivation, who asked them who invites them to come? And you’ve already identified lots of things you could invite them to, but how’s it actually done sure well, in the ideal scenario, if a boardmember identifies somebody, a friend or a colleague has somebody that they would like to introduce to the organization, you would have that boardmember call and invite them either to coffee with the exec director or the development person or to the event or to a tour. So in the ideal scenario, a boardmember would reach out to their connection and invite them tto learn more about the organization and whatever way, in a less than ideal situation weather when a boardmember perhaps doesn’t know the person you want to cultivate, maybe a donor, a private prior donor to your organization boardmember could still reach out on call or development person or eggs negative director could call and say, you know, we want to thank you for your prior giving, and we’d liketo get to know you a little bit more. Introduced you more to the organization update you what have you on? Bring them in that way. Do you find that let’s say, for this first cultivation meeting that that something group setting is better because it’s less off putting to the person, or is it better to try to meet them individually and get them to get to know them one on one in that first instance, yeah, i think you want to do a combination of activities is probably the most appropriate, and it is going to depend on the individual if they’re willing to meet one on one that’s, a great way to introduce them to the organization. But if they’re more comfortable coming to a group activity that’s perfectly appropriate, too, so so maybe have, ah, couple of things to choose from. I mean, when you’re actually someone’s, actually making the invitation, maybe there’s a couple of things? Yeah, absolutely. I have three or four things on my list in front of board members you know the upcoming events, so one possibility is a tour. One possibility is the next fund-raising event, and one possibility is coffee with the executive director and sort of let them throw them out. What, however, the conversations going and invite them, and then if the person doesn’t want to come tto one they can say, well, how about something else? Andi just didn’t like thirty seconds or so we have before the break. I suppose i don’t want to come to anything supposed, the person says no, do we ignore them from now on? Or is there some other way we can still try? Yeah, i think definitely putting them on your mailing list so that they start to receive hopefully newsletters or emails about upcoming events, your annual report, those type of things and then trying again and six months or so they may have changed their mind, maybe their schedule was busy or whatever the case may be, i would give it a few more tries before stopping completely. Okay, excellent that’s a great leading to what we’re going to talk about after the break and after tony’s, take two, which is some of the direct mail, the bulk solicitation, a cz you call them in the book. My guest is amy eisenstein, the author of fifty asks. And fifty weeks after this break, it’s, tony’s, take two. You’re listening to the talking alternative network. This is tony martignetti aptly named host of tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent technology fund-raising compliance social media, small and medium non-profits have needs in all these areas. My guests are expert in all these areas and mohr tony martignetti non-profit radio fridays one to two eastern on talking alternative broadcasting do you want to enhance your company’s web presence with an eye catching and unique website design? Would you like to incorporate professional video marketing mobile marketing into your organization’s marketing campaign? Mission one on one media offers a unique marketing experience that will set you apart from your competitors, magnify your brand exposure and enhance your current marketing effort. Their services include video production and editing, web design, graphic design photography, social media management and now introducing mobile marketing. Their motto is we do whatever it takes to make our clients happy contact them today. Admission one one media dot com hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business, why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com welcome back to tony martignetti non-profit radio at roughly thirty two minutes into the hour. It’s time for this week’s edition of tony’s take two my block post is called six tips to mastering your fund-raising relationships, my block is that m p g a d v dot com, and i want to touch on just three of them. Last week, i talked about three talk about three others quickly today, and you can always read mohr at the at the at the blogged getting out of the office if you’re talking about fund-raising relationships and my guest today, amy has made this point. If you’re too distracted by administrative tasks or sometimes volunteer, you know, sort of committee work, then you need to do what you can’t extricate yourself. Delegate, plead with your boss, stop volunteering, maybe so that you can spend more time out of the office, actually developing relationships that lead to the types of activities that amy and i are going to be talking about solicitation and then stewardship so spend time out of the office if your if your job is fund-raising you should be out of the office, i think more than half the time and there are a lot of people who think, you know, seventy five percent of the time you should be on the road, meeting people where they work, where they live, where they play to build those relationships, make introductions i love to see, and i always encouraging clients to use the non-profit thatyou’re fund-raising for as a leverage to bring people in and and connect them. So in events are you introducing donors to other donors and they don’t necessarily have to be in the same same profession? I guess they could be that there could be synergy there, but they don’t necessarily have to be they both people because they’re at your event love your work, so get them talking about your work. Are you introducing not only donors to donors but prospects to donors? Who better to tell the story of the great work that you’re doing? Then somebody was already supporting it? And who better to encourage additional people to do that? So be willing to make those introductions use the organization as the connection point and you’re the connector on dh. The third one i’ll talk about is just, you know, be good to people, if this is fund-raising relationship building, people like to be treated with respect and, you know, i blogged about and talked about a few weeks ago multitasking when you’re on the phone and how off putting that can be and how insincere it comes across on the phone, you want to avoid things like that, and i think basically just treat people the way you’d like to be treated, and that will help you in building sincere, honest relationships. And of course, we all know that, you know, people give to charities they love that are represented by people who they like, and they’re more likely to like you if they feel that you have ah, that’s sort of a sincere, honest relationship with them. So the blood and the block post is six tips to mastering your fund-raising relationships. And the other thing i wanted to mention is just that a style consultant image consultant friend ofmine dubbed me a profile in awesomeness, and you could see a video about that on my block. The post there is called i’m a profile in what that is tony’s take two for friday, april first and with me waiting patiently. As i talked a little longer than i usually do for tony’s, take two is amy eisenstein, the author of fifty asks in fifty weeks and principle of tripoint fund-raising amy, welcome back from that verbose break. Thank you, tony. Amy was able to go to the bathroom, go get coffee, came back with some danish lunch for the whole office in the time that i was talking to tony stick too. So we left before the break, talking about those starting to think about direct mail and and book solicitations. So what? What what advice do you have around thinking about using direct mail? Okay, so i’m going to get to that in a minute, but i just want to go back for one second to something you just mentioned in tony’s take too, and that is about being out of the office fifty or seventy percent of the time. So i think that that is accurate and appropriate, where you might have a major gifts officer or somebody who’s working on individual solicitations full time now, in my book, we’re talking two small development shop people who are doing everything they’re doing the grantwriting the event planning the newsletter, writing and all everything in between and so they’re going to have a much smaller portfolio of individual donors. So they do need to be out of the office asking a fair amount. But they are going to be in the office more than perhaps someone who’s asking for individual gifts as their full time job. Okay, excellent. Thank you for keeping that in context. And also, teo, to keep things in context, we want to be sure that people understand that your book is about not at campaign consultant, not campaign fund-raising or major gift fund-raising but it’s more about building the your initial list or your annual fund list. That’s, right? And so right. I just wanted to clarify thank you. Clarify the point that this individual asking that were encouraging people to do is really about increasing and enhancing your annual fund. It’s not about going out and getting major gifts or campaign gifts for the first time. You’re trying this stuff, so it might be a five hundred dollar donation or five thousand dollars donation towards your annual fund and that’s perfectly good to dio with individual asking. Yeah, yeah. And of course, the definition. Of a major gift varies by organization, but if we’re talking to a small shop oppcoll a sze yu said yu know fifty or even five hundred? Maybe even fifty dollars might be a sizable gift when it’s the first one that the individual has made right. And yes, we’re keeping things in context here and amy’s keeping my feet to the fire, keeping me honest, okay, so let’s talk so let’s talk about using direct mail or the book you call them book solicitations, right? Bulk solicitation, so by that i mean both traditional male as well as email. So i just think it’s important for small shop organizations to be continuously in contact with their supporters, their donors, their list via email and traditional male, and have unorganized calendar at the beginning of each year of when they’re going to be sending out email solicitations and when they’re going to be sending out mail solicitations and not just have it randomly happened when you happen to get to it but have a planned out schedule in advance on dh with the price of mail and email these days. There’s really no excuse for non-profits don’t not to be. Emailing their donors it’s so cost effective, but also it’s critically important to continually have some sort of system of mail solicitations as well traditional mail solicitations. Okay? And actually next week’s guest is going to talk about email marketing and best principles in the practices and email marketing. So now we’ve moved from we’re moving now from cultivation to solicitation, the next step in the fourth step process, right with individuals? How do you write that letter? Let’s get started, we’ll have lots of questions for you, but how do you write the letter that asks for support? Okay, so we’re talking about bulk mail, so you’re talking about a letter, but if you’re doing the individual solicitation, you’re going to do it face to face, so we’re going to talk about two different things bulk mail, letter? Absolutely. I hope most non-profits have their end of the year campaign, and that would come as a mail solicitation and so having a well written letter, obviously from very basic things like no grammatical errors, no spelling errors, but really, that tells the story of your organisation, what you accomplished that that year and some success stories, individuals, success stories. Even more importantly than all the statistics of your organisation, but talk about that one individual whose life you really impacted, so that goes a long way. Okay, do you have ah, is there a rule? Or do you have a rule about the length of the solicitation and what should be in the in the mail? And again we’ll get we’ll get to the individual face-to-face too, but showing his book male what do your tips about length and inserts and things like that? Yeah, i think opinion varies on length of letter, you know, i’ve heard everything from one to two to four pages i think is good strong one, two, two page letter is my personal preference, and you absolutely need to include a business reply envelope, something for people to send back their donation in s o that’s critical, don’t send the letter without a reply envelope, because the donations just won’t come back and and so we’re talking about the traditional male but also email it’s important teo email, solicit your donors and as well. Of course, more and more people are giving online these days, so you need to have a link that brings them to a place where they can donate right online with a credit card and there’s so many affordable options these days to donate with credit cards online. There’s no excuse for a non-profit not to have the ability to have people donate to them online with a credit card. How would we go about getting those email addresses since this is our this is our initial foray into individual giving? Where do we get that from? Yeah, i think start building your list by asking your current list in the mail for their e mail addresses. You’ll get a few that way asking for board members to start collecting email addresses of friends and family that want to receive your emails collecting them every time you do an event or an outreach or give a tour. Of course, you can only solicit by email or send e mails to people who willingly opt into your list so you don’t want to be sending e mails or spamming toe anybody that doesn’t opt in to your list, but collecting them that way, just like you would collect traditional emails, are addresses and add them to your database. Okay, who should? The letter or the e mail come from that’s. An excellent question. I think that you can change it up. Ideally a volunteer. So from a boardmember you’re bored president or the fund-raising chair, but it can. Some of them can come from the executive director, but mostly volunteer. You’d rather see a volunteer someone who’s already supporting in a different way. Absolutely. Okay, let’s, talk a little about the face-to-face solicitation. Ah, now, i know you have a lot of ideas about that in the book. What were your thoughts initially about that kind of meeting? Yeah, i think you know, when people talk about not wanting to fund-raising especially boardmember zor volunteers, this is actually the part of fund-raising that they think of as all fund-raising it’s, the ask and it’s only a ce, you know, one moment in time, one meeting as a compared to the whole fund-raising process. And so we need need to really break it down and simplify it for board members and volunteers who are going to be helping with this. But basically, it should be done in a face-to-face setting, not over a meal, preferably as many people newbies make the mistake. Of wanting to go to a restaurant because they think it’s great to go to lunch, but it really is challenging when the waiter interrupts or you’re trying to chew or eat or decide whatever the restaurant can be loud and their comm in the, you know, hearing issues, so it’s also it’s a public place and you might be talking about you’re going to be talking about, which will get two dollars in dollars and cents, right? So a meeting in the home or office of the person that you’re asking if if they’re willing to that’s where they’re most at ease, but otherwise in the organization’s office, or maybe at the board member’s office, where everybody feels comfortable, sort of neutral territory and set up that meeting to have a conversation about asking them, inviting them to support the annual fund and hopefully a boardmember will be with you explaining that they already supported the annual fund. Amy eisenstein is with me. She is the author of fifty asks and fifty weeks when we come back from this break, we’ll talk more about the individual face-to-face solicitation stay with us talking alternative radio twenty four hours a day. Are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three, that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. Buy-in i really need to take better care of myself if only i had someone to help me with my lifestyle. I feel like giving up eyes thisyou, mind over matter, health and fitness can help. If you’re expecting an epiphany, chances are it’s not happening. Mind over matter, health and fitness could help you get back on track or start a new life and fitness. Join Joshua margolis, fitness expert at 2 one two eight six five nine to nine xero, or visit w w w died mind over matter. N y c dot com do you want to enhance your company’s web presence with an eye catching and unique website design? Would you like to incorporate professional video marketing mobile marketing into your organization’s marketing campaign? Mission one on one media offers a unique marketing experience that will set you apart from your competitors, magnify your brand exposure and enhance your current marketing efforts. Their services include video production and editing, web design, graphic design photography, social media management and now introducing mobile marketing. Their motto is. We do whatever it takes to make our clients happy. Contact them today at mission one one media dot com. Talking dot com. No. Welcome back. We’re talking about small and midsize shop fund-raising with amy eisenstein, the author of fifty asks and fifty weeks and amy before the break, we were talking about that individual solicitation meeting. Um, who should be in that meeting? Yeah, ideally, it should be a boardmember and the executive director that’s the ideal scenario for an individual meeting. But whoever has the best relationship with the person you’re going to be asking for money needs to be there on dh two is the right number it’s easier to have a conversation with three people than it is just one on one and that way? Also, somebody from the organization can be listening and asking good questions while two people dialogue okay on dh. So aside from the board, members should be the executive director or the fundraiser. Ideally, it should be the executive director. The executive director is the visionary of the organization and the face of the organization, and if you’re asking someone for a substantial donation at whatever level, they will want to be hearing from the executive director, if the executive director either isn’t available or is unwilling or is not the person the relationship has been built with then it can be a fund-raising staff person. What do you think about rehearsing this meeting beforehand? Yeah, i think rehearsal is really important. We do role playing with clients all the time before they get ready to go for an ask board members definitely need to be coached and practice with role playing and no who’s going to be doing which part of the meeting the meeting needs to be introduced and the ask needs to be made and you need to know in advance, who’s going to be doing what? Okay, so you’re not stepping on each other and looking sort of amateurish, right? Okay, plus, do you find the rehearsal? Just reduces people’s anxiety about it or doesn’t make the more anxious but it’s still necessary to do. Yeah, i think for the most part, it relieves anxiety because they know what to expect. Some people are just going to be nervous, no matter what you d’oh. But after one or two asks, go well, then they’re not nervous anymore than it’s fun. Excellent. And it ought to be mean, right? Because we’re trying to get support for a mission that we all love that’s, right? It should be fun. You make a very important point in the book about after the actual ask is made. So a person who’s asked for a dollar amount or arrange what’s what’s your point there that you’re very precise about in the book. Yeah, after the ask is out on the table, the askar is need to be quiet, i assume that’s what you’re referring neo-sage once you ask say, i’m asking, will you please consider joining me? Dahna in supporting the after school program in the range of two thousand dollars that’s the ask? Then you have to be quiet. The person that speaks first, as we say, loses, and so if you speak first, you’re likely to backpedal and say, oh, i know that’s a lot of money during the period when the donor is thinking about what they were just asked to do. The oscars need to be quiet because i’m sorry i dropped your brothers want make sure people are saying this is the hesitation period and what might i had asked her do if if they if they do blurt something out, right, right, they’re likely to back pedal, so you’re right after you ask, you need to be quiet no matter how long it takes for the person you’ve just asked to respond, whether it takes ten seconds or so five minutes, they need to think about it, process it, and you need to be ready to listen to whatever they have to say. Whether it’s yes, no, or maybe we’re going to assume that you’re asked goes well, and the person gives in the range that they were. They were just solicited because i want to spend a few minutes thinking about the next steps stewardship saying that important thank you, what’s your advice there, let’s, say it’s now that we’ve just left the meeting what’s our what’s our what? How do we start stewardship right after the meeting ends in success? Sure. Well, of course you’ve thanked the donor right before you’ve left them for the meeting. But then you go back to the office and you craft thank you note and maybe you have a draft of one written advance, but the thank you note should go out soon after the meeting. They probably haven’t handed you a check in most cases. So it’s thank for the thank you for the meeting, and we’re excited that you’re, you know, committed to supporting this activity or project or whatever, and we look forward to talking to against soon or whatever the case may be. Or you can give even details about the gift that they’ve just promised to make. And then, of course, another thank you needs to go out after the gift comes in, but thank you can be done in many ways, in person, by phone and e mail all sorts of ways by multiple people. Okay, so not just the boardmember who invited the person or not? Just the ceo, but multiple multiple thank you’s from different people. Sure, especially if there were two people at the meeting there should be. Thanks. You know, a written formal. Thank you from the organization can come from the boardmember or the executive director and the other one can call and thank or send an email. Sure. Okay. And how about after that? Now the gift has been received. We wantto cultivating the person. Probably for their next gift. Whenever that might be. We’re not everything about the timing of that. But just so how do we continue? Stewardship so that we can lead into cultivation again cultivation in seoul station again? Sure, you know, clearly you want to be inviting them to other cultivation of events, but in terms of thanking the person in six months or a year, whenever is appropriate, you want to write to them, thanked them again, and let them know what their money has done for the organization and that’s, a really critical piece that lots of organizations either forget or missed and that’s letting the donor know how important their gift was to your organization after it’s been used. Okay, what the actual outcome was in terms of maybe telling a story about the person who had helped. I mean, in that kind of detail, absolutely. If you can do that, or say what the organization’s been able to accomplish with their donation and others, you know, many times their donation hasn’t funded the whole program, our project, but thank them for their donation and the part that it played in making your organization a success this year. I also like the idea of remembering the gift anniversary, the one year point from the time that the person made the gift. What do you think about that? Yeah, i think that’s a great time, except for that you may be at that point ready to ask them for their next gift, so maybe six or eight months in, you want to thank them for their gift again and let them know how it’s going or what it’s being used for, and so that at that year point, you’re ready to ask for the next gift. Okay? And that is where we have to leave it from. Getting from the first gift to the next gift. And my guest has been amy eisenstein, the author of fifty asks and fifty weeks a guide to better fund-raising for your small development shop and she’s also the principal of tripoint fund-raising at tripoint fund-raising dot com amy, thanks very much for coming to the studio. Thanks, tony it’s been a pleasure to have you next week. As i mentioned earlier email marketing, my guest will be dave pulis principle of granite partners and he’s going to share five elements of effective email marketing and have tips for list hygiene. You shouldn’t want to be working with an unhygienic list that sounds gross, he’ll keep your list clean? I hope you’ll be part of that conversation next friday. Keep up with what’s coming up on tony martignetti non-profit radio. Sign up for our insider email alerts on our facebook page it’s, facebook dot com, of course, and then just the name of the show. While you’re there, please click like and become a fan of the show itunes, you can subscribe, download automatically download and listen on the device of your choice. Iphone, ipad, other tablet computer, that’s all at non-profit radio dot net, we’ll take you to our itunes paige, the creative producer of tony martignetti non-profit radio is claire meyerhoff, our line producer and the owner of talking alternative broadcasting is sam liebowitz. Our social media is by regina walton of organic social media, who texted me during the show i’m gonna have to admonish her about that. The text during the show booker t and the mgs composed our theme music. This is tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. I hope you’ll join me next friday one p m eastern here on talking alternative broadcasting at talking alternative dot com hyre hyre miree dahna. I didn’t think you did a good ending. You’re listening to the talking alternate network, get in. E-giving good. Are you suffering from aches and pains? Has traditional medicine let you down? Are you tired of taking toxic medications, then come to the double diamond wellness center and learn how our natural methods can help you to hell? Call us now at to one to seven to one eight, one eight three that’s to one to seven to one eight one eight three or find us on the web at www dot double diamond wellness dot com way. Look forward to serving you. 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