‘Tis the season for mulling. I don’t mean wine – although that’s not a bad idea. What I’m talking about it putting a few anticipated 2016 fundraising challenges into your noggin and letting them simmer.
I don’t mean to suggest that you ruin your well-deserved break by thinking too much about work.
What I am suggesting is that you take five minutes to write down a few big, strategic things you know you’ll need to tackle in the New Year. And then let your subconscious do the rest.
I’m willing to bet that when you return to work in 2016, you’ll have some brilliant new ideas just waiting to bubble forth.
Here are three common fundraising challenges that you might want to mull over:
How can we diversify our fundraising revenue streams?
It’s a rare organization that has the balance it truly desires between individual, foundation, events, corporate and government dollars. What might you do in 2016 to start shifting the picture? Draw a pie chart of your current revenue streams. Then draw one that represents your dream scenario.
When you come back to work on January 2, look at these charts again and start mapping out your path toward the ideal.
How can we take better care of our donors?
Stewardship is the key to fundraising success at every level of the pyramid and it needs to happen year round. January’s the perfect time to refine your donor communications plan. Before you go on your break, scribble down the names of three of four different donors. Be sure to include a range of types of donors – a lower level giver, a major gifts donor, a foundation donor, a board donor. Then hammer out some ideas for how you might make each of them feel special in 2016. How can you encourage them to feel really, really good about giving to your organization?
In January, you and your colleagues can put together a stewardship plan for the entire year and imbue it with some new creativity.
How can we make time for major gifts?
Most nonprofits would like to ramp up their individual major gifts programs. But somehow, it always seems to get pushed to the bottom of the “to do” list. Everything else in fundraising has such hard deadlines – grant proposals, board reports, special events, annual report copy, etc., etc. So, you’re going to have to be extremely disciplined if you want to see any real major gifts change in 2016.
Make a quick list of the things that your team could do to incorporate major gifts into their weekly routine. Don’t worry about prioritizing it. Just allow yourself a brain dump. Then set it aside until January. At that time, you can get serious about it and set some SMART (specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, time-bound) objectives for your major gifts work.
There are so many other questions you might mull over, but don’t get carried away! Just pick a few and have a little fun with it.
Who knows what great ideas your gray matter will come up with while you’re busy being festive?!
