Category: Stewardship and Relationships

Fundraising Appeals
Stewardship and Relationships
Caitlin Fillmore

5 Elements of Effective Fundraising Appeals

For many nonprofits, the fundraising appeal provides the backbone for year-end, fiscal year-end, and annual campaigns. The appeal, often a direct mail letter or e-blast, frames the most important concepts surrounding your nonprofit and encourages donors to join the cause. Because an appeal is so essential, fundraisers must begin with a solid foundation for this fundraising strategy. Follow these five elements of effective fundraising appeals as a useful template for all of your upcoming appeals.

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Image depicting dementia
Stewardship and Relationships
Viken Mikaelian

Dementia in Family and Friends

It’s been two years since my mom died. But in my mind, she had already passed away seven years ago, with the onset of dementia.

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Hear What People are Really Saying
Stewardship and Relationships
Gail Rodgers

Five Key Tips to Become a More Active Listener

Being an active listener ranks highly as a skill valued in any profession. However effective listening skills prove even more useful in a relationship-building job like fundraising. In fact, becoming an empathic listener is one of the Seven Habits of Highly Effective People.
A few simple tips can help you retrain yourself into becoming a better listener. Read on to learn the top five habits to help you build active listening skills.

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Mentor with new board member
Planned Giving Marketing
Viken Mikaelian

Energize Your Board with a Board Mentorship Program

Sometimes it seems like every nonprofit is currently searching for engaged, committed board members. You may live in a place where the usual CEOs, entrepreneurs, and political figures’ list of board assignments is already too lengthy to ask them to add your nonprofit too.

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Artificial Intelligence Human and AI hands
Major Gifts
Viken Mikaelian

One Place to Never Use AI in Major Gifts Fundraising

Artificial intelligence is today’s most relentless buzzword, as teachers, bosses, online daters, and everyone else learns the advantages and disadvantages of allgorithm-predicted answers in our daily lives. But there is one place in your development department where AI does not belong.

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A picture of a granddaughter whispering into her grandfather's ear, to illustrate a PlannedGiving.Com post on Planned Giving Power Words That Work.
Bequests
Patrick O'Donnell

Planned Giving Power Words That Work

While the planned giving world isn’t exactly the wizarding world of Harry Potter, believe it or not, there really are some magic words — “power words,” if you prefer — that can make bringing home the endowment bacon a lot more likely.

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Mother carrying daughter at sunset on the beach
Giving
Jack Miller

Little Jessica

Before she became ill, I used to see Jessica every Sunday night when her parents came to play in the little mixed-couples pickup basketball league at the gym. At that time — and this was thirty years ago — Jessica was about one year old. Cute kid. An only child who was barely talking yet.

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Two Men Having a Difficult Legacy Conversation
Stewardship and Relationships
Viken Mikaelian

Initiating the Legacy Conversation

My Dad never wanted to talk about creating a will. “Don’t worry,” he’d say, “It’s not like I’m going to die tomorrow.” Then he’d change the subject—usually to the tomatoes he was growing—because he found talking about planning his estate too uncomfortable. Guess what? My Dad died without ever making that estate plan.

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