Category Archives: Fundraising Oops

Do you know when the real work of a big event begins? Not the day of the gala, but afterwards.

Nonprofit organizations often put  much energy into an elegant gala, an annual dinner, a silent auction, or some other special event. The event itself may be a roaring success (or maybe not). But then, as Bay Area fundraising consultant Lela DaVia describes it, “the captive audience attending the event is often forgotten in the aftermath of  staff and volunteers recovering from the hard work. If there’s no follow-through, you may have lost a golden opportunity to cultivate current donors and engage new ones who attended.”

A profitable event can, with the correct follow-through, maximize its fundraising potential by fostering new and ongoing donor involvement.  This was a key theme in DaVia’s January, 2013 workshop at the Foundation Center in San Francisco, entitled “A NONPROFIT’S NEW YEAR’S RESOLUTION: IMPROVE DONOR RELATIONS.”

What exactly does effective follow-through involve? In the case of one organization with which DaVia worked, it meant that “after the event, every person in the room was entered into the organization’s database; the guests were segmented into categories; and then they were personally contacted by someone from the organization (ideally a Board member or key volunteer), asking how they learned about the group and inviting participation, for example in the next year’s event-planning efforts.” Sending a follow-up letter or e-mail is another option for communication.

Of course, the organization that holds the event may not have a complete guest list on hand — after all, if a corporation buys a table and invites various employees and their family members to attend, even the ticket-buyer may not know until the last minute who will actually show up. But your group can capture such names by unobtrusive means, such as putting out a guest book, offering a door prize, or holding a contest (in which attendees are quizzed on facts about your organization). You can do all of these to cover all bases.

If this sounds like common sense or something you’ve heard before, remember that it’s still not the way things typically happen. In fact, lack of follow-through was a prime concern expressed by members of DaVia’s workshop audience. In many cases,  despite coming from established nonprofits, and their interest in attending the workshop indicating their organizations’ commitment to professional development, many cited lack of follow-through as a major impediment to their group’s fundraising success. Sometimes the ball got dropped even before the event was over, as in: “We have house parties, but no one is willing to make a clear ask for money.”

Follow-through issues can be compounded when a group brings in a consultant to serve as events planner. The very person who was devoting the most energy to assuring the event’s success must pick up and leave when it’s over, along with a good deal of institutional memory. No matter how great a job the event planner did at creating notebooks or files describing what happened before and during the event and what needs to happen after, the key is  actually reviewing those notebooks to take the next steps. A good new year’s resolution to cultivate those donors from minor to major!

For a foundation that seemed to have so much marketing savvy, the Susan B. Komen foundation can be awfully tone deaf — and send a message that it’s more interested in raising cash than in spending it charitably.

Their current colossal oops, having stopped funding Planned Parenthood despite that agency’s importance in providing mammograms to low-income women, is only the latest example. As I described in January of last year, the Komen Foundation alienated plenty of nonprofit watchers with its hypervigilant efforts to protect its brand: See “Fundraising Oops: The Susan B. Komen Foundation Uses Donor Dollars to Sue Smaller Groups.” (I was going to illustrate this post with something pink, but decided not to take the risk. Did I say “pink?” I meant “that color that is a mix of red and white.”)

And then there was the foundation’s odd choice in 2010 to put its branding on buckets of Kentucky Fried Chicken. Given that junk food and grilled food have been linked to cancer, this inspired plenty of commentary, and one “What the Cluck?” headline by the group Think Before You Pink (“a project of Breast Cancer Action, launched in 2002 in response to the growing concern about the number of pink ribbon products on the market.”)

Clearly there are people who were already shying away from pink products, not to mention supporting anything else but the Komen foundation, before the latest misstep. But at this point — based on all the media attention, not to mention the fact that my Facebook friends seem to be talking of nothing else — I’d say we may start seeing some pink products on the remainder tables. And an increase in donations to Planned Parenthood.

For an excellent summary of the current pink meltdown, analyzed in terms of nonprofit marketing best practices, see Kivi Leroux Miller’s “The Accidental Rebranding of Komen for the Cure.”

Today I received a fundraising email with the subject line “Bad Start to December Fundraiser.” I didn’t open it. (Would you?) It’s from an organization that I won’t name, but which I’ve come to think of as the perpetual purveyors of doom and gloom in my inbox.

With all the access to fundraising wisdom out there, explaining the need to make donors want to join your winning cause, rather than getting them worried about throwing good money after bad, shouldn’t they know better? Only a couple of weeks ago, Nancy Schwartz wrote a fine blog about how to write good email subject lines — and among her tips was “Inspire, don’t guilt” people. (I talked about her post in my November 2 blog entry.)

But maybe this strategy is actually working for this group . . . . nah, probably not. I get too many emails from them telling me how badly their fundraisers are going. Time for a change in strategy.

A nonprofit thank you letter for a donation serves two purposes: It furthers the dialogue between the organization and the donor (hopefully making the donor feel good about the great uses to which the gift will be put), and it gives the donor something to tuck away in those tax files, to be brought out next April 14th. (Oh, do other people start their taxes earlier than that?)

So I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when I recently received a thank you letter for a $50 donation that I’d made, where the last line read, “Estimated value of benefits received in consideration of this donation is $47. The portion of the contribution exceeding the fair market value of  benefits received is tax deductible as allowed by law.”

What’s so laughable/cryable about that? Hold on, you need a little more information: The “benefit” that I received for my $50 was a canvas tote bag, pretty clearly hand silk-screened. And there are two very large problems with that:

• There’s no way the FMV of the tote bag is $47.  And if it was, I wish they had not bothered to send me such a gift, because that would leave me with a mere $3 tax deduction. More likely they got it backwards — they’re estimating the FMV of the tote bag at $3, which should have been the amount stated in the first sentence.
• I suspect that the tote bag is of “token” value — that is, an item that bears the organization’s logo (which it did), cost it no more than $9.50 to produce (which it must have), and was given in return for a donation of $48.50 or above. A nonprofit doesn’t even need to mention the fair market value of token items in its thank you letters.

For more information on requirements for a thank-you letter, and related tax issues, see The Volunteer’s Guide to Fundraising.

Yesterday was “Mug Root Beer Float” day at the Oakland A’s baseball game, at which families brought lots of kids to enjoy meeting celebrities, watching floats, and of course drinking root beer floats.

Yes, it sounds like it was fun.  And according to the press release, the event raised over $29,000 for the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.

But as a friend of mine who went to the game commented, “Isn’t there something a little weird about feeding kids sugar at an event dedicated to dealing with a disease that’s all about the body’s inability to regulate blood sugar?”

Call me a curmudgeon, but I’d say it’s very weird. No one has yet found the cause of diabetes, but doctors are certainly raising alarm bells about sugar consumption and obesity, both of which are rampant in the United States. I give the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation credit for creating a business partnership that got them in the headlines and raised some significant amounts, but what a mixed message to send.

Of course, this isn’t the first time that processed and sugary foods have been drafted into the cause of fundraising. And people are taking notice — and better yet, suggesting creative alternatives.  For example, you’ll find some helpful tips on healthy food alternatives in this guide from Canada’s Nova Scotia Department of Education, called “Fundraising with Healthy Food and Beverages.”