Wild Woman Fundraising

So how to make sure your holiday appeal works for your organization? Does it have: 1. Testimonials? 2. Stories? 3. Pictures? 4. Stats? Have you segmented your appeal to donors who give for certain reasons? For instance, if you are sending this letter to people who give to your nonprofit through their faith-based institution, are [...]

Here are 52 ways to fundraise, one for each week of the year! Of these, which ones do you think yield the most money? Which ones, the least? If you have any to add, please leave a comment! 1. Quarterly Appeal letter 2. Grants 3. Your Annual Report 4. Sell Fruit 5. Old-time photograph booth [...]

This is a map of Texas, and how I drove all over it! Red line is actual route, Blue line is the route for squares.

Five things can make people want to give to you, according to Robert Cialdini’s book, Influence. Reciprocation This is also known as the give and take and take. If you give a donor a flower, they might feel more inclined to give money to your organization. This is also the way the free sample works, [...]

There’s a reason you’ve never seen a full picture of me on here! Yeah, I’ve got a long tail. It’s kind of got a “Puff The Magic Dragon” vibe. But I roll with it.

So, in the spirit of my long tail, here’s what I learned from Chris Anderson’s bestseller The Long Tail, and how this applies to your nonprofit!

What is the Long Tail?

It’s a book by Chris Anderson, who talks about the internet’s ability to keep a product going long after it should have stopped selling. The Long Tail means that there are no masses, but lots of people with very specific sets of niches and interests. Mr. Anderson looks at the business models of Zappos, Amazon, Ebay, Apple, Google, and other top American companies, and tries to decipher how they keep up with the changing pace of the business world and the internet markets.

This can apply to your charity, and I’m going to tell you how after the jump.

So FYI, if you haven’t given to our kickstarter project yet, here are 3 good reasons why.

Because:
1. You could help thousands, perhaps millions of people that you’ve never met!
2. Building the capacity of thousands of people to fundraise is not an opportunity that just comes along every day!
3. You can be the first in your city to have a game that teaches people in your organization how to fundraise. Imagine the edge you’ll have when all of your volunteers know how to research grants for you, do a mailing, or run an event!

Here is a Fundraising Plan Checklist that you can use every time you start a new appeal, campaign, event, or grant proposal. How much do we want to raise? Are you going to try to raise $3,000 with your annual report? Are you going to try to raise $20,000 with an event? What is a [...]