End-of-year fundraising tips and ideas - Ep26

11/19/20 • 27 min

Guests: Humane Network CEO Diane Blankenburg and Humane Network president and Shelter Success Simplified podcast co-host Bonney Brown

Main questions: Why is fundraising so important in the final six weeks of the year, and what can people do to be more effective in their year-end fundraising?

Takeaways:

Fundraising is like retail sales – most donations come in at the end of the year.

Dec. 1 is biggest online fundraising day of the year, and the last week of the year, especially Dec. 31, are also extremely big for donations.

Make sure it’s easy to donate to your organization. You can test this by trying it out yourself with a small donation.

Matching programs greatly boost donations. This is different than company-match programs. Instead, this is where a donor – likely someone who was planning to give a large donation anyway – agrees to match donations. This inspires the top donor as well as the smaller donors because they know their money will go even further.

One fun easy idea is to highlight your favorite 12 saves or rescues of the year over 12 days in December.

And be sure to focus on individual animals in the stories you tell. These are more meaningful to donors than stories about your overall efforts or the overall need in your community.

Links:

Video of end-of-year fundraising webinar

PDF of end-of-year fundraising presentation

Leadership recommendation - "Strategic Planning: Five Steps to a More Secure Future”

Recorded November 18, 2020

Guests: Humane Network CEO Diane Blankenburg and Humane Network president and Shelter Success Simplified podcast co-host Bonney Brown

Main questions: Why is fundraising so important in the final six weeks of the year, and what can people do to be more effective in their year-end fundraising?

Takeaways:

Fundraising is like retail sales – most donations come in at the end of the year.

Dec. 1 is biggest online fundraising day of the year, and the last week of the year, especially Dec. 31, are also extremely big for donations.

Make sure it’s easy to donate to your organization. You can test this by trying it out yourself with a small donation.

One fun easy idea is to highlight your favorite 12 saves or rescues of the year over 12 days in December.

And be sure to focus on individual animals in the stories you tell. These are more meaningful to donors than stories about your overall efforts or the overall need in your community.

Links:

Video of end-of-year fundraising webinar

PDF of end-of-year fundraising presentation

Leadership recommendation - "Strategic Planning: Five Steps to a More Secure Future”

Recorded November 18, 2020

Previous Episode

Basics to know about animal shelter finances and HR - Ep25

Guest: Chelsea Staley joined the Petco Foundation team as the Director of Lifesaving in May 2020. Chelsea oversees the Foundation’s grants team and supports animal welfare organizations nationwide. Before joining the Foundation, Chelsea served as the Executive Director of Kanawha-Charleston Humane Association in West Virginia. She also has an MBA from the University of Charleston.

Main question: What basics should shelter leaders know about finances and human resources?

Takeaways:

Essentially, nonprofits are businesses. Their mission is different, but they still only run well when using sound business practices.

Financial stewardship and trust with donors are crucial, so it can be worth contracting with a skilled bookkeeper and accountant.

Hire people who align with your mission. Recognize signs of stress in employees and reach out to them.

Progressive discipline or corrective action can be hard when you are starting out in a leadership role because most of us avoid conflict. Thinking about corrective action differently can help. You want the person to keep their job and, to do that, they need to follow protocols. You are offering them opportunities to grow as an employee. It’s your job to stand up for the animals. If an employee is dropping the ball, the pets can’t alert you. You need to monitor performance and speak up on behalf of the animals. It doesn’t have to be confrontational, but there need to be consequences for poor performance.

Links:

Petco Foundation

Leadership recommendation: Jim Collins' "Best New Year's Resolution? A 'Stop Doing' List"

Recorded Sept. 22, 2020

Next Episode

How to develop partnerships with other organizations - Ep27

Guest: Joy Smith is the founder, president and executive director of FieldHaven Feline Center, a shelter, rescue and spay/neuter organization in Northern California. It was founded in 2003, and the shelter facility was created in cooperation with the UC Davis Koret Shelter Medicine Program to be a model for improving the health, safety, and adoptability of rescued cats. With devastating wildfires in Northern California, the organization has been a lifesaver for displaced cats.

Main question: Why is developing partnerships with other organizations so helpful to groups, agencies, and communities?

Takeaways:

Reach out to other organizations in your community and start talking about ways you can coordinate and support each other – this is especially important for disaster planning.

Cultivate a team of volunteers who are willing and able to step up when disaster strikes. Your staff will still need to perform all of their essential duties, so having a disaster team will minimize disruptions at your organization.

You don’t have to be a big organization to develop local partnerships and to play an important role in disaster planning.

Understand that government agencies don’t have the same flexibility that nonprofits have so things can sometimes move more slowly.

Partnering with government agencies can benefit your organization as it can sometimes open doors to funding that you otherwise would not have been able to access – and it can help you to get such partnerships off the ground by pointing out that government agencies can generally save money by having you take on some of the work because of your organization’s better capacity and skills at handling some situations.

Links:

FieldHaven Feline Center

Leadership recommendation: Amy Eisenstein blog post on “The Easiest Thing You Can Do Every Day to Raise More Money”

Recorded November 24, 2020