Last week, we hosted a Fundraising Day Plenary full of tips, tricks, and tactics for successful fundraising, facilitated by Floyd Jones. Floyd brought the ENERGY! There were two sessions that covered the full day - Session 1: “Community as a Catalyst: How to Unlock the Power of Peer-to-Peer Fundraising," in the morning and Session 2: "Building Strategic Alliances: How to Secure Corporate Partnerships and Sponsorships,” after lunch.
We held the event at the Girls Scouts Program Activity Center in Farmingdale, which has beautiful indoor and outdoor event space. HUGE thanks to the Girl Scouts team for hosting us and helping throughout the day! We also want to highlight Tenth and Willow for catering the event.
Floyd’s presentation was outstanding. He kept the energy going all day and provided valuable takeaways for nonprofit fundraisers. Here is a fundraising toolkit that Floyd spoke about to help create successful fundraising practices….
- Make sure you have a direct link or QR code to donate front and center on your website. When someone is ready to donate and they visit your website, it should be as quick and easy as possible for them to find this information without having to search.
- Have approved language ready to go. Write templates that are pre-approved by your organization and can be customized for each fundraising ask - whether email or verbal. This is also helpful when working with volunteers and board members who are asking on the organization’s behalf.
- Make it about THEM! When giving your pitch, whether through an email, cold call or warm lead, it should be about the potential funders and how your organization can help them. Do your research, know the mission and challenges of the prospective partners, and make sure you tailor your delivery to show how you can help them achieve their goals.
- Have a clear timeline and set goals along the way with dates and activities. From the amount of people you want to reach and dollar amount you want to raise, to dates for kickoff activities and celebration events, put everything in a timeline.
- DON’T LOSE MOMENTUM! Fundraising isn’t easy and it might not always go the way you planned but keep moving forward.
This plenary session was the last in-person Grunin Capacity event of 2024. We are excited to bring a new year of Grunin Capacity offerings in 2025. Stay tuned for more and visit https://gruninfoundation.org/capacity-building/.