Improving/Expanding Your Fundraising Program

By Hank Lewis, MA, CFRM on June 19, 2012

The Summer Is A Great Time To Make New Things Start To Happen !! It would be a good time for a Development Program Analysis/Assessment/Audit to take a look at your current fundraising activities/programs to determine: • What you’re not doing that you could do; and, • What you’re doing that you could do more […]

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Who Moved My Funder?

By Lynn deLearie on June 14, 2012

Using Moves Management To Secure Foundation Gifts Moves Management, initially developed by G.T. “Buck” Smith and David Dunlop at Cornell University, is a process of managing relationships with individual donors and moving them towards major giving. As cited in the white paper, Moves Management: The Science of Fundraising, according to David Dunlop, “the moves concept […]

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Naming Opportunities and Bequests

By Hank Lewis, MA, CFRM on June 12, 2012

This posting is based on an email exchange asking about the relationship between bequests and Naming Opportunities (NOs). I have expanded on my responses in that exchange: With regrets, I do not have a set of generic naming policies that I can share. I would, however, be happy to suggest how you might structure such […]

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Winning Back Those Lapsed Donors – Part Two

By Tony Poderis on June 7, 2012

Continuing (from Tuesday) to devise/structure the process for rebuilding our relationship with our lapsed donors…. Our next step is to design our solicitation strategies based upon how “major” the lapsed donors’ gifts were … and might be again. That helps us decide whether we just send solicitation letters with return gift envelopes enclosed; if we […]

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Winning Back Those Lapsed Donors – Part One

By Tony Poderis on June 5, 2012

It’s an old saying in development, that your best prospects for the next time are the people who gave to you last time … or the time before that, or the time before…. Based on our best knowledge and understanding of the people who’ve given to us before, we should be making case-by-case judgments on […]

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Write a Great Federal Grant Executive Summary!

By Jayme Sokolow on May 31, 2012

Why are Executive Summaries so Important? Some federal grant guidelines require an Executive Summary or Project Summary. Some Project Summaries have page limitations and strict rules about their content. However, if the Executive Summary is open-ended you have an opportunity to introduce your narrative and provide a roadmap for reviewers. If your Executive Summary is […]

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Executive Director, Deputy Director & Founders – Part Two

By Hank Lewis, MA, CFRM on May 29, 2012

This posting is a continuation of the email exchange begun last Tuesday. “I am happy to step down and then go through the hiring process, I just don’t understand how it works.  When, specifically, do I step down from the board?  Is it when we have enough money to pay staff or as soon as […]

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CFC and Planning for the Fall, Part II

By Carter McNamara on May 24, 2012

By now, CFC charities know the numbers and total dollar amount of the gifts pledged to them during the CFC Fall campaign. So, if you’re in the CFC, have you asked yourself if you’re satisfied with the results of your last CFC campaign? If yes, great, if no, let me share a few tips that […]

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Executive Director, Deputy Director & Founders – Part One

By Hank Lewis, MA, CFRM on May 22, 2012

The following is the first part of an email exchange with a reader: “My partner and I are creating a non-profit organization, and we will serve as Executive Director (me) and Deputy Director (my partner) as well as, of course, founders.” Executive Director and Deputy Director are titles of functioning roles.  Founder is a description […]

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What Is Your Grant Win Rate? What Should It Be?

By Lynn deLearie on May 17, 2012

Neither of these questions is easy to answer, so I did a little research before writing this post. When I Googled “grant win rate,” I came up with a lot of grant writing consultants that advertized win rates of 75 – 95%. I also came up with a post by Jayme Sokolow, contributor on this […]

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