Top 10 Fund Raising Ideas That Work!

In simplest terms, fundraising is really about communicating. You will want to reach your donors and communicate why your non-profit group deserves money and why your purpose or efforts are worthwhile.

The groups that do this successfully generally manage to make more money than the groups that do not.

If you want to raise money, you will have to work hard on communicating with your donors. There are several ways that you will be communicating with donors:

  • Advertising: Through advertising, you will try to catch donors attention and will try to explain why your non-profit is crucial enough to deserve donor money. In advertising, you will communicate through words and images and sounds (if you are advertising through radio or television). Non-profits can advertise fundraising plans through radio, television, Internet, posters, newspapers, and magazines.

  • Letters: Every non-profit uses words to communicate with donors, grant providers, and others through letters. Letters need to be well-written and professional. Direct mail letters may require extras such as photos or images to really capture attention.

  • Email/Internet: Today, you can expect to use the Internet or email to give information to donors. Use the same techniques and rules in email and Internet communication as you would in letters.

  • Telephone: You will be using the telephone to call donors, follow up with workers, and to finalize details of fundraising efforts. You will need to use pleasant and professional phone manners to use the telephone effectively.

  • Thank-you notes: You should never overlook these. Every person who helps you non-profit should be made to feel appreciated through a thank you.

  • Person to person: You will need to speak to people in order to convince them of the importance of your non-profit.

  • Grant proposals: Grant proposals are a very formal and precise way of communicating. Grant providers will tell you in their application exactly what they want to see from you in order to make a funding decision.

  • Press Releases: Press releases are sent to the media and tell newspapers, radio, and other media the latest news about your non-profit and your fundraising efforts.

  • Campaigning/Marketing/Public Relations: A more subtle form of advertising, marketing has to do with gaining exposure for your non-profits fundraising through articles, radio spots, and interviews.

You may not use each technique each time you communicate, but you need to master all these forms of communication in order to get a steady source of fund for your group. Luckily, learning to master these areas is not hard. There are many books about communicating effectively at your library and you may in fact have someone in your group already who is good with words and who can communicate effectively.

Thank-you notes

Few non-profits send tank-you notes to their donors, citing high costs. This is truly a shame. Thank you notes can make anyone feel appreciated, especially if they are handwritten. It does not cost much to have notes printed and then to take the time to sign each note. Donors will remember your non-profit with a smile.

If you want future fundraising to be effective, and if you can at all afford it, do send thank you notes. Even if this is not possible, do find some other way of thanking those who support you. At the very least, send handwritten thank you notes to the groups and companies who support you (and to your volunteers!) and find some other way to thank the many individual donors who help you fundraise.

Thank you is a word you need to say often while fundraising. You need to remind others that their efforts are a valuable gift and one that is well appreciated by your non-profit. When thanking donors and supporters, be sure to note your non-profit groups name and purpose and offer a reminder of what programs or facilities generous support will be able to ensure. This will help make those people you are thinking rightfully proud of what they have contributed.

Person to person

Talking to another person is one of the most challenging forms of communication for most us, especially if we are naturally shy. However, if you are fundraising for your non-profit, this is a form you will have to master (especially if you are canvassing door to door!).

You need to make sure that each person in your group who deals with the public (this includes sellers at the bazaar, door to door volunteers, and marathon organizers - anyone dealing with donors and potential supporters) has good personable manners. Attributes of good person to person contact include:

  • Eye contact: Making occasional eye contact (not staring) lets people know that you see them and that you are listening to them. It makes the people you are talking to feel more comfortable.

  • Manners: Being polite and kind helps put people at ease and allows them to focus on what you are saying.

Good body language. Good body language means that your movements and posture (the way you use your body) is pleasant rather than jarring. Smooth movements and a minimal of hand movements put your listener at ease and allow him or her to focus in what you are saying. A hunched posture, shoulders raised nervously and jerky movements will make your listener uncomfortable and may cause him or her to try to avoid you - not exactly the reaction you want if you are fundraising!

  • A smile. Smiling gives a listener the message that they are liked and accepted. It also makes you seem less threatening.

  • Good distance. Standing too close or far away can put your listener on the defensive.

  • Congruence. If your voice is pleasant and kind but you are scowling or your movements are agitated, you will not seem very trustworthy. Your movements, body language, voice, message, and appearance should match.

  • Pleasant voice: A well-modulated voice that is easy to hear and understand will go a long way in making someone listen to you.

  • Pleasant speaking style. If you are personable (making small comments or engaging with a listener in some way) will put your listener at ease and will help ensure that your request for fundraising is listened to. Simply listing your groups mission and request for money will not inspire anyone. A lively speaking style, a joke, or even a comment on the weather will make you seem less like an automaton and more like a person who should be listened to.

  • Appearance. Although looks are obviously a personal issue, a clean-cut and pleasant appearance is still most likely to result in yes responses to fundraising. People simply do not trust people who look dangerous or frightening to them.

For some lucky people, these basics of talking to others are automatic - they seem to make friends wherever they go. For everyone else, person to person contact is a learned skill. You may not think it has much to do with fundraising. But if your style of communication is unappealing to people, you will not be able to make much headway in fundraising. To be successful at fundraising, you carefully need to consider which ideas work

If you can appeal to people by communicating with them, you are more likely to succeed as a fundraiser.

It does not take much to acquire people skills that can help you fundraise. Practice talking, smiling, and making eye contact in the mirror (yes, it feels silly, but it really works). Better yet, video tape yourself and note what areas of personal communication you need to work on. There are toastmasters clubs that can help give you some tips and practice with oral communication, and these are well worth checking out if you want to become a master communicator who can convince donors to support your group. Beware anything can go wrong when fundraising

Grant proposals

Grant proposals or applications will be an important part of your fundraising, as often you can get large sums of money for writing an effective grant application.

Grant applications often have several components, which may include:

Letters of reference

  1. A formal proposal of what you intend to do with the grant money

  2. A formal explication (with supporting evidence) of what your non-profit group is

  3. Plans for your programs or groups facilities

  4. A business plan for your group

  5. Information about resources you have and a list of resources you need

  6. Information about your workers/group members/volunteers

  7. Future plans and goals for your group

  8. Financial papers that show what your group needs

The grant application will tell you what material you need to submit. It is vital that you follow all directions for filling out the application to the letter. Many grant providers will automatically throw out or reject any applications that do not follow application instructions.

If you can, look at an example of a successful grant application to get a sense of what sorts of applications get a specific grant.

Grant providers want to make sure that the money from the grant is used as well as possible. That means that in your proposal you need to prove that your group is focus, organized and responsible enough to use grant money wisely. Grant providers also want to make sure that their grant money goes to a group that uses the money in a useful way.

In your application, stress how many people your group can help with the money and how the grant money will be used to create a better life for people in some way. The more compelling reasons you give grant providers that you will use the money carefully and effectively, the more likely you are to get the grant.

Press Releases

Press releases are essentially announcements to the media about an important even that is taking place. You should be able to write good press releases in order to cheaply advertise your non-profits fundraising efforts. In general, you will want to write a press release to announce the start of your group, another press release to mark the opening of facilities for your group, and other press release to announce fundraising efforts such as marathons or fairs.

There is a specific way of writing press releases. Sometimes, the media will use actual quotes from the pres release in their articles or news items, so you need to make sure that your press release is written in an engaging style. Consider the following Press Release:

Media Release

Contact:

J. Doe

Director

Felicitations Child

134 Acme Ave.

London, ST USA

Phone: 555/ 555-5555

FAX: 555/555_5554

Email: j.doe@felicitaions

August 12, 2005

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

New Non-Profit Group Defends Childhood Reading from Development

(London, ST, USA) - Felicitations Child, a new non-profit organization established in London, has announced a fundraising effort to bring a Bookmobile into the inner areas of London. According to J. Doe, director of Felicitations Child, This is a very exciting time for us. We have long noted that our city does not support many libraries, and childrens literacy skills seem to be falling as a result. Recent reports on the state of education in the inner city have suggested that literacy among children is quite low and test scores in reading and writing are well below average.

J. Doe blames development, which three years ago claimed the old library building, which was torn down to make way for new condo complexes. Annie Law, a volunteer at Felicitations Child, notes that the newly developed organisations have received many calls from worried educators and parents who feel that the children on inner city London are not reading enough. A library is badly needed, as many of the children in these areas come from families who simply cannot afford to buy books. According to Law, the bookmobile would travel to all the neighbourhoods between Upper Ninth and Upper West a few times a week in order to bring reading material to these areas. Although childrens books would be plentiful, reading material for adults and non-fiction books would also be made available. In the future, Felicitations Child hopes to raise enough money to bring books to house-bound readers and to outlying areas of the city. As Law notes, In the future, we imagine several book mobiles that will bring books to anyone who needs or wants them in our area.

Felicitations Child was founded by Doe three months ago after the director of the current non-profit group read about the falling rates of book reading in London. As Doe notes, I grew up on Upper Ninth and we had an old library there. I cant believe its gone, and I cant believe no one seems to have cared about the tearing down of the library. Incensed, Doe founded Felicitations Child to encourage literacy among school-aged children. Already, Felicitations Child has found some support in Acme Company, publisher of Childrens books. Felicitations child will be holding a book sale on Feb 18 at the Old Town Hall and will also host a marathon on March 19 in the Old House Park.

This press release does several things that you will want your own press release to do:

  • It provides full contact information for the non-profit so that the media can contact J. Doe with questions

  • It provides a title that can be used as is as a newspaper or article headline

  • It gives a date for the press release and notes that the release can be used at once. This means that the media can use this report at once.

  • It immediately tells the reader what the press release is about.

  • It provides quotes that media outlets can use in their reporting

  • It is short enough to be readable but provides enough information for a short article or news report

  • It lists the major fundraising efforts (including dates and locations) so that readers can take part in these.