Name: Timeless Fundraising Principles
Uploaded: 2026-03-18T18:31:09.650Z
Duration: 56 min 48 s
Description: Timeless Fundraising Principles

Transcript for "Timeless Fundraising Principles": Welcome, everyone. Thank you so much for joining us for our fundraising master class session today, timeless fundraising principles, presented by Steve McLaughlin from the GoBull Group. Before we kick it off, I just want to introduce my colleague, Kenneth. He's our Blackbaud representative who's on the line. If you have any questions about how Blackbaud can help you raise more and transform your mission's impact. He'll put his information in the chat now so that you can connect if interested. You'll receive a link to the recording, and please feel free to enter questions as you think of them throughout the session into the q and a. You'll find also some great impact filled resources on how to raise more as well as that q and a to the right of the chat. So feel free to send any questions you have. And without further ado, I'm going to pass it over to our expert today to dive on in. Great. Thanks, Abby, and thanks everyone for joining me today as a part of this session. I'm Steve McLaughlin. I'm the senior vice president of product at Global. Wanna thank Blackbaud for having me here today and also thank Global for having me here today. Goble's the trusted partner for consulting and technology that's helping transform health care philanthropy. I'm really fortunate every single day to be able to work with fundraisers and nonprofit organizations, in particular, health care organizations, drive their fundraising results that help impact their mission and their communities. So, I may be new to some of you and may not be new to others, but, again, I've been working, in and around the nonprofit sector in technology for over twenty five years, spent a lot of time looking at fundraising practices, data analytics, all of those good things. And to start, I wanna introduce you to someone that you may have never heard of before, but this person had a profound impact on fundraising in the nonprofit sector. That person is Lyman Pierce. Now I first learned about Lyman Pierce when I was working on my book, Data Driven Nonprofits, back in 2016. Must have been something in the water back in 2016 about the importance of data and the nonprofit sector because data driven nonprofits became a bestseller. And now just about all of our organizations are dealing with data, artificial intelligence from one way or another. But one of the things that I found when I was first researching for the book and writing the book was a little bit more about Lyman Pierce. And so the book actually starts out on April '5, and there is a story in the Washington Post called money is best talker. And it's about a fundraising dinner that had been held in Washington, DC the night before. So well over a hundred years ago, this event took place, but in some ways, probably wasn't radically different than a lot of the fundraising events and fundraising dinners that nonprofit organizations hold today. Now the reason why I started with this momentous event that probably many of you've never heard of was because of these two gentlemen, Charles Sumner Ward and Lyman Love Pierce. Now back in nineteen o five, both Ward and Pierce worked there for the YMCA. But over a span of more than thirty years, they became the real fundraising pioneers in the nonprofit sector. Between their work very early on in the YMCA through work through the nineteen thirties, Ward and Pierce worked with a variety of organizations, not only in The United States, but around the globe with organizations like the American Red Cross, the Salvation Army, Stanford University. And, of course, they continue to do work with both the YMCA and the YWCA. Now during this time in their careers, they worked with a lot of organizations and really pioneered what we consider to be modern fundraising practices. Together, Ward and Pierce raised more than $350,000,000 for these organizations. To put that in perspective, that would be over $5,000,000,000 in today's money. And think of it. They did a lot of it without the modern technology that so many organizations have today. Now one of the things I found was that later in his life, in fact, in 1932, Lyman Pierce wrote this book called How to Raise Money. It was essentially a collection of all of the techniques, practices, and principles that Lyman Pierce used and learned during a career that spanned over thirty years. I happened to, along the way, pick up two original copies. It's out of print. You can't really find the book anymore. And while there's some amazing insights in Lyman Pierce's 1932 version, it's a tough read. Some of the language in, 2026 is not exactly easy to decipher. And so one of the things I set about doing that I said I would never do again was to write another book. So one of the things I've done, is I've taken the original content of how to raise money and completely reworked it, rewrote it, restructured it, and republished it into a modern version of how to raise money that came out just a few weeks ago. And, again, in just a short period of time, became a number one bestseller in some of the nonprofit categories on Amazon. And so what I wanna share with you today are some of the timeless principles that Lyman Pierce found to be true that are still true today, but to give you, a more modern perspective on to take these principles and put them into practice, put them into action for you and your organization. So, the book is 333 pages long. I'm just gonna cover some of the core concepts today, but certainly invite you to pick up a copy. So where should we start? One of the recurring themes is, you know, certainly, there was technology that was available to Pierce during the nineteen tens, nineteen twenties, nineteen thirties. It's very different than what we have today. Right? And so in the book, Pierce will sometimes reference that they use letters and phone calls, a lot of in person visits, dealing with cash and check and coin. And certainly in today's world, we have the advantage of CRM systems, online giving, the use of a auto AI automation. So all these kinds of tools that certainly Ward and Pierce did not have access to in their time. But what they had were the fundamental principles. And so time and time again, you see this transition. Right? In in Pierce's day, it was the use of index cards as opposed to a CRM system where you have constituent records. A lot of manual tracking, a lot of paper to keep track of individuals versus having modern technology that allows you to do that. And so we've come a long way certainly from the days of, Lyman Pierce, but now we've got that added benefit of technology that he and his, colleagues never really had. We also have seen the change in the channels that are used to engage with prospects and donors. Pierce dealt a lot with telegrams and letters and postage costs. And even though postage costs have not completely disappeared today, certainly, we've got more channels available to us than ever before. Email, text, much more instant, immediate, and cost effective ways of engaging with supporters. But, again, it's so important to think about the principles that are involved here. The other thing it's clear is that Pierce really definitely believed in the notion of tracking, measuring, monitoring what was happening. Now in his day, this would be gift tables, tally boards, a lot of manual tracking. Today, we are fortunate enough to have technology that can do a lot of these things for us through the use of things like predictive analytics, AI fundraising agents, more data driven insights. But the key thing I wanna get through and and sort of as a trend throughout the whole book is that there are certain core principles that have really stood the test of time over a hundred years now that so many organizations sometimes lose sight of, but we have the tech. What we need is the principles and the the know how that goes along with it. So let me note again. The tools are gonna change. The principles won't. And the tools and technology that you maybe used a decade ago or two decades ago, those have changed, and they're just gonna continue to change. But it's these core principles around how do we do fundraising from a best practice standpoint that are so fundamental. And while I love the technology, and I work with technology every single day and have for the past twenty five plus years, it's important to not to lose sight of some of these core principles. And I wanna share some of the insights, that Lyman Pierce passed down that I've sort of recaptured in the new version of the book. So early on in his book, Lyman Pierce talks about the 11 major factors in a campaign. Some of these have stood the test of time, although what I've hoped to show you now is I've given it sort of a modern refresh. Right? Kept the concepts, but just updated the language and made it more applicable to a modern fundraiser. So he had 11, and the updated version has 11. I wanna talk through some of these at a high level to to get some points across. So first, you have to have a compelling cause. Right? The campaign must present a cause that resonates deeply, inspiring action and commitment. And there's a reason why this is number one on the list because everything on else on the list doesn't matter unless you not only have a compelling cause, but you're able to articulate and describe that compelling cause to both prospects and donors. Number two, gotta have competent leadership, and something not to be taken for granted. The organization behind the campaign should demonstrate confidence, reliability, and clear direction. And notice this isn't a competent CEO or just competent executive director. It's competent leadership at all levels of the organization that are critical to the excess of any fundraising campaign. Third, you've gotta have a reasonable objective. Right? Ambitious but achievable objectives motivate supporters without overwhelming them. Right? It's it it needs to be a goal and a fundraising objective that is a stretch, but it's achievable to drive that momentum as a part of a campaign. An informed constituency, engaging and educating the campaign's base ensures trust and readiness to participate. Right? How are you messaging? What is that message that you're providing to constituents? And do they feel informed about the purpose, the goals, the objectives, the why of the overall campaign? Timeliness. Launching at the right moment maximizes receptivity and effectiveness. A lot of parts in the book get into timeliness, how to manage the timeliness of the campaign, how to take the right amount of time for a fundraising campaign, and also a reminder that you can't rush a good thing, and you also can't rush a fundraising campaign either. Six, numerous points of contact. Right? We have to have numerous opportunities for engagement to make the campaign accessible and relatable. And that's both numerous points of contact with constituents, but I think it goes back to multiple channels. Right? How are we engaging them with direct mail, direct marketing, social media, email, SMS? In a world where donors and supporters are bombarded with a lot more messages than they were back in 1920 or 1932, we've gotta be able to engage across those numerous points of contact. That was true in Pierce's age. It is even more true today. Seven, adequate preparation time. Allowing sufficient lead time ensures thorough planning and avoiding rush decisions. Again, typically, when we're talking about a fundraising campaign, which is a larger effort, we're talking about something that happens over many months or, in some cases, many years. And so you've gotta build in that adequate preparation time. A balanced scale of giving. So having clearly defined giving levels that help donors understand their potential impact, and I'll give some examples of that in a bit. One of the secrets that was true in Lyman Pierce's day and age and true today is the importance of significant early gifts. In some cases, 70 to 80% of the gifts around a major campaign often are the early gifts that organizations try and close. So securing those major gift donations upfront go builds momentum and confidence. People can see there's progress. People can see that other people are giving towards that campaign. It certainly helps to drive momentum, progress, and awareness of what's happening. Tested methods, probably one of the longest chapters in the entire book. One of the longest chapters in Lyman Pierce's original version and my updated version as well. So utilizing tested and reliable method minimizes risk and enhances efficiency. We know a lot about what works in a fundraising campaign and also what works in ongoing fundraising and development program. So sticking to those tested methods and putting those tested methods into practice is so critical and important. And finally, number 11, because this goes all the way to 11, expert guidance. So having professional, experienced leadership that helps navigate challenges and optimizes outcomes. Sometimes that's the expert guidance within your organization, and sometimes that's the expert guidance outside of your organization who's been down this path before and can help guide you and avoid potential challenges. Again, that was true back in the early nineteen hundreds, and it's certainly true today, especially when we think about pulling all of these particular pieces together at once. Now I wanna take a couple of these things and and sort of structure it in a framework that might be helpful. So if I'm thinking about planning an overall fundraising program, how do I put these principles into place? And here's one way to think about it, which is at the foundation of any solid fundraising campaign is yeah, making sure you've got that compelling cause, competent leadership, or reasonable objective. Right? What's the cause? What we're driving for? Who's leading the organization at all levels? And what's the goal? What's the objective that we're trying to achieve here? The next thing that you've gotta have is the plan. Right? Timeliness. When are we asking? When is the when is the kickoff? When is the launch? All those things. Having adequate preparation time, taking advantage of those tested methods. Then, of course, you need the people involved, the informed constituency, numerous points of contact, expert guidance. And then finally, the last piece of the puzzle here is is the momentum. Right? How do you keep things going not only in the planning phase of a campaign, but the launch throughout the campaign and the wrap up? A balanced scale of giving, significant early gifts, all those things come into play when you're thinking about campaign based fundraising. A few of these I wanna highlight in particular because I just think they're so important. Right? So what do we mean when we say competent leadership? Right? And for me, and something that's echoed in the book, right, are a couple of main things. Right? What competent leadership means is demonstrating the ability to get things done. Can you get things done? The big tasks, the little tasks, and all the tasks in between. Now getting things done is important, but also is delegate responsibility and demand accountability. A lot of organizations often struggle because leaders may try to take on too much or don't wanna delegate out to team members. A sign of growth is not only your ability to delegate certain responsibilities as part of the campaign effort, but also to demand that accountability. If you're asking people to step in to be responsible, you're also asking them to be accountable for the results. And this last one I think is super important as well is that, ultimately, competent leaders build organizations that deliver without them in the room. Right? If you're in a leadership role and you feel like, I can't take a vacation. I can't take time off. I can't do something else because everything will fall apart without me. You need to work on that. Right? Because competent leadership means you've built an organization, a team that can deliver those results without you having to be on every call, be in every meeting, be constantly in the room or the virtual room. Ultimately, competent leaders, develop the ability to build those teams so that they they are involved and they can see what's happening, but it means their teams have enough autonomy to get success when, you know, sometimes they're not there. A balanced scale of giving. So it's so funny how this notion of a gift table has been around for over a hundred years now. So in this example, this is a gift table to raise a million dollars. Now your mileage may vary, but the concept of a gift table and the use of a gift table has been around for a long time to the point now where a lot of technology actually builds out these types of gift tables for you. So in this example, if I wanna raise a million dollars, I'm gonna need, close to 900 prospects, and I'm gonna need to get about a 175 gifts of different sizes. But the other thing that this example shows you, if you look at the far right column where it says cumulative percent, what you'll notice is those first few gifts, $50,000 gifts and $10,000 gifts, raise 85% of the million dollar total. And, again, this has proved to be true for over a hundred years in fundraising, which is the importance of those significant early gifts, also that those larger gifts often make up the majority of the overall fundraising goal. And, again, the more things change, the more they stay the same. This still works and is still applied even today with modern fundraising programs. Like I said, there's a whole chapter, probably one of the longest chapters in the entire book about tested methods, but I wanna just make the point of why do these tested methods matter? Like, so what? Who cares? And there's a couple of tested methods that are pointed out, that I thought I would highlight here. So first, personal conversations are nonnegotiable, especially when we're talking about major gifts or, in some cases, mid level gifts. Every other method, direct mail, mail, events, social media, crowdfunding, you name it, supports the personal conversation, but it cannot replace it, especially when we're talking about those larger significant gifts that make or break a campaign or a program. You have to be able to have those personal conversations with donors. Despite all the technology and all the channels, all those things are in support of getting to a personal conversation. Another tested method, and this might seem obvious, but I often see organizations struggle this, always ask for a specific amount. Vague requests produce disappointing results. Having a specific ask to a specific donor with a specific objective is so important because not only does it establish the appropriate giving level, but it also gives the conversation a clear direction. Right? Now what you may find during that conversation is they're not able to give at that level today, but maybe in the future, but at least it helps to guide that conversation. A big thing that Lyman Pierce talks about in the original version and have retained in this modern version is also the ability to to look at the importance of accountability, in particular, having accountability meetings and that these meetings are not optional. So organizations that treat accountability meetings as optional discover quickly that optional means skipped. And if people skip meetings, that means that they have uncompleted assignments. And so there's a definite rigor and process of tested methods that have been proven out over a hundred years now about what works in these types of scenarios, making sure that personal conversations are nonnegotiable, always asking for a specific amount, and making sure that accountability meetings about the progress that individual gift officers or fundraisers are having are are non optional. Super important. Now why do some of these fundamentals get abandoned? Probably could spend a whole hour just talking about that concept. Right? Oftentimes, it's because in today's day and age, it's very easy for organizations to chase tactics. Oh, I heard about this one thing that someone did that one time on a Tuesday, and let's go see if that works. Chasing tactics often then leads to organizations who neglect to understand what makes it work. Right? That there's a set of principles and a set of tactics that align with those principles that ultimately drive those results. The other thing that sometimes happens too is we hear about this new technology, and that new technology creates the illusion that we must have to have a new strategy. I'm a big believer that strategy comes before technology in the dictionary, and strategy should always come before technology in your planning. I love technology, but I look at technology as the tool that helps you to implement and track and drive results and progress that supports the strategy, not the other way around. So super important. The bottom line here, right, cleverness is not a substitute for methodology. Enthusiasm is not a substitute for training. Technology helps well prepared staff ask for a specific gift. So, again, technology can help and support as a tool. Training helps and supports the team, and a methodology and the principles around this, really help the overall organization as well. One thing that I think comes out over again and again and again is this statement. Organizations with great tech and weak fundamentals consistently underperform those with modest tools and a disciplined approach. You may have the best, most amazing technology in the world, but if you don't also match that up with core principles, core fundamentals, you're gonna underperform as opposed to organizations who may or may not have the best tools, the greatest tools, the most sophisticated tools, but that folks, the the approach of having a disciplined approach is so important to getting those results. Now a lot of the book and my talk so far has focused on these campaign principles, but there's a whole area within the book that I also talk about how do you shift from thinking about fundraising campaigns, which often are months and months or years and years, to an ongoing development operation, which, you know, many of you operate and manage today. So both of these topics are covered in the book. But there's a bit of a shift here. So I'll I'll take three principles that I just talked about in particular and talk to you, How those apply in a fundraising campaign versus how those apply when you're running a development or a fundraising program on an ongoing basis. So competent leadership in a campaign becomes year round executive engagement and fundraising when you're doing, an ongoing fundraising program. A reasonable objective that's a part of a fundraising campaign becomes annual goals built from the portfolio up when you're managing a fundraising program on an ongoing basis. And those tested methods that we talk about are so critical and crucial to success in a fundraising campaign. On an ongoing basis, this is all about being data driven and having a data driven, fundraising program that's always looking to optimize what you're doing. Now I wanna take these because some of you have probably lived and experienced or currently living and experiencing world in an overarching fundraising campaign. I also know a lot of you are just operating a fundraising program on an ongoing basis where some of these principles get applied to. So I wanna talk about these three and give some examples in particular. So when I say year round executive engagement and fundraising, in a lot of organizations, the CEO or the executive director isn't just responsible for the fundraising organization or operations, but they're often responsible for the mission of the organization as well. But it's so important, that leadership engagement and fundraising is an operational standard. And it may not be where leadership's background or experience comes from, but they have to be engaged in the fundraising program on an ongoing basis to be successful. That also means that oftentimes the CEO or executive director of of your organization has a portfolio of donor relationships they personally steward. Now is it a portfolio of a 150 donors that, like, a a a typical gift officer may have? No. But it's not zero either. And so one of the ways to build a culture around having that year round executive engagement is that the CEO of your organization does have a portfolio of donor relationships that they personally steward. Maybe it's only 10. Maybe it's only 20, but it's certainly not zero. Also, there's the role that the board plays here as well. So making sure that the board makes calls on peer level prospects and major donors, especially in smaller organizations, relatively speaking, although we see this in larger organizations too, the impact that the board can have on helping to make those connections. And it's made aware to them that the there's the importance of making those connections, making those calls, making those engagements with prospects and potential donors is part of what, board membership or participation means. Now the way to think about this in terms of an ongoing fundraising or development program, and it's something I touch on in the book, is I think about it in these three levels that for most organizations at some point in time are operating. Right? So if we start towards the bottom, right, you've got your annual giving program. And that annual giving program is, working to get unrestricted gifts, very important, and those unrestricted gifts are what funds the operations and some of the programmatic work of the organizations. And that annual giving program, as you might imagine, runs on a twelve month cycle. Now when I say twelve month cycle, a good annual giving program is also looking three years backwards to look at trends and see what happened three years in the past, looking at what's happening right now, and also looking a little bit ahead. But certainly, they're living in this twelve month cycle. And then on top of that, a lot of organizations will have a major giving program. Now we could get into the different series of major gift and a principal gift and all of those kinds of things. Right? But the key difference here is with a major giving program, you are gonna have a combination of both restricted and unrestricted gifts. I know traditionally with a lot of major gift programs and even campaign giving programs, a lot of that is restricted, but you're seeing organizations start to shift and, try to operate a major giving program that deals with both restricted and unrestricted gifts. The major giving program is often often tied to initiatives. So it may not be a specific project or a specific building or a specific outcome, but they may be broader initiatives of the organization beyond funding operations. Right? And a major gift program is typically working on a time cycle that's twelve to eighteen months because that initial, major gift prospect that you're engaging with today, it could be a twelve to eighteen to twenty more four month cycle before that major gift, is closed. And then we have our campaign giving program, which is this is the larger, much more, long term type of giving program that organizations operate. And almost every organization is either thinking about a campaign in the silent phase of a campaign, in a campaign, or has just wrapped up a campaign. So there's a large life cycle here. And, again, you're dealing with restricted and unrestricted gifts. In a lot of cases, a campaign giving program is for very specific funding projects. So it could be infrastructure related, could be a building, could be a hospital, could be a museum, could be a major overhaul of something, or it could be a major programmatic funding initiative that you're trying to raise money for. And, typically, these campaigns are thirty six to sixty months in in duration. And, again, when we're talking campaigns, this is where we're talking about organizations who may be trying to raise $155,503,000,000,000 dollars over a course of time. And, certainly, that does not happen overnight. These are much longer time horizons when we talk about a campaign giving program. But just about every fundraising organization has got some mix of all three of these types of fundraising, programs operating at the same time. Annual goals built from the portfolio. This is so important, especially when you're running your development or advancement or fundraising program, which is oftentimes when I talk to organizations about how it is they set their fundraising goals for the year or the next twenty four months. And, yes, five different organizations, you get five different answers. But the real advice here and something that's prescribed in the book is that you set goals bottom up based on what the portfolio can produce both from an annual giving perspective, a major gift perspective. And if you're in a campaign mode, what are you expected to achieve for the campaign as as well? Right? And that means that major gifts are closed based on relationships currently stand. If you don't have a healthy moving major gift pipeline, it becomes very difficult to plan and forecast. But you also can't make up things out of thin air either. So it's really important that when you're setting goals from an annual perspective, hey. What's gonna come in this year from major gifts? Likely, it's not gonna be gifts that are in identification or qualification. Likely, in a 12 time horizon, it's gonna be gifts that are in cultivation or some form of solicitation. Yes. We all have that example of a gift that quickly moved a lot faster than any of us thought. But the reality is if you think about annual goals, your and annual goals for a major gift program or gift officers who are running a major gift program, you're looking at people, and prospects who are already in cultivation or in solicitation as what you can achieve in that year. And then with annual giving, we're looking at lists of new, current, and lapsed donors. Right? So from an annual giving perspective, you're running a twelve month program, and you've got a couple of places that you're constantly looking to improve. Right? Acquisition of new donors, retaining existing donors, increasing or upgrading existing donors, and then, certainly, how do you reactivate lapsed and long lapsed donors as well. And from that perspective, you know, annual giving needs to be building goals based on, hey. How do we do year over year? Or how do we do two years ago? Or how do we do three years ago? And what does that look like for our ability to acquire, retain, upgrade, and reactivate donors? All this stuff are are principles, but certainly having the tools, having the CRM, can give you the answers to the questions, but you need to know what questions you should be asking in the first place. So we've all heard about this concept of a fundraising pyramid, and oftentimes people look to this magical mythical pyramid to set and drive fundraising goals. Not sure that that's the best way to go about things. Again, I'm a big believer that you build your annual goals from the bottoms up based on what's in your portfolio today. And having worked with countless nonprofit orgs over the past twenty five years, what I can tell you is this. I've never seen a perfectly formed, perfectly shaped fundraising pyramid. They come in different shapes and sizes, but I see a lot of space needles. There's a little bit of a base at the bottom. It's very thin through the middle. And if not for the generosity of a couple donors, you wouldn't have, something at the top. I think maybe if there was an ideal state, it might be something more like an Eiffel Tower, which is where you've got a very broad base of support. You actually have a mid level giving program, and then certainly you're looking at major gifts and principal gifts on the way up. Now that might be a way to think about donors, but my experience has been when you look at the data, it doesn't look like a pyramid at all. So this is some data. Couple years ago when I was with Blackbaud and working with the Blackbaud Institute, we looked at thousands of organizations to look at the distribution of donors and revenue. And, hopefully, quickly, you can see here, the donors might look like a pyramid kinda sorta, but the revenue certainly doesn't. I would argue if we're looking for things that are look alikes that the distribution of donors and revenue, to me, looks more like the Sphinx than it looks like an actual pyramid. But part of the point here, that I like to make is that when you actually look at the data, what you find is organizations drive a different percentage of revenue based on the type of gifts, but everything just points back to having a balanced fundraising program. Right? Point 1% of donors make principal level gifts that drives 26% of revenue. So principal gifts are great, but I can't hit my goals if I'm just raising 26%. And so what you really need to be able to have is a balanced fundraising program where I'm looking at base level gifts, mid level gifts, major gifts, principal gifts. And it's that balance to me that's the real key thing here versus getting into shapes and sizes. And is it a pyramid? Is it a sphinx? Is it something else? The key thing is that you've got balance at those levels from base level gifts, mid level gifts, major gifts, and principal gifts over time. That is really the timeless principle that continues to be true over time. Data driven program optimization sounds like a bit of word salad, but this is important. Right? You have to build a learning loop into every fundraising program area. So if I'm operating an annual giving program or I'm working on mid level gifts or I'm working on major gifts, you have to have a learning loop into place. Right? What did we do? What was the result we achieved? And what might we do differently, better, faster, stronger the next time? Right? So measuring results, opt optimizing based on evidence, not assumption. Assumption gets you in a lot of trouble. Right? So, really, what you've gotta be able to do is look at any one of these programs. What did we do? What was the result? Is that what we expected? Did we achieve our goal? Did we not achieve our goal? And then the next time do you do it, what lessons have we learned so that we can adjust and improve? Right? Analyzing what works and what didn't followed by adjustments. Right? That's the learning loop. Like, build, measure, learn. Right? What worked? What didn't? What would we change or do differently next time? So I'll give you a good example of how data driven optimization comes into play and why it's so important and how learning from the data can help us to optimize and improve on what we're doing. So, this is my Oprah moment of the presentation. So I'm gonna give every single organization here today a 100 brand new donors. So you get a 100 new donors, and you get a 100 new donors, and you get a 100 new donors. Alright? And then let's see what happens with those donors. Well, if we meet again a year from now and those donors were acquired offline, so things like direct mail, direct marketing, perhaps an event, you only have 29 of the 100 donors left. And that's because according to Blackbaud's donor centric benchmarking, the first year offline acquired donor retention rate is only 29%. Not great. We've lost a lot of donors in just one period of time. One year. Right? Well, what about the Internet? The Internet's fantastic. Surely, the Internet must be better at retaining donors. Turns out, it's not. First year, online acquired donor retention rate's only 22%. It's actually worse than offline. Right? So 22 versus 29%, not good. And then that leads us into discussion is is offline better than offline, and should we still send mailings even if we're a small organization? And perhaps the discussion about channel is the wrong one because if we actually have some insights from the data, we might adjust and be more data driven in our approach. And let me give you an example of that. So let's start over. Let's forget what what happened. Okay? I'm gonna give you another 100 new donors into your organization, except we're gonna do something a little bit different, and we're gonna see if we can improve the results. So for starters, we are going to look at the retention rate for donors who make a single gift. So the single, first year, single gift donor retention rate is 22%. It's not great. It's worse than, offline, and it's the same as online. If I'm asking for a single gift, my first year retention rate is only 22%. Not great. But what happens if I ask for recurring gifts or multiple gifts? Well, we have a big difference. So donors who make multiple gifts, in particular, what I'm talking about are those who run a monthly giving, sustainer monthly giving program, their retention rate in the first year is 73%. Right? And that's because the first year, multiple gift donor retention rate is 73. So it turns out when you look at the data, the discussion of online versus offline and should we send mail or not send mail, should we have events or not events, should we do a website, should we not have a website, does not isn't the thing that moves the needle. It's really about, are we asking for single gifts versus recurring gifts? Because there's a massive difference in performance. Right? Single gift retention rate, 22%. Recurring gift retention rate, 73%. Which would you rather have? And, hopefully, there's like, we might not agree on everything in my talk. I'm willing to bet 99.999% of you would say, I would rather have 73% than 22%. The other thing that's super important is when we look at revenue per donor on an annual basis, recurring gift donors massively outperform single gift donors. $222 revenue per donor for recurring gift donors. Single gift donors, only a 108. Right? Now you might be saying, but, Steve, well but they only weighed one gift, and these people made multiple gifts. Yeah. That's the point. And but those recurring gifts might be at much lower levels. Perhaps it's a recurring gift giving program that starts at $10, $15, $25, $30 per month. But part of it is it's the act of giving, the habit of giving. You know, we all live in a subscription economy these days where so much of what we do is what we're paying for on a monthly basis, Spotify, Netflix, Amazon Prime, all those things. That consumer behavior is now donor behavior, and it's a really untapped opportunity, when retaining donors is so vital to what organizations are doing. Other thing I thought I would touch on is what has happened since 2016 when I published data driven nonprofits and today with how to raise money is were there things in data driven nonprofits that still hold up today and actually apply to some of the principles in how to raise money? As it turns out, there's a few, and I wanted to share those. So for starters, data is a strategic imperative. It's not optional. Maybe ten years ago, was optional. I'm not even sure ten years ago, data was optional, but maybe it was looked at as optional. Data isn't just a nice to have. It is a foundational element of what your organization is doing, whether that's on the fundraising side or the pro programmatic side. Poor data quality directly translates to missed opportunities. I'm convinced that all the bad robots that we see in the movies, come from bad data. Bad data results in missed opportunities. We missing the opportunity to engage with a donor or prospect, whatever happens to have, and that gaps in that data become lost revenue. Ultimately, our ability to turn that data into information, information into insights, insights that help us improve our fundraising performance. If we've got gaps in the data, inconsistency in the data, quality issues in the data, at the end of the day, that translates into lost revenue. One story from the book, data driven nonprofits, is how much typos cost when, yes, it turns out, when you spell a donor's name wrong, it costs you, money in terms of lost retention It also costs you money, that's no longer given to your organization in uplift or or upgrades. So data has a value, and that's still true today. Metrics drive accountability. This is one of the really interesting things about reading through Pierce's original book and what I've adapted was the importance of measuring. Back then, it was literally they would telegraph results back to the headquarters to see what happened. They would have a board that would show progress, not unlike the dashboards that we have in our CRM tools today. So metrics drive accountability. Metrics and measurement has never been more important. Because if all we're doing is things based on I feel like doing something or I think we should do something, but I don't have any evidence or proof, that's a recipe for trouble. We also know that what gets measured gets done. And that's whether you're running an annual giving program, a major gift program, an overall fundraising program. The things you measure are the things that are gonna get done, and so metrics drive that accountability. And open accountability drives performance. This is something that Pierce noted from the 1920s that I still think is vitally important today, which is, one of the concepts in the book is around these accountability meetings where literally, instead of just a typical one on one where we might be meeting with a staff member in the fundraising program or just annual giving or just big major gift officer staff, but in fact, an accountability meeting where we go through how are we performing, how are we doing here. Let's look at how are we performing against goal? How did we do last quarter? How are we doing compared to what we were doing a year ago? Having metrics and performance out in the open where everyone can see how we're doing and where there are opportunities for improvement. Or some days or some weeks, it's a we just, you know, had a great success with a recent, fundraising effort that we had. Let's congratulate the team. Let's let's make sure that that's out there as well. But open accountability drives performance. Absolutely. The other point here as well, data serves relationships. It does not replace them. Again, I love technology. I love data, but it does not replace the human element. Right? Data is not just about replacing human judgment with algorithms. AI algorithm is fantastic. Again, we use that every single day even if we don't realize that's what's really happening. Data should focus limited time on the highest value activities. We all have less time than we have opportunities. And so if data can help us focus, where should we be spending our time in the annual giving portfolio? Where should we be spending time in the major gift portfolio? Data can absolutely help us here. Right? Data amplifies human capability. Fundraising is an art and a science. We need to balance that art and science. One is no more important than the others, but we have to use both. We have to use the data and the technology, the principles and the fundamentals, the the human judgment aided by technology and what it allows us to do. And just one example to bring this together from a data perspective is oftentimes when we're talking about algorithms and analytics, which are very powerful tools, it's using that data to get a better understanding of a donor's potential capacity, propensity, affinity, that it isn't just random luck or random logic why it is that we're able to get results for a fundraising program, that using the data that comes from multiple angles in multiple ways ultimately drives successes. So that is one of the other important drivers around data and analytics is it lets us get a more unified view of what's happening because the algorithms, the AI, the predictive models can all take into account capacity, propensity, and affinity for us to really zero in who are our best fundraising prospects today, but also who are the best fundraising prospects tomorrow. So five quick takeaways. I certainly enjoy, I invite you to to read the rest of them in the book. One, the principles are timeless. The tools are not. I think I've made that point clear a few times. A small number of donors determine success success or failure for a fundraising campaign. Again, those early significant gifts being so important. Competent leadership is the variable that everything else depends on. Without it across the whole organization, we really struggle here. Also, fundraising is a permanent discipline, not a periodic event. Yes. You may be in a campaign or thinking about a campaign, but having that permanent development advancement fundraising program in place is so critical. And, yes, the human element still makes the critical difference in all the things that we're doing here. And so just one more thing before I open it up for, from questions from the group. So I started out today's talk by introducing to you to this guy, Lyman Pierce. He's born in 1868, passed away in 1940. And when I was doing the original research on data driven nonprofits, I very quickly noticed something very interesting about this guy, Lyman Pierce. So Lyman Pierce was born in 1868 just after the civil war. He was born in Stockton, New York, which is a small, literally one stoplight town in Western New York. And the reason I know that is because that's where my mother grew up, and that's where my grandparents lived out their lives. And it's also where my great grandmother Pierce at a big giant antique shop in an old house. And so it just turns out this project and so much of what I learned about Lyman and Pierce isn't just a professional exercise. It's personal as well because as it turns out, Lyman Pierce turns out to be a distant relative of mine. So I'm really happy and pleased that I've been able to to resurrect his work, his principles, from the early nineteen hundreds and updating it for today and be able to share that with you here today and also to share it with you in the book. So with that, I'm gonna pause, take a quick drink, and see how many questions we can get through before the end of the time we've got. Okay. You can see you've got in your q and a box, you can pile me up with a whole bunch of questions. I'll try to get through as many of these as I possibly can. So as Abby will probably remind you, yes, you guys will get a PDF copy of today's slides. Happy to send those out. Yes. Absolutely. Couple questions in here. With annual gifts of direct mail, do you suggest small nonprofits use direct mail? What I would say is is you need to engage with multiple channels. So think online and offline. Think about mail. Think about phone. Think about digital. Organizations who may have bailed on some of the traditional methods, they still work. They still operate. So those successful organizations are using multiple channels. I think if you're a smaller organization, what you may need to do, though, is again, this is where data is your best friend. You may choose to focus. We're gonna focus on mailing these particular, prospects or how do we choose to use perhaps some different channels to engage different donors at different times? But absolutely. I think one of the biggest mistakes you can make is deciding we're gonna get out of one channel or another. The one way to know for sure is to obviously look at your data, look at your results, finding out what resonates, all those kinds of things. Question in here. What would be your best method to use to convey the board's role in fundraising? Love this question. Having been on the board of a nonprofit, in the past, what I can tell you is, first, it all starts with expectation setting. That when an individual joins your board or let's say you already have a board, at that next meeting, likely, you need to establish what is the expectation of board members. Now I can tell you that in most cases, the expectation that's placed on board members is a typical give, get model. Give, get model means you're gonna you're expected to donate at this level on an annual basis, or you need to help us get gifts at that level. Certainly, I found over time too is, typical board members don't have a background in fundraising, don't know a whole lot about it. They need some training and some education. That's also a great opportunity for you to have people from the fundraising team maybe get on the next board meeting agenda and do a little bit of a high level overview of what you're doing in the program, making it very clear what is the expectation of the board in fundraising. And like I said, for most organizations, it's setting that expectation. And I remember this from being a board member. It was very clear. You know, I had there was an expectation of me to give at a particular level or to help bring in gifts at a particular level as part of being a board and a board member with the organization. So that's one that came up, all the time. Look through some other questions here. There's a question about the accountability meeting. So I tried to touch on that subject again, but something that's very, very clear in the book is, you know, we might have our one on one meetings, our staff meetings, all those kinds of things. That's fine. But the idea of having an accountability meeting, especially when we've got goal based fundraising that the team meets. And not only do we review what we've achieved, the results, the progress we've made against particular fundraising goal, and then talking about what's coming up ahead next, but that's an open accountability. So everyone can see what progress is being being made, maybe where we're lagging behind a little bit, where we need to drive or improve some results, some stories that we can share about the success we have, or in some cases, where we've had some challenges so that the group can talk about those kinds of things. So, yeah, that's definitely a part of it as well, is is the idea of having a meeting that's very specifically focused on showing where we're going against the fundraising goal, having open accountability about the the team and the performance against those kinds of things. I think that's almost all the questions that we had in here, Abby, if I didn't get to them already. Hang out for another few moments, see if anyone's got any other questions. Thank you so much, Steve. Yeah. We really appreciate your time today and everyone here. There's so much chatter in the chat about how, like, great of a session this was and what a great reminder to focus on that strategy and those principles. So really appreciate it. I'm also just gonna open up a, poll here for anyone that's on the line and would like to learn more about how Blackbaud can help you play into that technology piece that Steve has mentioned. We'll have a representative follow-up with you just to share how we can help you learn more and raise more. And as we mentioned, you will receive a link to the recording as well as, a link or you'll download a PDF for these slides that Steve so wonderfully shared. And then there are a lucky 10 from everyone on the line today who will be sent a copy of Steve's book. So keep your eye out. Keep your email out. We'll we'll send those over to you and reach out directly. So congrats, Steve, on the new book. Thank you so much everyone for joining, Great. and we'll go ahead and wrap up. so much, Abby. Thanks, everyone.