Preparing for a Capital Campaign - Part 2

Introduction

Properly thanking and recognizing donors is not a strong suit for most charitable organizations. When we’re preparing for a capital campaign, we have to ensure that we have both a plan and a posture for donor acknowledgment.

The Importance of Donor Acknowledgment

We can take donors for granted in several key ways. Too often, we miss opportunities to thank them, and in doing so, we lose chances to keep them engaged and excited. In this particular blog series, we’re unpacking how we treat our donors through the fundamentals of acknowledgments.

Acknowledgment is the foundation of any relationship. It’s probably easy to bring to mind conversations or meetings you’ve been in where the other party simply wasn’t attuned to you or acknowledging you. Perhaps they spent most of the time talking about themselves or their work without reciprocating. That’s the kind of posture we have to avoid with our prospects and donors: keep the focus on them.

Building Genuine Donor Relationships

If we build our donor relationships well, we will have ample opportunity to share about our organization, its mission, our campaign projects, and even our own stories to illustrate that mission. That will come naturally. Too often, I see fundraisers abandon their relational gifts because the person they’ve been introduced to is a potential donor. They go right into “pitch mode,” trying to cram everything about their mission or project into an introductory meeting. They often miss the cues when a donor’s eyes glaze over, and worse, they’ve not made an authentic connection to the donor’s passion and interests.

Resist that temptation and know that approaching this person as a person and keeping the focus on them will reap mutual and long-term rewards. (There’s a reason I titled one of my books Donors are People Too!)

The Four-Part Cycle of Donor Relationships

If you’ve explored Non Profit DNA’s approach to development, you know we believe there is a four-part cycle of donor relationships, and in that, more than 80 percent of our time with donors needs to be spent on relationship and trust building. As you head into a capital campaign, don’t allow that to change your balance and how you handle your time with prospects and donors. Continue to keep the focus on them, and know that the authentic relationship you build will allow you to naturally and organically engage that donor when the time is right.

Conclusion

Up next in this series on donor acknowledgments in a capital campaign, we’ll talk about valuing donor time and how you earn the right to make an ask of a prospect.

Timothy L. Smith