Cookies or Camp? Fundraising or Development?

John Woodyard

The competition for contributors is strong. John Woodyard explains the importance of development and relationships to strengthening your organization's revenue flow.

Points Covered

  • What fundraising is and isn't
  • Fundraising: A step toward development
  • Cultivating relationships
  • The value of a "Day at Camp"

Which is which?
Every year the Girl Scout across the street would come over to ask if I would buy some cookies.  Every year the answer was yes. The transaction would be finalized with the delivery of the cookies a few weeks later.  The money for my three or four boxes would be used to support some unknown aspect of the Scout program - no further information or relationship was required.

The Scout cookie program is a fine example of fund raising, as are auctions, garage sales, golf tournaments and donut sales, but it is not development.

When a recent, informal poll asked a cross-section of policy institute leaders and development personnel "what are the most common reasons donors turned you down during the past 12 months," the number one reason was:

"They don't know us or fully understand what our organization does."

These responses clearly and accurately reflect what is most important to the vast majority of today's donor community.  Gone forever are the days when donors, large and small, without much in-depth knowledge of the organization's work, sent off handsome checks because it either made them feel good or generated good public relations.  Today they want to be a part of the organization.  Today they want to have a relationship with the organization. 

Fund raising is often the breeding ground for development, but the art of development requires a relationship be formed with the prospective donor.  When a relationship exists, the donor who will give you $25 for cookies or pay a $100 entry fee to play in your golf tournament usually is able to give you $500 or $1,000.  They will give because, through your cultivation of a relationship with them, they will know what you do, how you do it and why it is important. 

Such cultivation requires personal meetings, often beginning with a lunch or breakfast, or even just a cup of coffee along with written follow-up.  In the case of the Girl Scout across the street, she eventually invited me to tour her scout camp, see the program at work, meet other campers and participate in an evening around the campfire. Now she had cultivated a relationship with her donor (which resulted in a gift far more substantial than a few boxes of cookies). In the case of a policy institute the "day at camp" might be a tour of your state's legislature during a session for a bus or van load of potential donors. 

Most people have never seen their legislature in action - but would like to.  Mostly they haven't because they don't know where to go, park, enter, eat, etc.   Arrange all this for them and have a Representative or other elected official join them at lunch or somewhere else during the tour.

One of the many advantages of such a "day at camp" is not only the opportunity to talk with your prospects but to listen to them in an informal setting.  Listening is essential to good development.  Just as they need to be informed about your organization, you need to be informed about their interests and their concerns. More often than not an "informed" donor becomes a major donor ($1,000 +), a board member, a volunteer or someone who is willing introduce you to other like-minded persons.

In the Pacific Northwest, along the I-5 corridor from Ashland, OR in the south to Bellingham, WA in the north, there are approximately 65,000 non-profit organizations (inclusive of schools, hospitals and churches).  In others areas, such as California or the East Coast, the density is even greater.

How does one organization survive and grow in an over crowded environment

  • Build relationships. Know the top 20% of your contributors. Systematically follow-up with them. In-person contact is best, followed by phone calls, personal letters and direct mail (including a quarterly newsletter).

  • Build relationships. Thank your contributors. Dr. Jay Barber, President of Warner Pacific College, one of the best development officers in the country, says, "...the six most important words in development are thank you! thank you! thank you!" Nothing could be truer.

Thank yous must be prompt, personal and sincere.  Don't be afraid a try a little creativity.  A year-end telephone ‘thank-you-thon' to do nothing more than express appreciation for their support and to wish them and their families a happy holiday season, a still-warm, home-baked apple pie delivered to a work place or hand delivering a receipt with (or without) some small, inexpensive token of appreciation are just a few examples.

  • Build relationships. Know your donors well enough to make a link between one of your programs or issues with their deepest concerns.

  • Build relationships. The "best source of new business is old business." In other words, retention is accomplished through regular, personal communication.

How are you doing at building relationships?
A good measure of how well you are doing would be how you answer a few easy questions.  Do you know the names of a donor's children?  Do you know when and where your donor goes on vacation?  Do you know their birthday or anniversary date? Did you call or send a note in a donor's time of sorrow or celebration?  Have you listened to a disgruntled donor lately?  Do donors initiate contact with you?  Have you hosted a donor for a "day at camp" recently?  If the answers are mostly yes - congratulations!  If they are mostly no, you still have some work to do! 

John Woodyard is a development consultant to the non-profit community.  From 1988-1999 John served as program director with the M.J. Murdock Charitable Trust in Vancouver, Washington.