A Strategy For Cultivating Relationships With Donors
We cultivate relationships with donors in order to bring them closer to an organization and strengthen their connection with that organization. There are many tools and techniques for cultivating donors, but before you can cultivate donors, you have to get them. So, a few words on donor acquisition need to preface our discussion of donor cultivation.
Donors almost invariably fall into one of two groups:
* Those whose lives have been touched by the organization. Hospitals always put former patients high on their list of potential donors. Schools and universities have entire departments devoted to alumni relations. At the Cleveland Orchestra, we collected the names and addresses of everyone we could who purchased tickets.
* Those not personally touched by the organization, but who are influenced and impressed by its work or its leadership.
Individual donors can fit easily into either of these categories. Foundations and corporations fall almost exclusively into the second group. However, it is possible that the people either recommending or approving grants and contributions may have been personally touched by the organization.
Every organization should have a database of users to prospect for donors. Even if the organization serves a clientele unlikely to be able to make gifts, those clients may lead to previously untapped sources. One of the first organizations I ever worked with was Big Brothers of Greater Cleveland, which at the time served more than 500 boys who did not have fathers at home. The mothers weren’t able to give much money, but a little research showed that 10% of them worked at a utility company. When we pointed this out in our solicitation of the utility and included endorsements from some of the employee-mothers, we received gifts in excess of the company’s usual. So, when it comes to finding donors: prospect, prospect, prospect and look for connections.
Now, on to donor cultivation. Fund-raising has many engaging and inspiring sayings. Three that give insight into donor cultivation are:
* People give to people.
* You don’t raise funds; you raise friends.
* Fund-raising can be summed up in just three words - relationships, relationships, relationships.
This article is part of a series of featured articles on building donor loyalty by: Tony Poderis
Visit his website at: http://www.raise-funds.com/
