How to Reposition Yourself as an Advisor to Major Donors

And welcome back to our next set of sessions. Right now we’re going to be working with real Wang RIA has raised millions of dollars in private philanthropy and is passionate about building the next generation of fundraising leaders. Though she has deep experience with institutional Read More

And welcome back to our next set of sessions. Right now we’re going to be working with real Wang RIA has raised millions of dollars in private philanthropy and is passionate about building the next generation of fundraising leaders. Though she has deep experience with institutional corporate and event fundraising. She is also passionate about major individual donors and helping organizations establish individual giving programs.
She has become a leader in the New York nonprofit community, and is a frequent educational commentator in the media. She was recognized with the smart CEO Bravo award in 2015. And New York nonprofit media is 40 under 40 in 2017, really lives in Brooklyn with her husband, when she is not raising money for causes she loves. She can be found hosting her podcast nonprofit lowdown, promoting her newest book, get that money, honey, are onstage as a newbie stand up comedian in downtown Brooklyn.
So just a few housekeeping items, this session is being recorded. You’ll find the handouts under the details on the it’s to the left of your chat. You want to scroll down, you’ll find them there. And if you want additional information about this session, you want to take the poll that’s going to be on the right side in just a few minutes. Ria if you want to take it over. I will I will. Hi everyone’s so happy to be here. Thanks to my friend and ally Erickson for inviting me. We are going to have an a fast and furious we’re gonna have some fun. Please use the chat. I really want to hear from you. So as questions come up any emotions that you’re feeling always welcome. Unfortunately, because I don’t have the dual monitor situation. I won’t be able to see the chat and present at the same time, but Laurie will feed me any questions. So let’s get this party started. Can you all see my screen?
Laurie, can you see my screen?
Yes, yes. I’m gonna Okay, cool. I’m just gonna say yes. All right. Thanks for for the intro. Laurie. I am a recovering Executive Director. As I like to say I’m a podcaster. I have a podcast called nonprofit lowdown. Some of you might know it. Your host s. Mallory has been on it.
I wrote a book my pandemic, baby get that money honey. And I truly am an aspiring stand up comedian Though I will say the pandemic put a bit of a damper on my comedy career with dog mom, and a true crime and royal enthusiast. So if that is true for any of you hit me up happy to chat about all the things. Okay, let’s get into it. So this session is about how to position yourself as a guide to major donors be the guide, not a hero. So often when I work with nonprofits and leaders, I feel like the big mistake that they make the big opportunity that they miss is that they talk about themselves as a hero of the story. Instead, we really want to make our donors have heroes or the people that we serve as heroes. We want to be the Yoda the guide. So we’ll get more into this. Okay.
In the chat, let me know if any of these sound familiar and or has have happened to you, you reach out to prospects or pastors asking for a meeting, can we get a coffee only to get a big fat zero?
You’re meeting with the same prospect for the millionth time, but things aren’t moving forward. And now it’s awkward because they think your friends I call it getting friendzone. Or you’ve done endless background research on a wealthy prospect. You’ve tried to reach out they’re not responsive. But you keep putting them on your list, even though you’re just like this getting a date with Ryan Gosling. In the chat. Let me know if any of these are happened to you? Yes, yes. Yeah, yep. Yeah.
Type Ugh, in the chat if this has happened to you? Yeah, it’s happened all of us. Big guests of the second right friend zoned? Emily, I feel that so hard. We’re like, Oh, now, they think we’re friends. And now I can’t ask them for money. Okay.
I’m going to help you with this. So what’s at stake, is if you don’t really figure out how to convert your major donors, you are not going to be able to raise the large unrestricted gifts that your organization needs. And I’m a big fan of major gift donors. What we know is that according to Giving USA statistics 76% of giving was of all giving was by individuals. And of that, we usually talk about the 8020 that 20% of the folks give 80% of the dollars. Actually the most recent analysis is it’s more like 9010. So 10% of the people are giving 90% of the dollar. So I’m a big fan of go where the winds are if if we know that the vast majority of funds are being given by wealthy donors, let’s have a wealthy donor strategy.
If you don’t nail down a process that feels good donors are simply just going to be annoyed that you keep bothering them for coffee for
site visit for a thing. Wealthy people in particular have more money than they have time time is actually the more valuable resource for them. So make it worth their while. And ultimately, if you don’t have a process where you feel like you’re successful, you’re eventually going to burn out because honestly, production sucks. And ultimately, you might leave because you feel like you’re not delivering results and or your organization might have to leave because you’re not delivering results. Can I get an amen there?
I’m still getting the eggs.
Okay, so the question is why, Oh, why is this happening to me? You all are good people. You’re smart, you’re good at your jobs. Why is this happening? So real talk.
You’re chasing people who don’t want to or aren’t ready to talk to you.
And they do not trust you? Or the cultivation process. The reason why is that so many of us have been on the receiving end of bad fundraising. And I will say that we haven’t upgraded the way that we treat donors, even though consumer behavior has upgraded. So
kind of example, when I go online to buy something, I go to the website, I click around, maybe I read some reviews, and then I just buy the thing. At no point do I feel like I need to talk to somebody about the thing. Or if I do it, I’ll send an email to customer service, whatever.
Guess what the way we buy online is also the way we donate online. And so for us to constantly try to like get a coffee meeting is ludicrous. Like people don’t want to talk to you facts. Thank you. Right, yes. 100%. So I think we need to just like realize this. But also I feel your pain, right? I too, was once upon a time in your shoes, like trying to get a meeting with the donor who ultimately like did not want to talk to me. Most people self cultivate themselves solicit. So think about your own donation habits. When is the last time you talk to somebody in order to make a gift? Probably Probably not. Right? You went to the website, maybe you talked to some friends who donated, maybe you looked at some testimonials and stories, and then you decided, so the constant insistence of our people to try to get coffee meetings with donors is really just an interruption in their day. And the reason why they don’t want to talk to you is they’re afraid that that you’re going to ask them for a gift before they’re ready. I call that drive by drive by ask right? Like, I don’t want to meet with someone for coffee, because I’m afraid they’re going to hit me up for money before I really understand who they are, what they are, or how this relationship is being built. Can I get an amen to all of this?
I promise you though, there is a better way of friends, there’s a better way, let me show you the better way. So I’m gonna give big props to my friend Greg Warner, CEO and founder of market spark. He is the architect behind this whole idea. I cannot take credit for this. Nor can I take credit for the work of Dr. Russell James. So I just want to give a big shout out to these two gentlemen, we’re going to dive deeper into how they’ve revolutionized actually great cause they upgraded the operating system of fundraising. So we’re going to talk about that. And Dr. Russell James is a fantastic researcher in Texas. And he actually put donors in MRI machines, and looked at their brains when they talked about philanthropy. So we’re going to talk about that in a second too.
All right. So I have a three part plan for y’all. So the three part plan Well, number one, help you identify
and help you engage and help you cultivate people who actually want to talk to you. Oh my god, I’m blue. Okay, so here’s our current problem. So, as evidenced by this weird little gnome, we’re in this pond fishing around hoping for nibble
is not working for us.
Instead, this new solution is a creation of a donor survey to gather information and let people raise their hand. Now, I know some of y’all buy stuff online. I personally, I buy a lot of stuff online. I think the pandemic has, has moved all of us on to online shopping. I literally cannot buy something without a survey popping up into my face. Right. But the question is, why don’t we do this as nonprofits? So
let’s talk about a donor survey. What makes a good donor survey and the other thing that I just want to highlight here is you might say like, Okay, well, Bria.
People don’t like to, they don’t like to answer surveys, right. I ignore surveys all the time from GAAP. Here’s the difference. The difference is that the way that people think about their, their philanthropy is different than the way that they think about their business. So shout out to Dr. Russell James. When he put people in MRI machines. He talked to them about business metrics.
ROI costs etc. One part of the brain lit up. He then talked about philanthropy and guess what a different part of the brain lit up. And that part of the brain is associated with family and emotion. So philanthropy is actually an emotional decision. And we use metrics to backup we have already decided with our hearts. So the fact that people are donating to you means that they like you, they love you, they they think of you as family so that the response rate tends to be higher than if it’s just a random company that I bought something from.
Put in the chat, if that makes sense so far, just trying to make sure keep us
moving here, okay. So when we think about creating a donor survey, we really need to think about designing it. So it triggers the emotional, why? Because again, remember, philanthropy lives in the emotional part of the brain, the part of the brain with family, so we want as much as possible to tickle that part of the brain to make to connect it to an emotional feeling, or connected to any personal connection. So a good donor survey will ask something like, Was there someone in your life who inspired you to give or was there someone in your life that the connected you to this personal mission, it that then influences me to think about a person that is influential in my life, thereby tickling the emotional centers?
A good donor survey will also ask about capacities. So as you’re looking at donor surveys, one question that you might ask is, you know, which of these giving vehicles are you interested in? Or are you likely to get from donor advised funds, family Foundation’s assets, etc. So, major gifts are given the assets? What I mean by that is your average major giver. So, you know, obviously, that really depends on what your organization how you define major giver, but let’s say a five figure gift and up is given out of assets, not out of income. And so, I know, there’s been a lot of talk about donor advised funds, and how do you find out about, I mean, the fact of the matter is, like donor advised funds are designed in order to keep a bit of a distance between grant seekers, and the folks who have donor advised funds. So the easiest way to find out if they have one is just ask, just ask. Alright.
And then personal information, such as number of children, estate plans, education levels, I will tell you, when we think about major gifts, in particular, there tends to be and again, like, obviously, there are outliers here. And I think, especially with a lot of tech folks, or finance folks, this might skew the balance a little bit. But in general, folks who are in major gift territory tend to be 50. And over because they’re thinking about legacy, they’re thinking about estate planning, they’ve kind of made their mark, they’ve climbed whatever ladder they’re going to climb. If you can find people who don’t have children, that’s also really good, because they’re gonna have to leave their money to somebody.
Folks who obviously are more highly educated, sort of trigger thoughts about like, this person could be major give territory. So all those things are kind of indicators that you should consider. And again,
I want to talk about wall screens for a second, because everyone really is like, so crazy about Wall Street, I think Wall Street is or can be helpful, their data point of one, but the truth of the matter is, if you are a person of significant wealth, there are a million ways to hide that wealth. Also, if you are a donor, like it doesn’t actually feel great to know that the person you’re talking to online stopped you and looked into your personal assets. Like it’s a little creepy, right? So I think we also need to think about if we were donors, like how would we want to be treated? Like, would you want to know that someone went online and dipped into all of your personal assets? Like not really? Yeah, Danielle, this does feel really personal. People really do offer it up, right? So you can expect about a 5% return rate. And again, none of this information is mandatory, like when you design your survey, you’re not going to make any of this information required. You’d be surprised at how much people will tell you and I’ve actually been running tests on a number of my of my cohort and like it is incredible the information that they’re getting. So again, because remember, Danielle, these people think of us family, not as an intrusive company that I just bought something from. So again, the the triggers are different and again, anyone can choose not to answer questions. Anyone can choose to not answer the survey, right? Like you are only offering an opportunity to start the conversation.
But it’s a good question. Oh, and then one of the components of a good turn survey.
is there’s an opportunity there to see if there is a willingness and interest to meet with you. So instead of shooting in the dark to see who wants to have coffee with you, you actually present an opportunity to have people raise their hand to say, yes, I would actually like to have a meeting with a gift officer about my giving, oh, my God, what a concept. We’re actually asking people who want to meet with us. So here are a couple of important caveats. As you think about this, this is not a research tool. This is an engagement tool. What do I mean by that? What I mean by that is, hold back on blasting your entire email list with this, that is not the point of this survey, this survey is used as a way to initiate a conversation. Okay, so what that means is that, you should only send it out to the number of people that you can actually personally respond to. Because if you do not personally respond, after they send out after they fill out the survey, it could actually do more harm than good, because you have demonstrated that you are now wasting their time. So even if they fill out the survey, and even if they say that they’re not interested at this time with meeting with anyone, it is an opportunity for you to reach out and say like, thank you so much for filling it out. Hey, you had this really interesting point about your third grade teacher, I’d love to talk more about that if you’re open to it.
So I have information here about designing a great survey, which you should definitely check out you should also make it not terribly long, maybe 10 questions is probably the max.
And the way that you want to present it to them is, hey, we’re reaching out to some of our tried and true and really want to gather information about how you would like to be interacted with. So you know, help us out.
Okay, any questions before I move on?
And Ronnie, I agree with you, while scritti has gone too far.
And also, it’s not accurate. So I actually well screened myself and it was like, I don’t know where they got this number. But listen,
I would love to be at the network that they somehow thought I was. But honey, that was like some fake news there. I have no idea where they got that number. All right, let’s keep going. So once someone has completed the survey,
that is an opportunity then to do outreach and invitation. So let me back up a little bit. And this is a work of some of you might be familiar with Joseph Campbell. This also ties in to the work of Russell James. So anyway, Joseph Campbell is this mythologist who talked about the hero’s journey. And essentially it is a an archetype, a narrative that has stood the test of time. So any book, any great movie, in the epic, is based on the hero’s journey. So Hero’s Journey is your regular person, right? Think Harry Potter think Star Wars think Hunger Games, right? I’m a normal person just living my life, then something happens, some explosion happens, some cult event happens. First, I refuse the call, right? And like it added, I don’t want to do that. But something compels me, it becomes so
unavoidable that I have to enter this call to adventure. Along this adventure, I encounter a guide and the guide helps me to achieve what is ultimately the victory that I receive. And then I am somehow transformed. And I then returned to my normal life as a as a different person. So
let me
let me pause here. Is this making sense so far?
In the chat, can someone put in your favorite movie we can break down? Oh Jolin. How do you decide who to send surveys to? Sorry, let me answer that question. Briefly. I would start with your board. Start with your board, and then go down the list of your major donors and your loyalists. So again, small groupings of people, right. So you, I would say depending on the size of your organization, knowing that there’s a 5% return rate, I wouldn’t send it to any more than 20 people at any given time.
With a handful.
Okay, The Princess Bride now, sorry. Let’s get to it. The Princess Bride, one of my favorite movies. So let’s talk about how this this happens. Martin?
The Princess Bride.
Wesley is our protagonist. He’s a farm boy. He then goes on some great adventure. He becomes Dread Pirate Roberts. You
He then needs to rescue his love. He goes on a great adventure. The guide along the way, I think you could argue is probably Indigo Montoya or physic one of the two of them.
He then receives a victory, he wins the girl, and then they return back to the farm happily ever after. Right. So this is a, an epic story that we see everywhere. Why this is relevant to us is that
every donor is the hero to their own story.
By inviting them on a journey with us, it philanthropic journey, we are calling them to adventure. We are the guides are the mentors here, right, we are the ones who are helping them to achieve the victory that they seek in the world. Because the reason why people give you money is they want something and there’s something could be, I want to make a change in the world, I want impact, I want to make a dent in the universe, I want the world to be a better place for my children, I want to belong to something, we all have a reason. Your job as the guide is to figure out the reason for your particular donor. Right? And then to help give them the victory to fulfill that need for them. This is making sense of our as you wish Yes, thank you Mark.
So once they complete the survey, that’s step one, and what we call qualification that they are not yet fully qualified. That is the first step. So once they reach out,
then you have to fully qualify them. So you reach out and you say thank you so much for filling out the survey. There are two things that you need to know in that initial phone call. Who do they believe that they are? Like? What is the story that they’re telling themselves about on their great adventure? What is the victory that they seek?
Why does this particular cause matter to them? What is the meaning and purpose for them? And then do they have the capacity to get right?
So it doesn’t really do us any good? Trying to cultivate people who don’t have money to give us so when I think about major donor prospects, I think about it along four different metrics. Metric one is, is there any kind of relationship with us? So listen, if you put Oprah Winfrey down on your prospect list, unless you actually have a direct connection to OPA route free, that is just a pipe dream. So there has to be some kind of relationship? Do is a board member connected? Am I connected, etc? Number two, is their affinity. Is there some kind of evidence that they actually care about the cause? Because if someone is like a environmentalists donor, and I’m running an education program, there’s it may not be a fit.
Number three, do they have capacity? So again, with the survey, I can look and see if they have a donor advised fund if they have a family foundation, etc. And then the fourth thing will be recency. Has I interacted with them in some recent way? Right, you’re much more likely to go on a date with someone who you saw last week versus someone that you saw a year ago, who ghosted you. So when you think about these four metrics, you can start to think about who are the people who are most likely to give now with the capacity to give. It’s really a timing issue isn’t Is now the right time for us to start to talk about this. Because listen, maybe I’m about to have a liquidity event. And I’m going to have a lot of extra cash, or maybe a little Bobby’s about to go to college and I’m big cash strapped at the moment, right? So what you really want to ascertain in this initial conversation, is these three things. Do you have the capacity? Why does this matter? And who do they tell themselves that they are?
So then you process this information. And I want to be super clear with everybody here. You listen more than you talk. 75 To 25% should be what you’re aiming for 75%. I’m talking 25% You’re talking, I know some of you are tempted to like, go into pitch mode. Please stop yourself. We’re not pitching. We are starting a conversation. Once you have that initial conversation, if it feels like it’s a fit, you go away. Actually, sorry. Before you end the conversation, you say this has been great. I really appreciate it. Would it be okay, if we touch base next week, make sure you have a time so that we can talk about potential next steps. Yeah, sure. That will be great. Okay, in the potential next step session, what you do is you issue an invitation. And essentially it is an invitation to embark on a philanthropic journey together. There are a couple of key components in the invitation, which I’ll get to in the next slide. But the idea here is that the invitation is intended to increase transparency and trust. So so often the reason why we have a an all time, low in trust between donors and fundraisers is because
So many donors have been treated poorly. They’ve, you know, people aren’t transparent about what they intend to do. They’re asked for a million coffees that don’t make sense. They’re asked to go on site visits that don’t go anywhere. And then they’re asked for money when they’re not ready. So what we do with an invitation is we literally just lay it all out. There’s, there’s no hiding the ball, we’re just putting it all on the table. So what are the components of the invitation? So you know who I am, obviously, you probably shouldn’t cover that in the first conversation. But how I help people like you, and how you help people like your donor is that you help them to give smartly, you help them to give in a way that achieves what they want to achieve with their philanthropy. When people like bring me into the fold to help, so you’re talking about past folks that you’ve helped, and you say, people bring me in at a point when they are considering making a serious investment in a philanthropy or they’re, they want to see a major change, or they’re concerned about a certain thing, right, you want to provide a sense of like, we are a this is a partnership.
You know, my goal is to be a guide, why people like you, trust me and the process, and you actually have to just lay out the process of like, generally speaking, this is what we do, when we are working towards a process.
Here’s what you can tell me if you decide as we go through this process, if this is not the right fit for you.
And here’s what I might say, if I decide that this is not the right fit for for us,
at the end of this process, and we can go as slow or as fast as you would like. But we will be talking about a mutual value exchange, ie a gift. But you’ll know that when it’s coming. And it won’t happen until after we’re done with this process. And we have a mutual understanding and trust. Does that sound fair?
And let me just tell you,
I’d love to get responses for the audience.
Does that feel like a different way to approach a conversation? Because essentially, you’re laying it out? Think of it almost like a scope of work, like you’re an attorney or you’re a contractor. Like you’re just putting out all of the things on the table and say, Hey, do you want to embark on this journey or not?
Can I get a Can I get a thumbs up? Can I get any kind of indication if this is making sense so far, if this feels good? This does feel good?
Yes, thank you. Lovely. Absolutely. So the reason why people hate fundraising, is that they think it feels icky, anything, they think it feels icky?
Because it is icky, right? Because we’re not treating people like partners, because we are acting like we’re extracting something from them because we’re not being transparent and open and authentic. So
this is just a different way to do it. Oh, and I have details. So you can check out my podcast with Greg Warner about why major donor processes suck. Okay, so once they have accepted your invitation to go on the journey,
right? And at any point, they can decide to say like, No, this isn’t right for me right now. Totally fine. This reminds you like when I was dating, I’ve been married for a while. But when I was dating, I want to really appreciate it when I was in the dating world, for someone to be really upfront, like, Hey, I’m looking for something serious. And I’m acting and right now. But like, that’s kind of where I’m going. So if you want to do this, let’s do this, as opposed to like, are we just hanging out? Is this casual? Or is this series like, and that’s fine. I just need to know what journey I’m on. Right? Let’s give people the respect to let them know what journey they’re on.
Yeah, they can deal with what they know. It’s what they don’t know. And the thing is the brain, the brain is triggered when we feel unsafe, right? The amygdala is the Center for fight flight, fear. And uncertainty makes our amygdala go nuts. So if you’re literally laying it out on the table, like this is what we’re doing. Does that sound like a journey that you want to be on? Like, cool, let’s do it. All right. So once I accept your invitation on the journey, you then co create oh my god, what a concept. How many of you have spent like a million hours sitting there and be like, Ooh, how do I create a cultivation journey for this person? And it’s like some random assortment of like, coffees and site visits and like dinners with board members and visitors and like, I’m going to send them the thing
I have, I spent many hours instead, why don’t we just ask them? Why don’t we co create a journey to gather so when we co create a journey with our donor to gether? It’s designed to build trust, and it’s about what is
They want not what you want. And frankly, everyone is different. Some people are like, You know what I, I don’t actually need all this, I can make it gift right now some people like going slower and they like all the dinners and they like all the beatings and dinner, that’s fine, we tailor it to the thing that people want to do.
It’s a service that we’re offering.
So you co create the journey, and you think about a victory that is meaningful for them. Now, in the back of your mind, you should have a timeline and an amount in mind that you will continue to revise as you deepen your engagement. And then when you’re ready for the ask, it’ll be the natural next progression. And PS because you’ve developed this relationship of trust with your donor, you let them know on the front end, when it’s time to ask you send an email, Hey, Jane,
it feels like we’ve gone through the process. Should we talk about the mutual values like is is not a good time for us to talk about the gift.
So by the time you get to the meeting, Jane already knows why you’re having the meeting. So 80% 80% of your time should really be spent on the cultivation process, not on the chasing the people who don’t want to talk to you. So your guide is to your job is to guide your donor on the path to realizing their philanthropic dreams and desires. So, bottom line, it’s not about you, it’s not about your organization, and how quickly you want to go and get that you want to close right now. It is that in the donor score, we move at the velocity of trust. And so to quote Greg Werner, you can be a CPA or the IRS. What does that mean? A CPA is trying to
the IRS is just trying to get the money, a CPA acts on your behalf to try to make sure that your goals and your desires are met. So
this is this is future you time here.
So here’s some of the resources that I mentioned. I think Laurie put them in the chat, there’s a guide to them or surveys, there’s guidance on the invitation and sample scripts here. The other thing that I just want to
reiterate very strongly here is that this strategy is not a strategy for all of your donors, because you just cannot scale the strategy. But this is a strategy meant for your top level major donors. And this is a strategy designed to get them to the next level. Okay, so now I can take questions.
I’m gonna stop sharing my screen.
Okay.
The session as opposed to
leave the stream for bet.
I’m gonna see. Should I check the q&a? It’s under the q&a? Yeah, we have a question under there. So please make sure if you have any questions, you want to post them in there. I’m gonna scroll through chat a little bit and see if there’s anything I can find. But the one that we have says if your causes sensitive, such as family violence, how can one ask tactfully, why a major donor is moved to give?
I don’t think you need to get any more detail like, why why did you Why does this matter to you? Why did you get right people are allowed to tell you as much or as little as you want. But like, I don’t know, I don’t think family violence is necessarily
any more personal than like,
I don’t know, let’s say there’s like an eating disorder or, you know, pet rescue. I mean, we all have personal reasons for the things that we do, and giving people the opportunity to tell you about themselves as a gift back to them.
So
I know in your survey, like why, why does this organization matter to you? Loise. Well, Lewis says, How do you suggest the journey with large donors have given me more than once without having to reach out to them? Well, let me tell you this.
If this donor has given you a significant gift, without you reaching out to them, I’m pretty sure that there’s a lot more there. So oftentimes, when people give a gift, and again, I don’t know the specific details, but like, is this an opportunity to reach out to them just to get to know them? Like, you’ve never reached out to them? You don’t know anything about them? You don’t know why they give like, Wouldn’t you like that information? Even if it’s even if there’s no more additional gift, which I find hard to believe it even if there’s no more additional gift? You’re going to get like, wouldn’t you want to know why this person wrote a big check to your organization?
shouldn’t like, it seems like I would want to know. I don’t know if that helps.
Yes. And, Jamie, to your point about the giving.
I agree, I think that there’s a level of transparency and accountability that all of our donors should expect. And ultimately, when we talk about donor fatigue, like, look, we can all expect some level of churn, right. But if you have retention rates, anything less than 70%, I would look at your leaky bucket, because we know that giving happens in the emotional part of the brain. And so if you’re number 10, your donors in all likelihood I would look at
perhaps you have not done a good job of telling them what you did with their money. And then you ignore them for a year. And then you come back at them when it’s time to give again, but hey, you want to give a gift? Well, no, because you didn’t tell me the thing.
What you did with my last gift, so
just starting, alright, Kelly says, What if you’re just now starting to make connections, the new donor? How do you move a new connection from a contact to a new donor?
Again, Kelly, what I would say, is it. I don’t have the details. But I would literally, if you’re already in conversation with them.
Start with the invitation is now is right now a good time I have this process. Would you like to be a part of this process? Let me lay it out for you, like here are the key components of what it means to be in process with me? Do you want to do this, right? Because we, we keep engaging people with the hope that they’re going to go where we want them to go, as opposed to be like, here’s the path, here’s the destination, do you want to do it? I am a big believer in just being really transparent. Now, let me be clear with you. This level of service can only really be done with a small group of people. So if you’re an EDI, probably you’ll max out at about 10. If you’re a major gift officer, and this is all you do, you’re probably gonna max out at 40. Right? This is a high level high touch way to interact with the earth that cannot be at scale.
Okay,
in the q&a, do you want to jump over there and can use
those questions? How do you engage the importance of the top tier donor? Wait, I can’t see. Hold on. Let’s see.
I can’t read the whole.
It’s read
it now it just ends with a.dot.so. It’s how to engage a board to the exploring that top tier donor, I’ve found complacency.
I don’t know math. So if we know that 90% of giving is done by 10, top 10% of donors. And I’m like, Well, okay, like, I’m no mathematician. But it seems to me that if that’s true, you probably want to concentrate your efforts on your top 10%. But look, if your board has other ideas about that, and they want to somehow define math then like,
congratulations, like, good luck.
I mean, I know it’s like very slippin. But I just think like, just do an analysis of your database. What percentage of your givers is giving the bulk of the guest? And I’m certain you will find at least 8020 If not 9010?
So the answer is math.
Okay, Mohammed asked our surveys about donor evaluation of our own performance effective. Now, well, that was really quick. The point of a donor survey is it’s not about you. It’s not about you, it is about them. So at any point in the process, if you want to ask a donor about like, is this an effective process for you? Are you enjoying it? Do you enjoy like working with me that you can do that? But the donor survey is an opportunity to learn more about them and not about you. So I hope that that helps. The other thing that I just really want to say here is that
for those of us who are frontline fundraising, and we’re pressured to deliver on, you know, ROI, and obviously, I don’t think ROI is a bad thing. But when you lose sight of the relationship of trust, in service to getting that money in the door when you act like the IRS, that is when you burn your donors right because it becomes about you and your needs and not about them and their needs. So on average, it takes about 21 months to convert a major gift.
This is a long term
trust building strategy you cannot build trust overnight, as you all know. And so one of the metrics that I would suggest that you use not, I think a lot of the traditional metrics, like how many meetings that I go on how many phone calls that I make, how many emails they send, that’s fine, you can track those. But to me, the more interesting metric is, how many relationships did I
write because I can go in a million coffees, but it doesn’t mean that I’m actually building a relationship deeper.
Okay, let’s keep going. And learn. What time do we wrap here?
Sorry, I can’t hear you. Hold on. Is it me?
Oh, no, I can’t hear anything. Hold on. All right. I’m just gonna. Oh, yes. Hi. There you go.
Yeah, so we have a few minutes. Okay, great. Well, we’ll end in about eight minutes on its own at this point. But we do have some questions.
Or can’t let me get to the q&a right now.
So can you see the q&a? Are you answering questions out of the chat? All answer, Tony, Tony, and che Lee’s question and security. So Tony, you’re 100%? Right. If somebody is not comfortable, they don’t have to answer. Oh, but thank you for asking me on the survey, you should make sure that your name and email is on there. If you have questions or concerns, feel free to reach out to me, right? You want to make them feel like there’s a human being on the other end of it. If you prefer to talk through any of these, feel free to call us right. You have to reposition yourself as like the guy you have to make it easy to do business with. You have to make it comfortable for people to give you the information the way they want to give it not the way that you want to give it to a really good point. Tony Silla sheerly has your name, right? What happens if we are Department of 101 to provide a great level of service? Well,
this is such an interesting question and a relevant question, Charlie.
I did a training yesterday. And there are two things I want to tell you. So number one,
I’ve been obsessed with this book called 10x is easier than 2x. And I really recommend that everybody reads it. But I’ve started to think about the fact that the things that we do are either 10x activities, or 2x activities. And the reason why 10x is easier than 2x is 2x is just like doing more of the same stuff. But just more of it. 10x means that you actually have to be a different kind of leader, there’s a different set of strategies, your mindset has to be different, your processes have to be different. So what I would say to you is if you are a one person team, and you think about all of the things that you have to do, ask yourself, what is the 10x activity here, not the 2x activity. And what I what I suspect that you will find is that the 10x activity is going to be your major donors. But the second thing I will say is the word decide, is if you break down the Latin roots, that decide of the side is a same side as ut like homicide and suicide and patricide. It means to kill when you decide you kill all other options, you decide, and then you commit. That is how you get to 10x.
Surely I don’t know if that answers your question, but I think if you think about it through the lens of like, what all of the BS stuff I’m doing that’s to x, I think the answer will come to you.
Okay, name of the book. 10x is easier than to X. Fernando. I love books. Do you know the author? Dan Hamilton, please put the chart the name of the book 10x is easier than to ask yes. Is like I’m obsessed with this book right now. Okay, Gary said, What would you say about the advisability of blogging the wealthy person that you are friends with fundraisers for other important causes? If mine is not the top of your list, but let me know what it is? Because I might be able to help? Yeah. Gary 100%. So
within your donor survey, one of the questions you will most likely ask is
on your list of philanthropic priorities, where does our calls live? Up at the top? Top 10%. Middle? Not really. Unless, right? So someone says that they’re that you’re on the top of their list, obviously, you should be paying attention. But Gary, to your point, you are a guide. So if in the course of the conversation, let’s say I’m running an educational organization, and I’m talking to Lori, and in the course of like discovery, Laura’s like you know what, Ria I realized that I’m called to save the oceans. Like that’s actually what I’m super passionate about. My job is to
Yes, thank you go, please save the oceans. And let me help you do that, right? Because again, it’s not about me, it’s not about my organization.
When you’re operating in the scarcity mindset, you’re grasping, and you think every gift is going to be your last gift. When you’re operating in abundance, you know that there’s more than enough out there for all of us. And the oceans need saving too, and the whales need saving too, and kids need to get like there’s so many things that need to happen. And so if Laurie saris are using the example of Laurie comes to the realization that her purpose in life is to save the oceans, wonderful, we need those people to and I, I will lovingly deliver you into the arms of an organization that can help you to achieve your goal of saving the oceans. Right. So like, this is not about being the IRS. It’s about being a CPA. Okay.
Any other questions? Do we have any other time? She’s muted connection? Nope. We have we have about three minutes. Oh, anything else in the q&a that you can? Yeah. Oh, well, I’m happy to answer any last questions. But I really recommend that y’all.
Just plug in myself here. I have a newsletter real long.com. I send it out weekly. I have my weekly nonprofit lowdown. I would love if you could write a review if you’re so inclined. No pressure, but if it’s a bad review, don’t write it.
Oh, the link does not open. My they came it came through as a string when you sent it to me. So
is it open? Yeah. Okay, something missing unless it is in the slides, correct? Yeah, it’s in the slides here. And they can download the slides. Okay, great. Yeah. So they’ll have the link there. Yeah. Okay, here, actually, let me redo it. And then the last thing I’ll say if I’m allowed to plug is I’m recruiting now for so the only way you can really work with me is I have a group coaching program. It is September, applications are open. Now I to small group there no more than 20. Folks, it’s ideal for executive directors of nonprofits under a million.
So if you’re interested in working with me one on one, or not more than one to many,
that is available on my website at under the join accelerator.
All right. So looking to see if
Julie, it doesn’t work from the chat because there’s no space between the word surveys and the HTTPS. It ended up blending everything together. So readjust, posted. Sorry, actual link. No, it’s okay. My fault. I should have noticed it when I posted it. Gary. Gary, was that a question? For me personally, what is my own top class?
Well, the thing is, I care a lot about a lot of things, right? I would say education is probably my top cause but very closely followed by environmental, increasingly, reproductive rights.
But yeah, we all have, we all have our things. But the thing is, I care a lot about a lot of things. And so the reason why I launched my accelerators, I realized that I personally was not going to be able to do all of the things. But if I could empower people who were doing all the things to bring in needed resources to make their missions happen, that was going to be how I was going to contribute in the world.
So oh, there was an upload to cool.
Okay, so I had somebody just asked about the CFRE credit, she loved the presentation, but just so you know, the documents can be found, or the tracker that you need is in the resource center, so you can download it from there. And at this point, we’re getting ready to end our session. So Maria, thank you so much for presenting today. We have about 10 minutes before our next round of sessions. So we hope you all join us there. Yeah, come find me my website. Love to hear from you.
All right. Thank you.
Thanks, everyone.
Sarah, Susan. Thanks, Sarah.
Yeah, I can little copy things
Oh, you’re welcome, Gary. What’s your favorite cause I’m curious.
Thanks, Buck.
Thanks for havin
Nice.
Thanks, Jim. Appreciate you
Oh, thanks, Paige.
I’m actually a little sick.
You’re getting like 85% free. I’m usually like, busting out of the screen. So
I’m a lot. My husband will tell you probably too much.
I’m also happy to answer more questions. Am I allowed to answer questions Laurie Are
you can’t at the moment this session doesn’t seem to want to stop. So at some point it will cut off.
We’re overstaying our welcome. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, here. Andrea Russell James is doing some really cool stuff with brain science and philanthropy and major gifts and plan giving. Actually, fun. Other fun fact I spoke with Tony Marinelli. He was the evangelist for planning giving everyone I think should have a plan giving strategy.
You work with all kinds of see nonprofits. So Sylvia, I assume you mean 5123 A’s and C fours? Is that the question? Mostly C threes. I don’t really have much experience with C fours but I’ve had I’ve had a couple of C fours
oh, we’re just like hanging out and I love this is dealing with
all right, I’m gonna see if I can in this year. Let’s go to their next session. Go to the next session everyone.
Ah, yes, Kimberly.