Don't Stop Fundraising
2020 has been weird. And we’re not even a whole quarter of the way through it. The CoronaVirus is disconcerting, to say the least. Now that we’ve all had a week or so to adjust to working from home, we’ve also had plenty of time to assess the situation and even forecast a little.
The problem is that we have no idea what will happen. At all. I’ve seen every range of possibilities imaginable and there are so many dependent factors for those prognostications that there is no way at all to know how this will play out.
A couple of things seem fairly certain at this point. First, there will be monetary help from the Federal Government for most nonprofits and secondly, that you still need to fundraise. In fact, now more than ever.
Here’s the thing: giving doesn’t go down year over year. Not after 9/11, not after 2008, it just doesn’t go down. But you have to put yourself out there. If you get caught up in thinking about how many donors you MIGHT have who are POSSIBLY adversely impacted by this, you will quickly talk yourself out of sending an appeal or even a newsletter with a soft ask.
Your donors want to hear from you. They want to be kept in the loop. You may not be scheduling a lot of lunches with donors, but phone calls/Facetime is very much in order.
Two weeks ago, when Tom Hanks got sick, was when things felt real to a lot of people. Last week, most people I talk with and work with had pretty much adjusted to working from home and social distancing and the rest. Bloomerang sent out Instagram posts of us working from home with our pets (I sent one with my adult children and am fairly confident that was not used) - you can do the same thing!
Update your constituents. Get to know your donor database inside and out. Come up with a fundraising plan that you can put into place the second things feel “normal” again.
(For the record, if you don’t have a donor database in the Cloud, message me, like, yesterday).
There are a lot of things you can and should be doing to be proactive and keep engagement levels high. Or you can curl up in a ball and hope everything turns out okay whenever everything gets back to normal.
Don’t do that.
Be proactive. Don’t stop fundraising.
Counsel Emeritus
4 年James- what I would like to see is a surge in support after the smoke clears especially from those who have to use RMDs. It’s a great way to make a major gift! Thought I would see you at VFRI but I now hear it’s cancelled!