Major Gifts = Major Impact

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Black and white image of two women having coffee at a round table. A chandelier hangs over the table.When nonprofits lean into “major gift” fundraising, they typically start with data mining to see who in their donor pool has untapped capacity—and then unleash a gift officer to visit those donors.

That, however, is only half the battle. The other half is what will you use to motivate that $100 donor to start giving you $1,000 or even $5,000. 

Your $100 donor likely feels just fine about their giving level; it feels normal and they may keep on giving at this same level indefinitely unless you give them a reason to change their gift level.

To get someone to climb the giving ladder, you need to be prepared to show them a parallel impact ladder.

To encourage a mid-level donor to increase their gift, development offices need to have well-planned middle-to-major donor programs that show impact. It goes like this:

  1. Research which donors in your pool are giving at well below their capacity. 
  2. From there, segment which of those donors give to a particular part of your mission. Are they interested in children’s programs, education, job training, etc.? 
  3. For donors who don’t designate their gifts, you can do the same thing. Just pick a program or service that is central to your mission and set a price point that will accomplish one discrete thing or serve one discrete person or class of persons.
  4. Present the donor with a thoughtful opportunity to have more impact on the population they most care about. For example, “a gift of $1,257 will provide counseling to a child for a year” or “provide job training for a single mother in our program.” Make it a realistic jump from their current giving level.
  5. The ask amount should be a precise number, not rounded up, and should approximate the actual cost of the services/program.

Remember, the larger the ask, the larger the impact. That is a donors’ primary motivation; not whether you hit your fundraising goal. That is for YOU to worry about.

 

Learn more about major gift fundraising in my new book “Finding Funding: How to Ask for Money and Get It.”
Want to talk? Email me at jpfundraising.com.