Joe Garecht Fundraising

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The 3 Keys to Successful Major Donor Outreach

Joe Garecht Fundraising

Building a strong donor pipeline at your organization means engaging in constant donor outreach. This means reaching out through mail, email, and social media for your low-dollar donors. For larger donors, this means reaching out through phone calls, meetings, and text messages, in addition to mail and email. The rules of successful fundraising arent always intuitive.

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Successful Fundraising is Emotional Fundraising

Joe Garecht Fundraising

Ive noticed a trend in fundraising communications recently. They seem to be more formulaic than ever before. Many of the fundraising letters and newsletters I receive are interchangeable just take the few sentences about Organization Xs mission and insert Organization Y, and theyre essentially the same letter. Some of this is undoubtedly good: more non-profits are learning what works and what doesnt and proceeding accordingly.

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The 3 Fundraising Sayings My Clients Hear Me Say Over and Over Again

Joe Garecht Fundraising

Over the past 25 years, Ive worked with hundreds of non-profit clients. And the vast majority of those clients have heard me say one (or all) of the following maxims. I repeat these sayings often because they are true, and each captures something important that can help your non-profit better understand the fundraising process. Here are my top 3 fundraising sayings, in no particular order: #1: Big vision, big gifts.

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Getting Around the Gatekeeper: A Guide for Fundraisers

Joe Garecht Fundraising

When it comes to major donor fundraising, nothing is more important than talking directly with your donors and prospects. To successfully solicit major gifts, you must cultivate your donors and build relationships with them , which requires one-on-one conversations. Generally speaking, major donors tend to be busy people. They are usually engaged in business or philanthropy at a high level, meaning there are many demands on their time and many people trying to get in touch with them.

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“Have you called each donor seven times?”

Joe Garecht Fundraising

Early in my fundraising career, I was tasked with calling through a list of major donor prospects. These were cold prospects people who had given to other organizations in our mission field but never to our organization. The goal for the calls was to set up meetings for our Vice President of Development. We had mailed out information packets to each prospect, and now my job was to call through about 100 donors to see if they would be willing to meet.

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Grant Fundraising is a Numbers Game

Joe Garecht Fundraising

I know many non-profit fundraisers who get depressed about their grant fundraising progress. They feel like they put in a lot of effort for very little return. But when I dig deeper, I realize they are focusing on the wrong things. These fundraisers dont understand that, when it comes down to it, grant fundraising is all a numbers game. Understanding the Grant Fundraising Process The grant fundraising process is simple to understand, but it does require work: First , you dig into the foundation

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The Peril of Relying on Government Grants

Joe Garecht Fundraising

For decades, some fundraising consultants (including me) have warned non-profits not to rely too heavily on government grants. This warning was based on facts, not politics. Writing government grants takes an inordinate amount of time, and these grants involve far more legal and accounting risk than non-governmental grants. Federal, state, and local government grants are inherently political (even if non-profits pretend they aren't), meaning that government grants are always at risk when legisla