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2011/2012 Edition
A Stevenson, Inc. Publication
The Operational Plan:
How to Create
A Yearlong Fundraising Plan
The Operational Plan:
How to Create
A Yearlong Fundraising Plan
— 2011/2012 Edition —
Published by
Stevenson, Inc.
P.O. Box 4528 • Sioux City, Iowa • 51104
Phone 712.239.3010 • Fax 712.239.2166
www.stevensoninc.com
© 2011 by Stevenson, Inc. All rights reserved by the publisher. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or
by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or any other information storage or retrieval system, without
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a Declaration of Principles jointly adopted by a committee of the American Bar Association and a committee of publishers.) Stevenson, Inc.,
does not necessarily endorse any products or services mentioned.
The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 1: Begin by Looking Back —
Historical Content ...................................4
• Start by Evaluating Existing Programs
• Yearly Plan Should Address Key Categories
• Operational Plans Have Seven Essential Elements
• When Developing Yearlong Fundraising Plan a SWOT Analysis is Essential
• Conduct SWOT Analysis
• No History of Gift Support? Develop a First-year Plan
• Plan Two Years in Advance
• Hit Your New Fiscal Year Running
• Make Time to Review Old Prospect Files
• Analyze Your Use of Time to Better Set Priorities
• Make Time to Review Systems and Policies
• Learn to Work at Three or More Levels of Planning
• Evaluate Past Fundraising Strategies to Set New Goals
• Boost Fundraising Success
• Forge Ahead by Making Historical Comparisons
• Analyze Annual Giving by Levels, Clubs
• Monitor Yearly Visits to Donors, Prospects
• Historical Giving Data Helps in Establishing Goals
• Analyze Gift Club Members’ Potential
• Analyze Constituency Types’ Historical Giving Patterns
• Analyze Your Mailing List at Least Annually
• Measure Your Direct Mail ROI
• Analyze Appeal to Improve Future Results
• Track Who Is Giving How Much Throughout the Year
Chapter 2: Goal-setting Procedures
and Considerations ...............................13
• Develop a Secret Goal-buster Plan
• Set Goal to Increase Participation Rate
• Gift Chart Gives Quick Answers for Goal Setting
• Road Map for Goal Setting Leads to Increased Revenue
• Additional Benefits of Team Goal Planning
• Calculate Participation Rates, Percentage Goals
• Synchronize Fundraising With Yearly Giving Cycles
• Now’s the Time to Be Bullish About Fundraising
• Tailor Goals to Your Nonprofit’s Anniversary
• Forecast Gift Revenue Based on Type of Fundraising
• Restricted Gifts Goal Creates Another Option
• Too Few Prospects? Map Out Plan to Change That
• Craft a Cultivation Plan for Your Top 25
• Develop a Yearlong Plan for Soliciting Nondonors
• Help Solicitors Buy Into Goals, Objectives
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
• How to Reach an Annual Fund Goal Increase of
10 Percent
• Weigh Specific Factors to Set Annual Fund Goal
• Set Measurable Event Objectives
• Ask Board Members to Commit to Fund Development Duties
• Establish Mailing List Maintenance Objectives
• Set Annual Goal for Board Gifts
• Establish Yearly Endowment Goals
• Goal-setting Advice
• Committees Should Have Yearly Goals and Objectives
Chapter 3: The Planning Retreat ..............................20
• Pre-retreat Planning Makes for More Productive Retreat
• Planning Retreat Tips
• Put Some Thought Into Planning Your Retreat
• Keep Retreat Agenda Simple, Focused
• Annual Retreats Help Staff Design a Team Plan
• Make Staff Retreat Attendees Accountable
• Make Planning Begin With Everyone on Same Page
• Consider Holding a Midyear Staff Retreat
• Three Ways to Keep Staff Energized, Avoid Burnout
• Tips for a Better Retreat
• Focus Retreat Exercises on Improving Communication
• Plug Volunteers Into Annual Planning Efforts
• Focus on Ways to Enhance Productive Programs
• Calculate Time Invested Against Total Dollar Return
• Spend Brainstorming Time on Each Method
• Don’t Underestimate Brainstorming Exercises
• Use Mind Mapping to Brainstorm Strategies
• Track Your Top 50 Corporate Prospects
Chapter 4: Fundraising Strategies to Consider .......25
2
• Ideas to Work Smarter in Today’s Economy
• Eight Ways to Boost Annual Fund Results
• Turn to a Backup Plan When Your Annual Goal
is in Doubt
• Break Lofty Goals Into Achievable Parts
• Raise $25,000 to $50,000 More in Annual Gifts
• Target Particular Groups With Involvement Opportunities
• Focus on Ways to Grow Your Pool of Investors
• Launch a Business-of-the-month Program
• Help Your Boss Plan Each Month’s Priorities
• Plan for Success With Business Prospects
• Share a List of Challenge Gift Opportunities
• Identify and Prioritize All Endowment Gift Opportunities
• Set Yearly Endowment Goals
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
TABLE OF CONTENTS
• Shrewd Direct Mail Planning
• Use Timeline to Visualize Your Direct Mail Flow
• Keep Refining Yearlong Direct Mail Appeal
• Tailor Different Appeals to Varying Audiences
• Share Your Strategic Plan’s Progress With Donors
• Developing a Planned Giving Marketing Plan
• Compare Completed Calls at Weekly Meetings
• Identify Who’s Not Giving and Why
Chapter 7: Appendix ..................................................47
Chapter 5: Put Your Plan Into Written Form ..........33 • A Look at the Creation of a Strategic Plan
• Create a Long-range Plan
• Plan to Plan
• Your Printed Plan Should Be Used Throughout the Year
• Yearly Plan Needs Focus
• Selectively Share Your Operational Plan
• Have Yearlong Timeline for Each Developmental Team Member
• Incorporate Professional Growth Into Your Plan
• Cultivation Helps Explore Next Moves
• Prioritize Funding Needs, Amounts
• Spell Out How You Plan to Increase Gift Revenue
• Strategies Define How You Plan to Achieve Objectives
• Action Plan Defines Quantifiable Objectives
• Plan a Year of Special Events
• Look Beyond the Dollars
• Make Volunteer Involvement a Part of Your Plans
• Consider a Yearly Operational Plan Based on Giving Levels
• Yearly Operational Plan
• Past Methods for Generating Funds
• Potential Fundraising Success
• Monthly Annual Giving Report
• Annual Giving Patterns
• Business Prospect Profile & Anticipated Moves Schedule
• Cultivation Possibilities Menu
• Weekly Calls Report
• Developmental Calls Evaluation
• Lybunt Identification Report
• Yearly Board Member Contact Report
• Yearly Timetable
Chapter 6: Monitor Progress
and Evaluate Success ..........................41
• Conduct Financial Assessment of Your Fundraising Programs
• Track Your Yearly Acquisition Average
• Complete a Year-end Report
• Conduct a Year-end Gift Comparison
• Are You Working Your Plan?
• Regularly Review Your Top 100 Prospects
• Monitor Progress of Your Fundraising Efforts
• Complete a Comparative Analysis of Key Fundraising Actions
• Track Last Year’s Contributors’ Current Year Giving
• Form Provides Helpful Way to Monitor Activity
• Monitor Progress of Operational Plan at Staff Meetings
• Evaluation Tip
• Make Board Contacts Regular and Meaningful
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
BEGIN BY LOOKING BACK — HISTORICAL CONTENT
To create a fundraising plan for the upcoming fiscal year, begin by analyzing past fundraising results and evaluating your
development shop operation: its strengths, weaknesses, successes and failures. A thorough review of past results will help
create an annual fund plan that’s challenging yet realistic.
Start by Evaluating Existing Programs
As you work to prepare an operational plan for the upcoming year –– a plan that
identifies goals, objectives, strategies, action plans and timetables –– it’s critical
that you begin by evaluating what is currently being done and making changes
based on the success (or lack of ) of existing programs.
As a first step in the planning process, it will be enormously helpful if you
can evaluate the current year in light of past years’ results. Examples of historical
reviews may include:
• Total gifts received each year
• Yearly gift types – annual, planned, etc.
• Giving by constituency type
• Numbers of contributors by category
As you evaluate the existing year’s programs in light of previous years’
results, when possible, attempt to quantify each program in terms of: net gift
revenue, the cost-to-revenue ratio, the percentage of staff time and budget required
to carry out the program and a comparison to other programs.
In addition, weigh each program in light of its long- versus short-term payoff.
A planned gifts program, for instance, may take years to achieve results, however,
those results may far outweigh another program’s benefits.
Examples of individual programs to be evaluated include:
•
•
•
•
Direct mail appeals
Personal solicitation calls
Telemarketing programs
Annual and planned gift programs
These program evaluation results will serve as your planning foundation.
Operational Plans Have Seven Essential Elements
The most successful development operations have a yearlong operational plan in
place. Everyone who is a part of the development staff or contributes to its efforts
should be involved in creating or shaping the operational plan.
The seven essential elements of an annual operational plan include:
3 Evaluating current development programs and gift data.
3 Establishing fundraising goals for the upcoming year (e.g., annual fund,
planned gifts).
3 Setting quantifiable objectives that support those goals.
3 Designing action plans (fundraising strategies) that spell out how those
objectives will be met (e.g., direct mail, gift clubs, phonathon).
3 Creating a yearlong calendar that identifies everything that will occur by when
and who is responsible.
3 Monitoring the plan’s progress throughout the year and making adjustments
as needed.
3 Evaluating the plan at year’s end in light of what was achieved or fell short of
expectations.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
4
Yearly Plan Should
Address Key Categories
Whenever you create your yearly
operational plan, complete with
goals, quantifiable fundraising
objectives, action plans and a
calendar of what happens when,
be sure that it addresses key
development categories.
Those categories may include:
 Direct mail
 Board giving
 Gift clubs or levels
 Online gifts
 Planned gifts
 Foundation grants
 Retention strategies
 Major gifts
 Special events
 Personal calls
 Acquisition strategies
 Community campaign
 Staff training  Volunteer involvement
 Individual giving
 Donor stewardship
 Sponsorships  Business/corporate gifts
 Fundraising publications/
communications
 Database and records
management
 Development policies/
procedures
 Telesolicitation (phonathons)
 Organization giving (faithbased, etc.)
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
BEGIN BY LOOKING BACK — HISTORICAL CONTENT
When Developing Yearlong Fundraising Plan
A SWOT Analysis is Essential
Conduct SWOT Analysis
Do you have untapped fundraising
opportunities? What challenges face
your department? What are your
biggest strengths, based on existing
personnel and other resources?
Whether you do so at an annual
planning retreat or midyear, conduct
a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses,
opportunities and threats) analysis
of your development shop. While
this exercise may not amount to a
full-fledged development audit, it
will provide valuable insight and
generate discussions that will provide a unifying direction for plans
that unfold.
Ask attendees to list the greatest
strengths, weaknesses, opportunities
and threats facing your development
shop. As in the illustration, strengths
and weaknesses should refer to
facts/behavior inside the organization; opportunities and threats refer
to outside factors that impact your
organization.
External Internal
Strengths Weaknesses
 Established  Little capital
planned gifts campaign
experience
program
Opportunities When developing a yearlong fundraising plan, be sure to analyze any previously
developed fundraising plans, say James Anderson, partner at GoalBusters Consulting, LLC (Flagstaff, AZ). One way to do so is a SWOT analysis, in which you look
at your organization’s strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats.
Anderson outlines what to look for when analyzing each area:
Strengths (internal): What do you do well or exceptionally? What unique value
do you offer? Often this will be your primary strength. What are the things you
want to keep doing and that you can do better than other organizations?
Weaknesses (internal): What are the things you know you are not doing well?
Are there things you need to change because it feels as though you just keep
pounding your head against the wall? Or are they things you simply don’t do well
either because you don’t know how or don’t have the resources to do properly?
Opportunities (external): What could you be doing or doing more of? Where
could you extend your offerings, services and programs? Where could you potentially tap donors and donor bases that you may be currently overlooking or not
fully capitalizing on?
Threats (external): What things have the potential to negatively impact your plan
and your organization? When you identify a threat, one way to assess it is to ask
what the worst-case scenario is. Some examples of external threats: 1) You are
heavily grant-funded and funds are going to dry up; 2) You are heavily funded by a
foundation and investments aren’t returning as strong as in the past and you know
that will negatively impact gifts to your organization. “When assessing threats,
you’ll be facing either conditions or problems,” he says. “Conditions are things
you may have to address or handle but you have no real control over. You have to
manage, accept or adapt to conditions. However, problems are something which
you can solve, resolve or fix.”
When looking at your SWOT findings, Anderson says, watch for intersections
of the areas and respond as follows:
q Where strengths and opportunities intersect, invest. You want to invest
more of your resources, time and capital on these opportunities.
q Where weaknesses and threats intersect, consider divesting yourself of that
project or program, unless it is something you truly must maintain.
q Where strengths and threats intersect, defend. “If you have an external
threat to one of your strengths, don’t let that negatively impact something that
you do well,” he says. “Instead, analyze what that situation is and determine
how you can best continue to capitalize on that strength.”
Threats
 High donor  Competition
for gifts
participation
rate
 Limited
prospects
q Where weaknesses and opportunities intersect, identify areas for
improvement. “It may be a situation in which you can bolster the area of
weakness or capitalize on what the opportunity is with the investment of
additional resources, but that is a decision where you will have to look at
whether your internal resources will allow it, and whether the return on
investment is worth the commitment of the additional resources,” he says.
Sources: James Anderson, Partner, GoalBusters Consulting, LLC, Flagstaff, AZ.
Phone (928) 890-8239. E-mail: jim.anderson@goalbusters.net
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
BEGIN BY LOOKING BACK — HISTORICAL CONTENT
No History of Gift Support? Develop a First-year Plan
If your organization is just getting started in fundraising or has little history of gift
support, it’s important to begin by developing a first-year plan. Then put it into
writing.
Your written plan should identify what can reasonably be raised during the
course of a year and how. Set specific goals for direct mail, special events, etc.
Once that’s done, develop a one-page action plan for each area describing
what will be done when and by whom.
Here are some examples of what a first-year fundraising plan might include:
• Conduct two direct mail appeals during the fiscal year, one in the fall and
another in the spring.
• Coordinate a volunteer-driven phonathon to invite everyone in your
community or service area to become a donor at any level.
• Organize a special event that reaches out to a particular segment of your
community and nets $10,000 or more.
Hit Your New Fiscal Year Running
Too many nonprofits wait until a new fiscal year is underway before starting to plan
for that year. Delayed planning can result in many missed opportunities, even failure.
Your operational plan for a new fiscal year should be finished and in writing
prior to the onset of that year. The plan should result in goals, quantifiable
objectives, action plans for each objective and a yearlong master calendar of what
needs to be done when and by whom.
To avoid procrastination, create a simple timeline that maps planning
procedures for the upcoming fiscal year. Begin with your end date — the week prior
to a new fiscal year — and work backwards.
The example shown here helps to illustrate some of what might be included
in your planning timeline. This example includes deadlines for historical review
(evaluating year-to-date giving in light of previous years’ support); preparation for
a staff planning retreat, the actual planning retreat, completion of an operational
plan draft, a final review of that plan and the final plan. All of this is scheduled to
take place prior to the beginning of the new fiscal year.
2011
May Mar Apr Historical Review
4/20
Retreat Prep
5/3
Staff Retreat
5/17
Draft Complete
6/1
Final Review
6/15
Plan Complete
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
June 6
Whether you’re just finishing up a
fiscal year or in the midst of one,
it’s never too early to begin developing an operational plan for the
upcoming year.
But here’s an additional twist:
When you meet to establish fundraising objectives and action plans
for the upcoming year, why not go a
step further and develop a preliminary outline of plans for the year
that follows?
Outlining plans for two years
out will:
1. Help to solidify your
operational plan for the
upcoming year.
2. Help illustrate what you will
need to achieve next year in
order to reach the following
year’s goals.
3. Ease the planning process when
you reach the second year since
the foundation of your plan has
already been established.
4. Allow you to better budget
anticipated changes to
personnel, equipment and
program costs.
Make Time to Review
Old Prospect Files
Have you ever been given the
name of a potentially fantastic gift
prospect only to later find out the
person’s name was already in your
files, but no one had ever followed
up on connecting with him/her?
Whether you’ve just taken
on a new position or been in
your current position forever,
don’t underestimate the value of
reviewing existing files in your
quest to uncover sleeping giants.
Many times files hold a wealth of
names and information that never
received the proper attention and
follow-up they deserved.
Operational Plan Timeline
(New Fiscal Year Begins July 2, 2011)
Plan Two Years in Advance
July
7/2
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
BEGIN BY LOOKING BACK — HISTORICAL CONTENT
Analyze Your Use of Time to Better Set Priorities
Make Time to Review
Systems and Policies
As you work to develop efficiencies
that generate additional gift support,
increase the number of contributors,
enhance your organization’s image
and more, it’s important to examine
existing systems and policies to be
sure they are efficient, effective and
meeting stewardship goals.
Here are a few examples of
systems and policies you should
examine yearly:
• Gift acknowledgment process
• Filing system
• Gift acceptance policy and procedures
• Planned gifts policy
• Endowment policies
• Job descriptions and responsibilities
• Prospect research policy
• Organizational structure
• Volunteer structure and committees
• Board structure and committees
• Memorial gifts program
• Prospect tracking systems
• Campaign structure and process
• Identity guidelines
• Existing marketing materials
• Pledge forms, letters of intent,
etc.
• Gifts-in-kind policy
• Database management procedures
• Board and volunteer training
• Professional development for
staff
• Cross-training of staff
• Board and volunteer selection
• Hiring procedures
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
In your efforts to raise funds, are you using your time to its fullest advantage?
Take a look back. Make a list of everything you did during a two-week period.
Evaluate how you spent that time.
By examining past behavior, you can make a conscious effort to maximize
your use of future time.
As you review your list of activities and accomplishments, ask yourself:
• What percentage of my time was spent behind a desk or in meetings versus
the percentage of out-of-office time meeting people?
• How many actual solicitations did I make –– by phone, personal
correspondence or face-to-face?
• How often did I review our operational plan to monitor progress or determine
next steps?
• What did I do to help board members or volunteers become more active in
fund development?
• What stewardship activities did I complete to help retain and nurture donors?
• What did I do to help generate future major gifts?
• How did I strengthen my professional acumen?
• In what ways did I attempt to identify new prospects?
Knowing the answers to questions such as these will help to reprioritize your
time for maximum results.
Learn to Work at Three or More Levels of Planning
Achieving fundraising success is a combination of working hard and working
smart. Learning sound planning practices helps strengthen the working smart part
of the equation.
Most people consciously plan their work minimally at one level. Some plan at
two levels, and fewer still at three levels. Those who can establish a planning habit
at three or more levels accomplish far more over time.
Establishing new time management habits requires both discipline and the willingness to follow a process. Categorizing various levels of planning makes it easier
to integrate them into your work. Here are three basic planning levels:
1. Daily planning. Make a point to map out tomorrow’s work at the end of each
day. List tomorrow’s tasks and then prioritize which tasks to tackle first. Many
achievers will complete their most challenging tasks first.
2. Weekly planning. Get in the habit of planning one week at a time. Whether
you write out your plans on a weekly management form, list them in a
calendar or utilize some form of planning software, articulate the upcoming
week sometime each Friday. Include the following categories:
• Projects completed this week
• Scheduled appointments for the upcoming week with times and objective(s)
• Tasks to be completed prioritized according to importance (A = must do; B
= complete if time permits; and C = items that deserve attention but are less
pressing).
3. Yearly planning. Your daily and weekly planning should be directly tied to
your department’s yearly operational plan. That plan should include broadbased goals with quantifiable objectives that support each goal. Individual
action plans with clearly delineated strategies should support each objective.
And finally, the operational plan should include a master calendar listing
deadlines and persons responsible for everything that needs to happen
throughout the year.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
BEGIN BY LOOKING BACK — HISTORICAL CONTENT
Evaluate Past Fundraising Strategies to Set New Goals
When setting fundraising goals for an upcoming fiscal year, there’s a tendency to
pay more attention to sources of gifts (e.g., alumni, friends, businesses, foundations, trustees) than to methods used in generating annual fund gifts (e.g., direct
mail, face-to-face calls, telesolicitation, Web-based strategies, special events).
Examining both your sources and your fundraising methods is equally important to maximize annual gift support.
By looking further into the methods used to generate gifts, one can draw any
number of conclusions that may include, but not be limited to, the following:
• Dropping one development strategy completely — an unproductive direct
mail appeal, for example.
• Shifting budget resources from one fundraising program to another —
perhaps lessening resources for special events and increasing efforts aimed at
generating $1,000-plus gifts.
• Changing a staff person’s job description, emphasizing greater responsibilities
in one area and diminishing responsibilities in another.
• Creating a new fundraising strategy aimed at broadening your donor base.
PAST METHODS FOR GENERATING FUNDS
XYZ Nonprofit
2010 - 2011 Fiscal Year
Historical Development Programs
PROGRAM
ESTIMATED
COST
ESTIMATED
STAFF TIME
PROSPECT
POOL
NO. OF
DONORS
REVENUE
GENERATED
/
PROJECTION
DIRECT MAIL
1. Fall Appeal
Boost Fundraising
Success
To improve fundraising success,
identify those variables impacting
your ability to generate gifts. They
include:
• Board members’ capability and
inclination to donate.
• CEO’s understanding
and commitment to fund
development.
• Development staff’s level of
experience and expertise.
• External influences: economy,
competition for funds, etc.
• Available financial resources to
raise funds.
• Constituency size, financial
makeup and history of giving.
• Number of constituents under
cultivation.
• Volunteer leadership.
• Age and mission of the
organization.
• Urgency of the cause and
degree of impact on those you
serve.
2. February Appeal
3. Spring Appeal
4.
TELESOLICITATION
1. Fall Effort
2. Spring Effort
3.
4.
FACE-TO-FACE CALLS
WEBSITE GIFTS
This chart (shown left) is intended
to be used as a template and to
develop a report that illustrates
historical methods of generating
funds as a tool in determining the
best course of action in the future.
A blank version of the chart can
be found in the appendix of this
manual for your use.
SPECIAL EVENTS
1. Winter Gala
2. Summer Golf Classic
3. Raffle
4.
5.
6.
7.
FDTN/CORP PROPOSALS
TOTAL REVENUE
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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8
$
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
BEGIN BY LOOKING BACK — HISTORICAL CONTENT
Forge Ahead by Making Historical Comparisons
Analyze Annual Giving
By Levels, Clubs
How much attention do you pay to
gift results as they relate to giving
levels or clubs? Analyzing those
results annually can help identify
ways to enhance your organization’s
fundraising strategies.
If, for instance, you see
significant growth in a particular
level or club, you may choose to
focus more fundraising strategies on
that level. Or if a club is not living
up to expectations, you may decide
it’s time to revamp its benefits or
take other actions.
Knowing each level’s total
donors, gift amount and how gifts
were solicited can help you to make
more informed decisions regarding
future fundraising strategies.
To achieve greater fundraising success, it’s important to know where you’ve been.
Rather than simply comparing last year’s total gift revenue with gift revenue to
date, make multiple types of comparisons to identify weaknesses and opportunities
that should be addressed.
Those year-to-year gift comparisons should include but not be limited to:
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Giving within each of your giving levels or clubs.
Constituency types (e.g., alumni, board members, businesses, foundations, etc.).
Geographic — communities, neighborhoods, states.
Age and/or gender.
Number of first-time donors this year compared to last year.
Lybunts (those who gave last year but not this year).
Types of gift responses (e.g., direct mail, face-to-face calls, telesolicitation, online giving, memorial gifts and more).
Types of gifts received (e.g., planned, annual, capital, etc.).
Monitor Yearly Visits to Donors, Prospects
It’s important to monitor both the number and quality of face-to-face calls that
your staff completes. Knowing the number of contacts made on a weekly, monthly
and yearly basis helps to determine if
staff are meeting expectations, and can
CONTACTS BY FISCAL YEAR
be used for staff evaluations. Those
2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010
numbers can also be of value when
Staff
comparing solicitation success rates for
each development officer: How much
Anders
120
138
147
133
125
155
143
gift revenue is a development officer
Cummings
98
120
111
132
132
99
101
generating in relation to number of
Saunders
192
201
187
165
146
157
211
completed calls?
Young
67
69
58
88
73
84
88
In addition to tracking completed
calls throughout the fiscal year, you
Board
may find it helpful to monitor staff
Belson
0
3
4
0
4
0
3
member calls from year to year. In fact,
you may want to include completed
Dunn
6
9
10
6
9
11
10
board and volunteer calls in your report
Everist
0
4
4
4
6
3
2
if the same individuals are involved
Nichols
0
0
0
2
0
1
0
with fundraising efforts on a multi-year
Opheim
3
2
0
4
0
4
3
basis.
Comparing year-to-year calls will
Rheinders
8
6
9
12
10
11
8
give you an indication of time spent
Trotter
0
3
1
5
5
2
1
making contacts on both an individual
and collective basis. These results can
Volunteers
then be correlated with yearly gift
Comstock
7
8
5
2
8
4
2
revenue raised.
Eppers
12
13
15
11
10
9
9
To the left is an example of a
Kleppe
3
0
2
2
0
1
3
contacts-by-fiscal-year report you can
use as a guide in creating one that best
Watson
6
7
2
1
0
3
1
suits your needs.
Total Calls 522
583 555
567
528
544
585
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
BEGIN BY LOOKING BACK — HISTORICAL CONTENT
Historical Giving Data Helps in Establishing Goals
What steps do you follow in establishing annual fund goals for your upcoming year
beyond looking at what financial resources your organization will require? To what
degree do you analyze historical giving data? Do you calculate goals for separate
constituencies (e.g., board members, individuals) in addition to an overall goal?
Here are some tips for establishing a realistic yet challenging annual fund goal
based on a combination of factors:
1. Attempt to summarize giving for three to five years back in setting next year’s goal.
2. Break giving histories down by constituency type to analyze how each group
gave from year to year, paying particular attention to the most recent year.
3. Include percentage increases/decreases for each constituency from year to year.
4. Analyze each constituency’s percentage increase/decrease to determine if a
particular factor(s) contributed to the results. (It’s not uncommon, for instance,
to have foundation grants vary significantly from year to year.)
5. Set a preliminary overall goal for the upcoming year before deciding the
percentage increase of each constituency group, then go back and determine
appropriate percentage increases for each constituency.
6. Develop a realistic goal based on historical data, then establish a stretch goal
based on what if strategies:
•
•
•
•
•
What if we implement an expanded telemarketing effort to new prospects?
What if we convince a group of volunteers to come up with a new event?
What if volunteer solicitors approached new business prospects for support?
What if we could decrease the percentage of unpaid pledges from 10 to six?
What if we increase by 10 percent the number of face-to-face solicitations that ask for gifts of $1,000 and above?
Analyze Gift Club
Members’ Potential
Do you ever analyze individual gift
clubs to strategize ways to increase
giving or to encourage members to
move up to the next gift level?
Doing so makes sense. But as
you evaluate a particular gift club’s
membership, take time to also
review and rate each member within
that club to determine who has the
greatest potential for increasing his/
her gift support. That way, you can
focus solicitation time on the greatest likelihood for success, based on
both gift capability and inclination
to give.
Analyze Constituency Types’ Historical Giving Patterns
Do you analyze the annual giving patterns of each constituency type that gives to
your organization (e.g., alumni,
businesses, board members,
local residents, employees,
2005/06 06/07
corporations)? By taking a
Alumni close look at those categories
Donor retention rate
of donors, you may decide
No. first-time donors
to change future fundraising
Average gift size
strategies. For example, you may
Local non-alums
discover that there’s far more
Donor retention rate
potential for first-time gifts from
No. first-time donors
businesses than what you realized
Average gift size
and, as a result, begin spending
more time and resources toward
Non-local alums
that end.
Donor retention rate
No. first-time donors
Use a form such as the one at
Average gift size
right and available in the manual
appendix to look at giving among
Businesses
donor categories for the past five
Donor retention rate
years or so to identify trends
No. first-time donors
and determine how to maximize
Average gift size
fundraising time.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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08/09 09/10
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
BEGIN BY LOOKING BACK — HISTORICAL CONTENT
Analyze Your Mailing List at Least Annually
Measure Your
Direct mail ROI
How do you calculate the ROI (return on investment) each time you
send an appeal letter to a group of
would-be contributors?
While there may be a number
of factors you could consider (e.g.,
average size gift, total gifts raised,
number of first-time gifts), the ROI
is generally the number generated
by dividing total profit of the mailing by the mailing’s total cost.
Here are the steps to calculate
your direct mail ROI:
A. Number of pieces mailed
multiplied by:
B. Percent response rate
multiplied by:
C. Average gift amount multiplied
by:
D. Percentage of profit per gift.
E. Subtract this amount from total
cost of the mailing for your
ROI.
When was the last time you reviewed your database to determine who is and is not
contributing on an annual basis?
Should your list be expanded or pruned? Do you have solicitation strategies
aimed at specific list segments?
Analyzing your list and developing strategies aimed at increasing the overall percentage of annual contributors is well worth the time and effort involved.
To fine-tune your mailing list, conduct these exercises:
• Determine the existing percentage of those who contributed last year and set a challenging percentage increase as next year’s goal. Quantifying what you hope to achieve commits you to developing a plan to meet that goal.
• Identify your list’s lybunts (those who gave last year but not this) and sybunts (those who give some years but not this) and develop specific strategies to secure their gifts. These groups should more readily make contributions.
• Evaluate the demographics of your nondonors (age, gender, location
and more) to determine targeted strategies. For example, you may want to solicit prospects geographically for projects that will benefit their communities or regions. Or, perhaps you will want to develop funding projects based on the age ranges within your constituency.
• Evaluate your system of donor benefits and incentives. Should changes be made?
• Share your list of nondonors with board members, your development committee or other key volunteers, and develop a plan that encourages them to help solicit particular persons or businesses.
Analyze Appeal to Improve Future Results
Which of your direct mail appeals was most productive last year? Which resulted
in the greatest dollar return? What was the average gift size from each mailing?
How much did it cost to raise each dollar?
It makes good sense to monitor and analyze your direct mail costs and results
throughout the
course of each year
Direct mail Cost Analysis
and prior to drafting
Appeal No.:_____________________ Average Gift:____________________
an operational plan
Target Audience:_________________ Largest Gift:_____________________
for the upcoming
Drop Date:_____________________ First-time Gifts:__________________
year. Doing so will
provide a quantitative
Total
Total Unit
Total
Response Total
Cost to
measure of what
Quantity Cost Cost
Responses
Rate
Gifts
Net
Raise $1
works and what
doesn’t work.
Complete a direct
Appeal No.:_____________________ Average Gift:____________________
mail cost-analysis
Target Audience:_________________ Largest Gift:_____________________
report (example
Drop Date:_____________________ First-time Gifts:__________________
shown left) to track
Total
Total Unit
Total
Response Total
Cost to
costs and results of
Quantity Cost Cost
Responses
Rate
Gifts
Net
Raise $1
solicitation appeals
throughout the year.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
BEGIN BY LOOKING BACK — HISTORICAL CONTENT
Track Who Is Giving How Much Throughout the Year
Whether your fiscal year ends in June, July, December or some other month, it’s
helpful to track who has given — and who has not — throughout the year. By
breaking donors and prospects into categories, you can better evaluate what fundraising strategies to focus on as you progress through the year.
Use the form shown to the right (or develop one of your own) to analyze who
is giving on a month-by-month basis. Donor/prospect categories for this example
include:
q Repeat donors — Those
who gave last year and have
given again during the current
year.
A blank version of this chart can be
found for your use in the appendix
of this manual.
MONTHLY ANNUAL GIVING REPORT
for month ending January 2010
Donor/Prospect
Group
q Increased donors — Those
who gave last year and
contributed even more this year.
No. of
Donors/Prospects
Repeat Donors
q Decreased donors — Those
who gave less than their
previous year’s gift.
q First-time donors — Those
who have either never
contributed or have not done
so in the past five years.
1,500
Amount/ Increase/Decrease
Avg. Gift Size Over Previous Year
$165,000/$110
$22,000>
Increased Donors
85$12,000/$141 $3,500>
Decreased Donors
49 $2,800/$57 $1,800<
First-time Donors
98 $2,940/$30
Lybunts
69
$0$11,000<
Sybunts
310
$0$18,000<
Total Donors/Gifts
q Lybunts — Those who
contributed last year but have
not done so this year.
2,111
$
182,740
$950<
$ 6,500<
2009/10 Annual Gift Goal:..... $210,000
Gifts/pledges to Date:............. $182,740
q Sybunts — Those who have contributed some years
(within the past five years but have not done so this year.
Over/under Goal:.................... ($27,260)
Using the example shown to
the right, you can see that while
certain donor/prospect categories
are up over a year ago (e.g., repeat
and increased donors), others are
down. Total giving to date reflects
a decrease of $6,500 in overall
giving. One of many conclusions
that can be made from this report
indicates that there are 69 lybunts
who contributed $11,000 last year
and still might do so before the
end of the current fiscal year.
Over/under Goal:.................... $ 1,740
Lybunt Potential:.................... $11,000
Sybunt Potential:.................... $18,000
KEY 30-DAY STRATEGIES:
1.______________________________________________________________
2.______________________________________________________________
3.______________________________________________________________
4.______________________________________________________________
5.______________________________________________________________
6.______________________________________________________________
7.______________________________________________________________
8.______________________________________________________________
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
GOAL-SETTING PROCEDURES AND CONSIDERATIONS
The process of setting annual fund and any other yearly goals should involve your nonprofit’s top management along with
advancement staff, and virtually anyone who holds any stake in achieving annual fund success.You may choose some
level of involvement with your board and/or other volunteers.Yearly goals can be established either prior to or during
the development staff retreat. Establishing those goals prior to the retreat, however, allows staff to spend more time
strategizing ways to meet and surpass those goals.
Develop a Secret Goal-buster Plan
Set Goal to Increase
Participation Rate
Having a high percentage of your
constituency contributing annually
benefits your organization beyond
the bottom line by adding credibility to your case when seeking
corporate and foundation grants and
increasing the likelihood of securing
more major gifts.
To increase your number of
contributors by a specific percentage:
1. Based on your constituency size,
determine how many additional
contributors are needed to
increase donor participation by
a certain percentage (e.g., five or
10 percent).
2. Carve out a plan –– including
direct mail, telesolicitation
and face-to-face solicitation
strategies –– to boost your
giving units by that percentage.
This plan may sound simple,
but many organizations have no
plan in place to increase their donor
participation rates. Make your organization the exception — then work
to win exceptional gifts.
Number
of Gifts
10
20
40
$10
$50
200
1,000
400
2,000
60
80
100
600
3,000
800
4,000
1,000
5,000
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Whether your fiscal year ended in December or you’re presently at the halfway
point, here’s an idea to get you past your public annual fund goal: Develop an
internal, departmental goal and keep it under wraps.
Obviously you will need to continue following your original operational
plans. However, adding this new and unpublished goal will allow you to develop
additional strategies to generate even more funds by year end.
As a self-directed incentive, you might even get approval from your CEO (and
board, if necessary) that all funds raised beyond the original goal be earmarked for enhancing the development budget in the following fiscal year. Now there’s an incentive!
1. Hold a condensed version of your annual retreat to formulate specific goalbuster strategies. Include action plans with each along with timelines and
names of those responsible for each action.
2. Come up with two separate groups of strategies for generating both new
donors and increased gifts from existing donors, recognizing you don’t want
your efforts to impede next year’s goal.
3. Keep in mind that everyone’s time should already be consumed in achieving
your original goal and supporting your new strategies with involvement from
board members and/or volunteers. Prioritize methods that maximize gifts and
eliminate those which are more labor intensive.
Gift Chart Gives Quick Answers for Goal Setting
Imagine this scenario: You’re in a meeting to assess your fundraising efforts and find
you’re $50,000 short of your goal with five months remaining in your fiscal year.
Quick, how many $100 gifts will that take? How many $250 gifts? You want
to find the answer quickly so that you can capitalize on remaining meeting time to
plot strategy. A gift chart is a simple tool that can help you do just that.
Creating a gift chart such as the one below lets you quickly calculate what it will
take to raise a certain amount of money based on gift size and number of gifts needed.
The gift chart helps visualize where to focus your time and resources. For
example, you may decide that
sending a direct mail appeal
GIFT CHART
aimed at raising 500 gifts of
$100 each is more appropriate
Gift Amount
than attempting to find 100
donors to donate $500 each.
$100 $250 $500 $1,000 $5,000 $10,000
Any number of factors will
2,000 5,000 10,000 20,000 100,000 200,000
determine the best fundraising
strategies that suit your
4,000 10,000 20,000 40,000 200,000 400,000
circumstances, but with a gift
6,000 15,000 30,000 60,000 300,000 600,000
chart such as this, at least you
8,000 20,000 40,000 80,000 400,000 800,000
can quickly discern the number
of gifts required to raise a certain
10,000 25,000 50,000 100,000 500,000 1,000,000
amount of money.
13
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
GOAL-SETTING PROCEDURES AND CONSIDERATIONS
Road Map for Goal Setting Leads to Increased Revenue
How did OSF Saint Francis/Children’s Hospital of Illinois Foundation (Peoria, IL)
increase major gifts and planned giving by 70 percent over the course of just one fiscal year?
Andrew Schuster, senior development director, credits the increase to highly organized long-term goal planning. He shares 11 steps to goal planning for development success:
1. Organization goals are set for the year based on core mission, vision and values.
2. Department management reviews organization goals and department
long-term strategic plan with staff to create annual department priorities as
they relate to overall organization goals. (Schuster’s plan assumes a strategic
plan is already in place).
3. Each person in the department creates his/her individual goals and
priorities to support the department strategic plan and annual priorities.
This process is based on roles and responsibilities within the department.
Everything should be in writing.
4. All staff come together to share feedback on priorities and goals.
5. Key questions include: Are the priorities consistent with the mission,
vision and values of the organization? Are the priorities aligned with the
strategic plan?
6. Key goals are selected for each area in the department (not all goals will
be a priority for the year).
7. Manager works with each staff person to create individual objectives that
support department annual priorities.
8. Create action plan to achieve department annual priorities for each person.
9. Submit annual priorities to executive for approval.
10. Execute the plan!
11. Review annual priorities quarterly. Make adjustments as necessary. Understand that annual priorities are different than annual goals. Priorities refer to
overall strategic plan of the department and focus for the year. Goals refer to
individual goals and department goals that will help obtain annual priorities.
Source: Andrew Schuster, Senior Development Director, OSF Saint Francis/Children’s Hospital of Illinois Foundation, Peoria, IL. Phone (309) 566-5666.
E-mail: Andrew.Schuster@osfhealthcare.org
Calculate Participation Rate, Percentage Goals
Colleges and universities often strive to increase the percentage of alumni who
support their institutions on an annual basis. Other types of nonprofits should do
the same using their database (mailing list) as the starting point.
Let’s assume you want to increase donor participation by 7 percent over the
prior year’s participation rate of 28 percent. To be sure you are on target with your
goal midway through the year, multiply your total database number by the desired
participation rate, in this case 35 percent, to determine the number of donors needed.
Assuming your total prospect pool amounts to 10,000 names, for example,
you would need 3,500 donors by year end to meet your goal.
Breaking goals down can help determine appropriate strategies needed to reach
them.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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Additional Benefits of
Team Goal Planning
A 70 percent increase in major gifts
and planned giving is just one benefit OSF Saint Francis/Children’s
Hospital of Illinois Foundation
(Peoria, IL) reaped with long-term
goal planning. Andrew Schuster,
senior development director, says a
concrete planning process can also
help organizations by:
3 Helping create a system that
moves donors along the donor
continuum.
3 Allowing each staff member
to understand how events, major gifts, planned giving and
donor relations relate to one
another. “We have focused on
increasing the amount of communication between the entire
staff in regards to how events
or solicitations are impacting
our donor base,” Schuster says.
“For example, the annual fund
and major gift officers now sit
down together after an event
and review the guest list for
major gift and planned giving
prospects. Likewise, prior to
an event, the major gift officers
will give the annual fund officers a list of names to reach
out to for an invitation to the
event.”
3 Giving all staff a better understanding of how each area
supports the others and how
important it is to communicate
regarding various aspects of an
event and/or cultivation of a
prospective donor.
3 Creating buy-in from all staff.
If everyone participates in the
process and has a chance to
create goals and offer feedback,
the staff becomes invested in
the overall process and goals
for the year.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
GOAL-SETTING PROCEDURES AND CONSIDERATIONS
Synchronize Fundraising With Yearly Giving Cycles
Tailor Goals to Your
Nonprofit’s Anniversary
Got a milestone year coming up?
Explore scenarios that tie annual
fund goals to the benchmark. List
the possibilities, then weigh merits
of each to determine which would
have the greatest impact in dollars raised, numbers of donors and
campaign visibility.
Here are some examples for a
75th anniversary:
• Invite existing donors to
increase their giving by 7.5
percent.
• Tie your yearly goal to 75:
$750,000 or $75,000 for
example.
• Set a yearly donor total that’s
tied to 75: 750 donors or 7,500
donors.
• Aim for 75 gifts of $1,000 and
750 gifts of $100.
Restricted Gifts Goal
Creates Another Option
Looking to boost the revenue of a critical annual fundraiser or donor appeal?
Take a hard look at your calendar, says Sarayl Shunkamolah, associate director of
annual giving at The University of Montana Foundation (Missoula, MT).
“Our fundraising is heavily weighted towards the fall semester because reliable
donors tend to give at the beginning of every academic year,” Shunkamolah says.
“Our phonathon runs for 12 weeks in the fall and 12 weeks in the spring, but
because of the difference in donor giving patterns, we are targeting $225,000 in the
fall this year and only $60,000 in the spring.”
Foundation staff also target past donors in the fall and new and lapsed donors
in the spring.
Source: Sarayl Shunkamolah, Associate Director of Annual Giving, The University of Montana Foundation, Missoula, MT. Phone (406) 243-2593.
E-mail: Sarayl.Shunkamolah@mso.umt.edu
Now’s the Time to Be Bullish About Fundraising
If you believe the sky is falling, you’re sure to encounter failure. And that appears
to be the prevailing attitude among many in the advancement profession during
these economically challenging times.
But it doesn’t have to be that way.
There is no better time than now to conjure up confidence that you will not
only reach, but exceed fundraising goals. Your unyielding belief that you will
succeed will positively impact your ability to raise funds in spite of external influences. A can-do attitude enables you to identify savvy fundraising strategies and
keeps you focused on doing what matters most.
Of course there are budget constraints. Of course many donors and would-be
donors are more financially strapped. But the confidence you exude can overcome
those obstacles if you allow yourself to stay positive.
Overcome the odds. Show the world you can succeed. Your contagious enthusiasm will positively impact those around you, including donors.
To help avoid being forced to accept
a dictated fundraising goal from
top management, be proactive in
Forecast Gift Revenue Based on Type of Fundraising
proposing a challenging but realistic
goal of your own.
When planning your year, it’s helpful to visualize goals from different
Here’s one way to go about doperspectives. For example, while it makes sense to estimate the amount of gift
ing just that:
revenue you will generate from each segment of your constituency (board,
Develop a restricted gifts project
businesses, foundations, corporations, friends, alumni, etc.), it makes equal
that appeals to donors. In addisense to project the revenue you plan to generate from each type of fundraising:
tion to your normal unrestricted gift
community campaign, direct mail, phonathon, special events and so forth.
goal, propose a multiyear restricted
Projecting gift revenue based on the type of fundraising helps prioritize use of
gift goal with funds designated toboth time and financial resources. It’s another way of evaluating how to make the most
ward one or more
of limited resources.
Anticipated ‘11 Gift Revenue
projects your office
To the left is a generic plan
Based on Fundraising Type
deems as attractive
intended to illustrate how much
to donors. By deeach type of fundraising will
Times Estimated
Revenue
Net
veloping a combigenerate throughout the year.
Per Yr
Cost
Goal
Return
nation unrestricted/
Use this outline as a guide
Direct Mail
4
$17,000
$27,000
$10,000
restricted gift goal,
to create your own outline
Phonathon
2
$8,500
$35,000
$26,500
your odds of genthat forecasts how much you
erating far more
Special Event
1
$11,000
$29,000
$18,000
plan to raise throughout your
gift revenue will
fiscal year based on each type
Personal Calls Ongoing
$9,000
$35,000
$26,000
only improve.
of fundraising you intend to
$45,500
$126,000
$80,500
employ.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
GOAL-SETTING PROCEDURES AND CONSIDERATIONS
Too Few Prospects? Map Out Plan to Change That
Far too many organizations launch a major fundraising effort without first evaluating whether they have enough capable prospects to get the job done. Then, once a
campaign is announced, it becomes clear that they have too few friends capable of
giving five-figure-and-above gifts.
If lack of major gift prospects is an issue for your organization, make it a top
priority to develop a three- to five-year identification and cultivation plan. That
way, when you ultimately launch a major fundraising effort, you’ll have a pool of
capable and committed prospects.
The basic components of that three- to five-year plan should include:
1. Recruiting a board of trustees capable of making five-figure-plus gifts —
perhaps a higher minimum depending on your organization’s stature and
history. (Your board should set the example for all gifts that follow.)
2. Identifying your region’s most financially capable individuals, businesses
and foundations, which includes prioritizing this group based on research and
rating and screening procedures.
3. Developing an ongoing plan of cultivation tailored to each prospect. As a
guide, plan on a minimum of six highly individualized cultivation moves
before embarking on the solicitation phase. This is in addition to more broadbased cultivation moves (e.g., inviting prospects to a reception).
4. Undertaking a strategic planning process that seeks to involve and engage
these identified prospects in various capacities: planning, serving on advisory
committees, completing perception surveys and more.
Develop a Yearlong Plan for Soliciting Nondonors
Do you have a plan in place that outlines strategies for converting nondonors into
contributors? Although retention of past donors should be a top priority in any operational plan, it’s also important to keep expanding your base of annual support.
As you create a yearlong plan of strategies aimed at converting nondonors, here
are some examples you may want to include:
• List the names of nondonors you would most like to see on next year’s list of
contributors.
• Share your nondonor list with your volunteer or board development
committee monthly or quarterly, encouraging members to develop solicitation
strategies for each person or business.
• Develop a yearlong series of direct mail appeals targeted to your nondonor list.
Have one or more specific funding projects in mind. Offer special benefits/
incentives for first-time givers.
• Coordinate a special event that reaches out to new prospects and provides a
forum to educate the public on your mission and programs.
• Develop fundraising strategies targeting specific nondonor groups –– e.g.,
physicians, professional women –– that make sense for your nonprofit.
• Instruct staff to make a minimum number of calls on nondonors each week or
month.
• Secure a challenge gift directed to matching any gifts from new donors over a
specified period of time.
• Coordinate a telesolicitation effort using volunteers or paid callers with
nondonors as its focus.
• Host a series of on-site receptions with donors hosting nondonors.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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Craft a Cultivation Plan
For Your Top 25
As you work at creating your yearly
operational plan, anticipated major
gift actions should be an integral
part of that plan.
During your planning process,
outline a plan of cultivation moves
you intend to use for each of your
organization’s top prospects. Does
that mean you will follow those
cultivation moves to the letter? Not
necessarily. But it will ensure that
you have thought through how you
intend to forge relationships with
each probable donor, and the very
act of identifying cultivation moves
will give you a better idea of what
needs to happen and when.
If you don’t already have one,
create a menu of cultivation moves,
you can review as you consider
appropriate actions for each of your
top 25 or so prospects.
Including a schedule of
anticipated cultivation moves in your
yearly operational plan will ensure
that potential donors are getting
deserved attention as they progress
toward the realization of major gifts.
Help Solicitors Buy Into
Goals, Objectives
Whether you’re counting on staff,
volunteers, board members or all of
the above to assist in the solicitation
process, allow them to be a part of
the goal-setting process if you want
them to want success.
Simply assigning calls after the
fact won’t do it. Your solicitors need
to own their objectives.
Even if the amount you seek to
raise is a forgone conclusion, at least
grant your solicitation team some
input into the strategies and methods
used to raise needed funds.
Once they have a stake in how
gifts are raised, they will want to
see that goals are met.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
GOAL-SETTING PROCEDURES AND CONSIDERATIONS
How to Reach an Annual Fund Goal Increase of 10 Percent
The Challenge: As challenging as it may be to achieve,
you’ve just learned that your department is expected to
generate 10 percent more in unrestricted gifts as part of
next year’s development goal. How do you set out to
reach — even surpass — that goal?
volunteers and/or board members — to be responsible for soliciting 10 new gifts of $1,000 or more.
Charge the development personnel to cumulatively
raise 20 or more new $1,000-plus contributors
through face-to-face calls.
Coordinate a program that encourages existing
$1,000 donors to identify and recruit additional
members at that level — 10-member goal.
Carry out a targeted direct mail appeal that invites
recipients to join your $1,000-and-above annual
gift society — five $1,000-plus gifts as a goal.
Identify a specified number of nondonor corporations/foundations and craft individual proposals
that invite grants of $1,000 or more.
Create a list of sponsorship opportunities of
$1,000 or more and invite nondonor businesses to
underwrite the project of their choice for one year.
Invite last year’s $500 to $999 donors — via faceto-face calls, direct mail or telesolicitation — to
increase their giving to the $1,000-plus level or
beyond.
•
One Solution: Focus your efforts on generating sufficient
$1,000-plus contributions to make up the 10 percent increase.
•
Action Plan:
1. First, figure the dollar amount required in additional
funds based on a 10 percent increase over last year’s
gift totals ($500,000 raised last year would require
$50,000 more in gift revenue).
2. Then, assuming you will generate the $500,000 repeating
everything done last year, determine the number of $1,000
gifts required to generate an additional $50,000 ($50,000
divided by $1,000 equals 50 donors of $1,000 or more).
3. Begin formulating strategies aimed at generating 50
new $1,000-and-above contributors for the upcoming
fiscal year. Such strategies might include:
• Charge your development committee — made up of
•
•
•
•
Set Measurable
Event Objectives
Weigh Specific Factors to Set Annual Fund Goal
As you plan events for an upcoming
year, it’s important to set quantifiable objectives that will allow you to
measure achievements and surpass
previous years’ accomplishments.
When it comes to event planning, what might you include as
quantifiable objectives? Here are
some examples to help get your
wheels turning:
• To generate $X in special event
net income throughout the
fiscal year.
• To attract X event attendees
throughout the upcoming fiscal year.
• To plan and coordinate X
events that attract the following target audiences (e.g.
senior citizens, females, the
wealthy).
• To increase first-time event
attendees by no less than X
percent in the upcoming fiscal
year.
“It depends. Annual giving goals are set in many ways depending on the
culture and needs of each institution. Sometimes I have been handed a goal
for unrestricted giving that equals the amount necessary to balance the budget.
Other times it has been a figure negotiated with volunteer class leaders integral
to the fundraising effort. I feel in the best cases that the annual giving goal is a
combination of unrestricted and budget-relieving designations that is reflective
of many areas of input, such as financial aid, program support and faculty
support. These requests are then balanced against the reality of what can be
raised. Surprisingly, young, underdeveloped programs can actually apply a
higher percentage of growth than most fully developed programs. The dollars are
clearly different, however. When setting annual fund goals, be sure to factor in
key items such as real strong reunion classes and weak reunion classes, and onetime anomaly gifts. The longer your historical record, the closer you can come to
accurate projections.”
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
How do you set annual fund goals?
— Ken Goebel, Director of Development, Keene State College (Keene, NH)
“I used to go to great lengths to determine a goal with complex methodology before
finally settling on a simple five-percent increase in dollars and donors every year.
Simpler is better. However, this will depend on the maturity of your program. Less
mature programs, with a leadership change or automation of their call center, will
see increases greater than this in a given year. When speaking with your leadership
about your annual giving goal, keep fairness in mind. Your annual giving goal
should never be a greater percentage increase than the major gift goal. Your major
giving staff shouldn’t be provided with a five-percent increase as a goal and the
annual giving staff a 50 percent increase as a goal.”
— Michael Westfall, Vice President, Eastern Washington University Foundation (Cheney, WA)
17
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
GOAL-SETTING PROCEDURES AND CONSIDERATIONS
Ask Board Members to Commit to Fund Development Duties
If you fail to communicate expectations of board members
to those board members, don’t
be surprised when they fail to
meet those expectations.
To get board members
to commit to helping your
fundraising efforts, offer them
a choice of three or four fund
development options from
which they can select. Then
get them to commit to those
choices.
At the start of a fiscal
year or whenever a new board
member signs on, share a fund
development menu such as the
example shown here. Ask the
board members to sign a commitment to follow through on
whatever they cho0se.
As you prepare your
menu of choices, you will
need to decide what matters
most.
Board Fund Development Menu
As we enter a new fiscal year, please select two or more fund development
responsibilities you are willing to undertake to help us achieve fundraising success
during the next 12 months.
In addition to making a personal annual fund gift of $1,000 or more, I agree to help in
the following two (or more) ways:
q Annual Fund — Identify and solicit no fewer than five donors capable of making
President’s Leadership Circle gifts ($1,000 or more).
q Annual Fund — Serve on the golf classic committee and enlist at least three
foursomes ($250 per player) for the summer golf classic.
q Major Gifts — Serve on the major gifts committee and personally identify and
cultivate two or more prospects capable of making $25,000 or more in pledges
toward specific projects approved by the board.
q Planned Gifts — Serve on the planned gifts advisory council and work to
identify and cultivate two or more individuals who possess the capability and
proclivity to make a planned gift.
In accepting these responsibilities, I will provide the development office with updates
on my progress on a quarterly basis throughout the current fiscal year.
Board Member Date
Establish Mailing List Maintenance Objectives
Your yearly operational plan should include quantifiable objectives that address
continued enhancement of your mailing list. Examples of objectives might include:
1. To reduce the number of constituents with incorrect addresses by 30 percent.
2. To be able to segment the database by certain criteria: age, ZIP code, gender,
funding interests and more.
Establish Yearly Endowment Goals
Most advancement offices establish a yearly operational plan that includes plans
on how to generate and meet unrestricted annual gift goals. Far fewer, however,
establish goals and objectives tied to generating endowment gifts.
You need not be in the midst of a capital campaign to work at generating gifts
of endowment, and that job should not be the sole responsibility of a planned gifts
officer. Outright gifts should be encouraged as well.
Although the realization of larger endowment gifts often takes longer than
one year to matriculate, a proactive plan will begin the pipeline process that
makes such gifts eventual realities. Here are some examples of yearly quantifiable
endowment objectives:
• To solicit X number of prospects for endowment pledges.
• To develop/submit X corporate or foundation proposals seeking endowment grants.
• To coordinate a special event, proceeds will be directed to the endowment.
• To identify and cultivate X prospects toward realization of endowment
commitments.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
18
Set Annual Goal
For Board Gifts
If your organization has little
history of fundraising, be sure
to set an annual goal for board
gifts. Without it, you will find it
challenging, if not impossible, to
raise the bar in terms of giving in
subsequent years.
Have your board’s development
committee come up with a realistic
yet challenging goal for annual
board support. Point out that the
board’s level of annual support sets
a precedent for others who give.
Many nonprofit boards will even
approve a minimum gift level that
board members are expected to give
(or get) on an annual basis.
When you share a written
report of total gifts to date (for the
year) at board meetings, include
a separate line item that reflects
board gifts to date in relation to the
board’s giving goal.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
GOAL-SETTING PROCEDURES AND CONSIDERATIONS
Committees Should Have Yearly Goals and Objectives
Goal-setting Advice
When setting your annual fund
goal each year, take anticipated
fallout into consideration based on
historical data including:
 The percentage of donors who
will discontinue their support.
 Unfulfilled pledges.
Develop a yearly plan of action for each
of your committees involved with various aspects of fund development. Here’s
a plan that illustrates one development
committee’s yearly objectives.
Just as paid staff should have yearly goals and objectives — as identified in an
operational plan — volunteers involved with fund development should also have
a yearlong plan of action. Whether it’s a major gifts committee, a development
committee, a special events committee or some other ongoing group, take the
time to work with a committee’s members in identifying quantifiable objectives
that support internal goals and objectives. And rather than informing them of their
responsibilities, engage them in a planning process that helps them more fully own
those objectives.
Once goals and objectives have been established for a committee, the written document should be monitored at regular meetings to measure progress being
made throughout the year. Having such a plan of action for your committee will
help to keep them focused on achieving what matters most throughout the year.
XYZ CHARITY
2010 Fiscal Year
Goals and Objectives
Committee: Development Committee
Goal
To assist the development department of XYZ Charity in achieving its annual goal of
$450,000 in unrestricted gifts.
Objectives
1. To generate 20 new Society of Jefferson members ($1,000-and-above donors)
by fiscal year end.
2. To net $30,000 by planning and executing the annual Golf Classic.
3. To coordinate and host five After Hours receptions aimed at area business
professionals throughout the metro area.
Scheduled
Meetings Objective Status 2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Next
Steps
Scheduled
Meetings Objective Status July
1.
2.
3.
January
1.
2.
3.
August
1.
2.
3.
February
1.
2.
3.
September 1.
2.
3.
March
1.
2.
3.
October
1.
2.
3.
April
1.
2.
3.
November 1.
2.
3.
May
1.
2.
3.
December 1.
2.
3.
June
1.
2.
3.
19
Next
Steps
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
THE PLANNING RETREAT
Annual planning retreats should involve all staff with any fundraising-related duties.You may choose to involve your
nonprofit’s CEO and key board members and/or volunteers as well. Some retreats are conducted in two parts: one that
includes staff only and another that brings in board members and/or key staff — even non-development employees — to
review the operational plan draft and provide input.
The retreat provides a focused opportunity to review past fundraising results and determine appropriate strategies for
the upcoming fiscal year.
The results of the retreat form the basis for a written operational plan that will be followed throughout the year.
Pre-retreat Planning Makes for More Productive Retreat
Retreats can provide a very productive way of mapping yearly fundraising strategies. They can also result in a debilitating experience if not conducted properly.
To accomplish the most from your planning retreat, hold one or more pre-retreat meetings to see that everyone is on the same page. Begin by meeting individually with members of your development team to review their job descriptions
and outline what you expect of them for your upcoming planning session. Then assemble as a group and develop a planning agenda that focuses on what you intend
to have the retreat accomplish — dollar goals, quantifiable objectives, action plans
and key dates.
By developing your shop’s retreat agenda as a group, each member’s plans
and suggestions will result in a much more cohesive planning process.
Put Some Thought Into Planning Your Retreat
Scheduling a planning retreat with staff and/or board members? The final outcome
of any successful retreat is determined, in part, by the planning that goes into it.
Answers to these questions will help you plan a results-oriented retreat:
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Where will you meet: On-site or at some more relaxed off-site location?
How long will the retreat last? A half-day? A full day? Overnight?
What will be the primary objective of the retreat? Any secondary objectives?
Who will play a role in planning the retreat?
Who will be responsible for making presentations or leading discussions?
Will a facilitator be required? Should that individual be an insider who is familiar with our organization and its goals or an outsider with professional facilitating experience?
What retreat materials will be needed?
What outcomes will determine the retreat’s success?
What types of follow-up will be expected as a result of the retreat?
What can be done to help retreat participants think creatively and contribute to their fullest capability?
Planning Retreat Tips
 During a planning retreat, make
it your goal to implement at
least one idea offered by each
participant, resulting in greater
buy-in and acceptance of
change.
 Collect information from all
participants prior to the retreat
(through interviews, focus
groups and surveys). That data
then serves as the basis for
discussion at the retreat. This
method also saves time.
 Before scheduling a staff
retreat, contact representatives
from other nonprofits — even
those unlike your own — to
learn more about particular
fundraising strategies they have
successfully used in the past.
You may come across a new
idea worth exploring during
your planning session.
Keep Retreat Agenda Simple, Focused
While it is only natural to want to get a lot done at your staff retreat, stay focused.
Keep the agenda simple, realizing that it is best to decide on one main goal with no
more than three discussion topics.
Having a focused agenda will help everyone stay on track, alleviate the
pressure of rushing through a jam-packed agenda and give you real solutions to the
main issue at hand.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
THE PLANNING RETREAT
Annual Retreats Help Staff Design a Team Plan
Make Staff Retreat
Attendees Accountable
To help ensure that what gets
decided at staff retreats receives
proper follow through, enforce
these post-retreat actions:
1. Take written minutes at your
retreat. Then, immediately
following the retreat, list
actions to be taken, who is
responsible and by what date.
2. Distribute your minutes to
attendees once the event is over
and they are back to their daily
routines.
Make Planning Begin With
Everyone on Same Page
Are you about to get a staff planning retreat under way to map out
your new fiscal year’s goals? A
planning retreat — held away from
your normal workplace — is a wise
move. It facilitates teamwork and
establishes focus for every member
of the advancement shop.
As you begin your retreat, get
every participant thinking strategically by posing a thought-provoking
question: “To achieve this year’s
fundraising goals, we must be
particularly good at the following
activities....”
Give everyone a few minutes to
think about the question and to jot
down the top four or five activities they think will be necessary to
achieve the year’s goals. Then, go
around the group asking each to
share only one of his/her activities
and explain why it is important.
Write out each activity on a flip
chart. Keep proceeding around the
room taking one activity at a time
until everyone has exhausted his or
her list. Once each activity has been
presented and listed, begin a group
discussion with the goal of reaching consensus on the top three most
important activities for the year.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
If you want your development staff to be enthused about achieving yearly objectives, they should have a voice in shaping the operational plan. If they own it, they
will want its goals realized.
Make staff assignments. Use a bottom-up approach in preparation for your
retreat. Ask every staff member to be responsible for some aspect of planning
prior to the retreat and to attend it prepared to offer a report and recommendations. Whether you make report assignments based on the job responsibilities
of each member or use some other method, this ensures that each staff person
has a stake in determining the future direction of your advancement effort and
cannot sit back during the retreat and simply make judgments about recommendations being made.
To be sure everyone is on the right track in preparing their reports and their methods are consistent with one another, you may want to meet individually with staff to go over assignments and then meet again to re-
view their progress.
•
•
Select the right retreat location. If at all possible, select a retreat location
away from offices and in a relaxed and quiet environment. In addition to serious planning, retreats serve as a bonding experience –– a chance to get to know
and appreciate colleagues on another level. This bonding and sharing experience helps to pave the way for team achievement. The ideal length of a retreat
is about two days, knowing there will be adjustments to be made in the plan
back at the office.
•
Work from a prepared agenda. Have a prepared agenda that is distributed to
staff in advance. Again, every staff member should have a report to be made at
some point during the retreat.
•
Review the big picture. During the retreat, schedule times to look at the big
picture –– what is working well and what needs fixing? There should be time
for brainstorming with no limits on what can be said. This big picture discussion will help provide a framework with which to set goals, objectives and
strategies.
•
Begin the process of setting new goals, objectives, strategies, action plans
and timetables. Following a review of your overall advancement effort, and
how it applies to your organization and mission, you can begin to set new goals
along with quantifiable objectives for each goal. This procedure will be linked
to your review of each program and whether it should be eliminated, enhanced
or left unchanged.
Revisit your plans at various times during and after the retreat. After you
have drafted quantifiable objectives and accompanying strategies that will
help to achieve those objectives, move on to something else, but allow time to
revisit your plans and make necessary adjustments since changing one program
may have an impact on the others. This revisiting process allows each team
member to more fully consider the ramifications of each change being made to
the previous year’s programs.
You may even want to consider a follow-up (one-day) retreat a week later
to review your operational plan in draft form to determine what changes are
appropriate before it is printed in its final form.
•
A well-organized staff retreat is a critical part of planning your year in advance.
21
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
THE PLANNING RETREAT
Consider Holding a Midyear Staff Retreat
The obvious time for a staff planning retreat is just prior to a new fiscal year. But it
can also be wise to hold a one- or two-day retreat mid-fiscal year.
A midyear staff retreat allows you to step back and evaluate where you are
in relation to goals. It provides the opportunity to evaluate gifts to date, sources
of those gifts (e.g., board members, community, businesses, individuals), and
strategies employed to generate the funds (e.g., telesolicitation, direct mail,
personal calls, special events).
Staff can determine what strategies are working best and what adjustments to
make to meet or surpass annual goals. And since a midyear retreat focuses more on
adjustments than creating a plan from scratch, it may also be a good time to discuss
other key issues such as budget, database management or volunteer involvement.
Three Ways to Keep Staff Energized, Avoid Burnout
Trying to top previous years’ goals — often with fewer budget resources. Facing
solicitation rejection on a continuing basis. Meeting deadlines. Endless meetings.
These and other factors can contribute to an overwhelming sense of weariness for
those in your development shop. To avoid burnout and keep everyone energized,
remember to:
1. Regularly celebrate both large and small victories. Recognize achievements
at staff meetings. Get your executive director or president to compliment staff
on a job well done. Point out the positive impact of a successfully completed
job.
2. Vary the routine. Alter work patterns to make the day or week more
appealing. Throw in a welcome surprise now and then.
3. Keep the communication flowing. Have one-on-one visits with every
member of your department. Discuss issues and work together to find
solutions. Sometimes just discussing a problem and knowing others are there
for you helps.
Focus Retreat Exercises on Improving Communication
Listening is a vital skill as a development officer and one that you should continually strive to perfect in yourself and your co-workers. Here are two active listening
exercises to try at your next staff retreat:
1. Divide your staff into pairs and have them interview one another with the goal
of finding out two to three things you would have never guessed about each
other. At the end of the exercise, share the most unique fact about your coworker with your fellow staff members. This exercise will prove to be truly
illuminating.
2. Pair up your staff and give each group five minutes to exchange stories about
their first, middle and last names. At the end of the five minutes, go around
the room and have each person explain his/her partner’s first, middle and last
names to the rest of the group. This exercise will reveal all kinds of interesting
information, especially if you include nicknames.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
22
Tips for a Better Retreat
Retreats are a great way to rejuvenate staff, board members or
volunteers. To get the most out of
your next retreat:
3 Get everyone thinking about
how to make the organization better. Open your retreat with
a thought provoking question
such as: “For our organization
to be successful, we must be
especially good at the following
activities...” Then have
everyone spend a few moments
writing at least three answers to
the question and then read their
answers to the group. Get a
consensus of the different ideas
and write each on a flip chart
or board so all can see. Now
discuss how to achieve those
activities or goals.
3 Keep a reminder list. Have a
reminder list on a flip chart or
board. Whenever a topic arises
that would fit better at a later
time on your agenda, jot that
topic down on the reminder list.
By doing so, you’ll confirm
your promise to return to that
item.
3 Ask two critical closing
questions. During the final
hour or so of your retreat, ask
participants what they learned
at the retreat and what they
intend to do with that new
information when they get
back. Have them write down
what was important to them so
they have a permanent record
of what they learned.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
THE PLANNING RETREAT
Focus on Ways to Enhance
Productive Programs
Plug Volunteers in to Annual Planning Efforts
Would you like volunteers to become more engaged in your fundraising efforts?
Then work to involve them in planning your year and in shaping specific
fundraising strategies.
Whether it is by participating in a planning retreat, being a part of a focus
group or meeting with you individually, ask for volunteer input that will set the
stage for continued involvement as the fundraising year progresses.
Volunteers can help plan by:
• Developing an annual giving theme.
• Reviewing and commenting on your yearly operational plan
• Brainstorming new approaches for increasing overall gifts.
• Planning a yearly campaign kickoff event.
• Reviewing and commenting on specific fundraising programs (e.g., phonathon,
community campaign, gift clubs and accompanying benefits, etc.).
• Brainstorming funding opportunities that might most appeal to the giving public.
Whether it’s at staff meetings
throughout the year, during your
annual planning retreat or during a
post-event evaluation, make time to
examine those programs that have
produced results in the past. There
is often a tendency to think, “If it’s
doing well, we won’t mess with it,”
when in fact, it’s important to explore ways to enhance the program,
so it does even better!
Whether it’s a successful direct
mail package, a solicitation effort
that involves volunteers, an annual
event that brings visitors to your
Calculate Time Invested Against Total Dollar Return
facilities or a telemarketing effort
that has done well, follow this stepAs you map out your fundraising year and create an operational plan complete
by-step process as a way to enhance
with goals, objectives, action plans and timeline, it’s helpful to analyze the time
already-successful programs:
invested in each fundraising strategy against the dollar return for that effort. If, for
 Review the program in its
instance, you discover that a direct mail appeal you sent took minimal time but
entirety. Look at the program in
produced a significant return, you may decide to increase direct mail appeals in the
light of all other programs. How
upcoming year instead of spending time on a labor-intensive special event that had
much total time and staff does
a marginal return.
it require? What percentage of
Although there are other factors one needs to evaluate when planning upcomyour budget does it consume?
ing development strategies (e.g., project costs, etc.), time is a key issue based on
What is the single most imporlimited development personnel. And while it may be challenging to estimate the
tant goal of the program?
time required to carry out a particular fundraising strategy from beginning to end,
you will no doubt be able to calculate invested time to a reasonable degree. The
 Examine each component that
key is to be consistent in the way in which you arrive at calculations — whether
makes up the program. Break
you are including support staff time, etc.
the program down. Determine
which program
parts are doTIME ANALYSIS ESTIMATES — 2010/11 FISCAL YEAR
ing well and
Paid Staff No. of Volunteers No. of
Dollar
Percent of
which could
Involved
Hours
Involved
Hours
Return
Total
Hrs*
be improved.
In addition to
Direct Mail
4.8
the program
Fall Appeal
3
50
0
0
$22,000
itself, be sure
Spring Appeal
3
50
0
0
$17,000
to examine
Phonathon
15.5
both pre- and
Fall Effort
3
240
36
144
$102,000
post-program
Year-end Effort
3
170
30
120
$54,000
activities.
By reviewing
Special Events
4.1
strategies that have
Golf Classic
2
90
10
60
$15,000
produced results in
Raffle
2
20
12
18
$40,000
the past, you can
Face-to-face Calls
3
2,025
5
100
$170,000
76.5
take steps to make
Total
2,645
$420,000
them even more
successful in the
* Volunteer time not included in percent of overall time.
year ahead.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
THE PLANNING RETREAT
Spend Brainstorming Time on Each Method
Make brainstorming part of every planning retreat. It’s a great way to think of new
and creative ways to improve on what’s been
Don’t Underestimate
done in the past. As you plan your year’s
fundraising strategies, try this approach:
Brainstorming Exercises
Break your retreat into segments based
on past fundraising methods (e.g., phonathon, All too often we become so
direct mail, face-to-face calls, special events, caught up in the emergencies of
today that we forget to occaetc.). Then devote a portion of each segment
sionally step back and examine
to brainstorming new and/or improved ways
of raising more gift revenue for each method. the big picture.
Take a look at where you
Remember: No idea is a poor idea when
are
with
regard to achieving
brainstorming. It may sound silly or frivogoals,
from
where you have
lous, but it could trigger another, stunningly
come
and
dream
about how far
effective idea in another person. That’s the
you
would
hope
to
go.
fun of brainstorming.
You
can
establish
goals that
After you’ve moved through the entire
help
to
achieve
your
dreams,
meeting, go back to the ideas generated during each session and begin to prioritize those but if you have no dreams,
what’s the point?
that make the most sense.
Use Mind Mapping to
Brainstorm Strategies
Have you ever used mind
mapping to strategize fundraising
approaches?
According to Wikepedia, a
mind map is “a diagram used
to represent words, ideas, tasks
or other items linked to a central
key word or ideait encourages a
brainstorming approach to any given
organizational task.”
Although there are online
tools that can be helpful for mind
mapping, you can just as easily
begin with a topic written on a
piece of paper. Place a circle around
it and branch out from there with
ideas. Visualizing concepts and
characteristics will lead you to next
steps.
Entrepreneur Friend of Marta Lenus
Track Your Top 50 Corporate Prospects
As important as it is to track cultivation/solicitation activity of individual
prospects, it’s equally important to track top corporate prospects. And because key
activities surrounding corporate prospects can differ from those for individuals,
using software or a form such as the example shown here is a useful tool for
corporate gifts managers.
First, identify and prioritize your top 50 corporate prospects by reviewing past
donor files, conducting rating and screening sessions among staff, board members
and other volunteers and by other means.
Once you identify your top 50 corporate prospects based on capability and inclination to give, plan and monitor all cultivation and solicitation moves monthly.
This collective view of activities surrounding your top 50 will help in the overall
solicitation of these key prospects.
John Doe
Endowed scholarship
Create and utilize a form such as this to track top corporate prospects.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES TO CONSIDER
Prior to and during the planning retreat, members of your team analyze a variety of fundraising strategies that will result
in the creation of several action plans to be used throughout the year.Those strategies may include but not be limited
to an examination of: direct mail appeals, telesolicitation efforts (in-house phonathons vs. outsourcing), personal calls on
individuals/businesses, special events, online giving efforts, employee giving campaigns, sponsorship programs and more.
If the yearly operational plan is intended to go beyond annual giving programs, you may also evaluate strategies
related to planned gifts, restricted gifts, endowment gifts, capital campaign and more.
Staff may decide to enhance or expand those strategies that proved most successful in the past or eliminate
strategies that proved unsuccessful.They may also decide to implement entirely new fundraising strategies that have not
been tried in the past.
This chapter shares examples of some specific fundraising strategies you may want to address or include in your
yearly operational plan.
Ideas to Work Smarter in Today’s Economy
To meet or even surpass this year’s fundraising goals — perhaps with a smaller operating budget — requires more focused effort. To work smarter in today’s economy:
1. Make donor retention the top priority, especially those who give at higher
levels. It’s much more time- and cost-effective to retain past donors than to
find new ones.
Eight Ways to Boost
Annual Fund Results
Challenged to beat last year’s annual fund total? Study these ideas as
you formulate a game plan:
1. Focus on approaching higherend prospects — those who
could give $1,000 or more.
2. Secure a challenge gift.
3. Identify and market more
sponsorship opportunities.
5. Test targeted direct mail
appeals.
6. Establish or enhance an effort
aimed at generating more gifts
from businesses.
7. Test new telemarketing efforts
aimed at particular groups for
particular funding projects.
8. Work at retaining a higher
percentage of lybunts and
sybunts.
3. Work at securing a challenge gift. Challenge gifts provide two sources of
gifts: the donor who makes the challenge and everyone who matches it.
4. Get board members and volunteers more actively engaged. Convince loyal
supporters about the urgency of meeting this year’s goal, and ask them to get
involved with your fund development efforts in very specific ways.
Turn to a Backup Plan When Your Annual Goal Is in Doubt
4. Plan an event that will reach
out to new contributors.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
2. Direct fundraising efforts toward higher-end donors. If your top annual
giving club includes donors at the $1,000-and-above level, for instance,
develop several strategies aimed at that level of giving. Why go after 10 $100
gifts when it takes no more effort to go after 10 $1,000 gifts?
As you prepare your annual fundraising operational plan, map out a backup plan
with fundraising strategies you can implement immediately should the possibility
of reaching your yearly goal become questionable.
If, for instance, your fiscal year began in July and in January you find that
you’re shy of where you need to be, put that backup plan in place.
What strategies could your backup plan include? Although strategic elements
will vary greatly from organization to organization, some examples include:
3 Announcing a compelling midyear funding project that will draw support
from both existing donors and those persons who have yet to support your annual effort.
3 Coordinating a fresh special event that was not a part of your original operational plan.
3 Enlisting board members and others to call on lybunts and sybunts — those
who gave last year (or in some years) but not this year.
3 Convincing a donor to establish a midyear challenge gift that will match all
new and increased gifts for the remainder of your fiscal year.
3 Approaching businesses to sponsor particular programs or events as opposed
to asking for outright gifts.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES TO CONSIDER
Break Lofty Goals Into Achievable Parts
When it comes to raising major gifts, lofty goals can be debilitating if you let them
overwhelm you. That’s why it’s critical you break goals down into achievable
and sequential steps.
How you break those goals down is equally important. Get rid of should
goals and focus on what makes achieving them more energizing for you personally. Beyond goal setting and creating a timeline in which to achieve those
goals, split your overall time frame into months, weeks and even days. “What
will I need to accomplish on a monthly basis, on a weekly basis and each day?”
For your daily to-do list, prioritize what three to five things you need to
accomplish that day, since that’s all most people can handle with thoroughness
and competence.
As you progress through each week, be accountable, not only to your
supervisor but to yourself. Did you meet that week’s objectives? Where did you
fall short? Why? What behaviors will you change this week and in the weeks
ahead to make up for it?
Create a personal plan for achieving your goals by breaking them down into
bite-sized pieces, prioritizing them, sequencing them and tackling them with confidence and enthusiasm. Use the example at right to craft one that works for you.
Personal Goal: Raise
$2 million in 2011
To make that happen:
3 Solicit no less than
70 probable donors for gifts
of $50,000 to $2 million.
3 Make, on average, five
cultivation/solicitation
contacts with each probable
donor throughout 2011,
recognizing that 350 total
contacts per year equates
to 30 meaningful contacts
per month or 1.5 contacts
per day.
Raise $25,000 to $50,000 More in Annual Gifts
Need an extra $25, 000 to $50,000 in annual gift revenue? You can do it by building a set of action plans centered around one strategy. The key is picking a strategy
best suited for your organization and putting it in writing. Documenting your ideas
will also help surface any weaknesses that may need to be addressed.
All too many nonprofits spread themselves too thin by doing a little more in direct mail, a little more in phonathons, a little more in face-to-face calls, etc. Instead,
zero in on one fundraising strategy that makes sense for your organization and then
build a set of substrategies around it.
Three Focused Strategy Options
Here are three examples of how a
To Generate $25, 000 to $50,000 in New Gift Revenue*
charity may decide to generate an extra
$25,000 to $50,000 in gift revenue:
Option No. 1: Longfellow Society (Annual Gifts of $1,000 or more)
1. Coordinate a special event. Enlist a
Member-recruit-a-member Initiative ................................ Goal: $20,000
committee of can-do volunteers who
Staff Calls (Four new members per staff member) . ......... Goal: $16,000
are committed to your organization
Targeted Direct Mail Appeal . ........................................... Goal: $10,000
and have experience at organizing Board Development Committee........................................ Goal: $10,000
fundraisers.
2. Convince past contributors to give
more. Calculate the percentage that each of last year’s donors would need
to increase their giving to generate
$25,000 to $50,000 more in gifts.
3. Develop a plan for generating 25
to 50 new gifts of $1,000 or more.
Turn to those who already give at that
level and involve them in a yearlong
recruitment effort to attract 25 to 50
new donors at that level.
Shown here are key strategy options
broken down into substrategies that help
illustrate this approach.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Option No. 2: New Sponsorships (To Underwrite Programs/Services)
Wellness Initiative.............................................................. Goal: $20,000
Outreach/Mobile Unit........................................................ Goal: $10,000
Neo-natal............................................................................ Goal: $20,000
Option No. 3: New Special Events
September Western-themed outdoor fundraiser . .............. Goal: $15,000
December Tour of Homes ................................................. Goal: $18,000
April Fashion Show .......................................................... Goal: $8,000
May Golf/Tennis Classic .................................................. Goal: $20,000
* Divide goals in half to reach $25,000 mark.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES TO CONSIDER
Target Particular Groups With Involvement Opportunities
Focus on Ways to Grow
Your Pool of Investors
In spite of your need for immediate
major gifts, a down economy offers
the perfect time to focus efforts on
building new relationships with
those who have the capacity to one
day make a major investment in
your organization. After all, if many
of your existing prospects are not
currently in a position to be asked for
major gifts, it would be worthwhile
in the long run for you and your
staff to concentrate on forging
relationships with those who will,
down the road, include your charity
at the top of their favorite causes.
To focus your efforts on creating
and nurturing new relationships
with financially capable individuals,
businesses and foundations, develop
a number of quantifiable objectives
such as these:
1. To ask each board member to
help identify, introduce and
cultivate relationships with no
fewer than three friends, relatives
or associates capable of making
gifts of $25,000 or more.
2. To meet with no fewer than one
new prospect a week for the purpose of introducing our charity
and nurturing a relationship.
3. To coordinate no fewer than
two events throughout the fiscal
year with the intent of attracting
new (and existing) persons of
wealth to attend.
4. To establish a major gifts committee and, with the committee,
develop a set of quantifiable
expectations that includes the
identification, introduction and
cultivation of new prospects.
5. To launch a new and ongoing
program that attracts the interest of local and area businesses.
Want to generate more and increased gifts? Work at increasing involvement among
both donors and would-be donors. As you know, involvement leads to investment.
To improve the level of involvement strive to offer opportunities matching the
interests of particular groups. For example, the volunteer projects you suggest
to former board members may be different than those you would offer young
professionals or recent high school graduates.
Examples of segmentation may include:
• Parents
• Baby boomers • Businesses
• Alumni
• Specific professions
• Church groups
• Singles • Civic organizations • Women/men • Senior citizens • Retired employees
• Former board members
• New graduates
• Environmental activists • Scout/4-H groups
• Community service opportunities • Young families
After identifying targeted groups, develop involvement opportunity menus
aimed at their interests and/or skills. Then market those opportunities through oneon-one visits, direct mail, online, group presentations and more.
Launch a Business-of-the-month Program
Looking for ways to make inroads with the business community? Launch a
business-of-the-month awards program. Here’s how:
1. Assemble a committee. Enlist a committee made up of business
representatives who are already loyal supporters of your nonprofit. Charge
them with overseeing the program and making nominations for the award.
2. Identify qualifying businesses. Give the committee a list of businesses
in your area whose services or good works somehow complement your
organization’s mission.
3. Make monthly awards. Based on the committee’s nominations — and
the criteria you provide — honor one business each month with a public
presentation of the award that includes favorable publicity for the honored
business.
4. Host an annual event. At the end of the year, invite all 12 award recipients
and the public to an event that recognizes all chosen businesses and announce
the business of the year selected from that group. Seek business support to
sponsor the event cost.
This concept allows you to: 1) provide deserved recognition to businesses
whose services or deeds support your mission, 2) build relationships with businesses that may become supportive of your work (e.g., donations, in-kind services,
partnerships), and 3) gain visibility for your organization throughout the community and surrounding area.
6. To initiate a dialogue with no
fewer than 10 new foundations
in the current fiscal year.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES TO CONSIDER
Help Your Boss Plan Each Month’s Priorities
Some nonprofits’ CEOs are so heavily involved
Monthly Fund Development Priorities
in the development shop that they are sometimes
referred to as micro-managers. Then there are those For the month of_________________ PROJECT/PROSPECT
OBJECTIVE
PROPOSED ACTIONS
DEADLINE
who want little to do with anything related to fundraising, “Let the development department do that!”
Sally Ballentine
Special cultivation
Invite to dinner
5/14
Whatever your situation may be, it’s helpful
Dr./Mrs. A Alden
Solicitation
Accompany Stubbs
5/17
to regularly identify projects and prospects that
Delany Manufacturing
Special cultivation
Invite to join Advisory Bd
5/17
require the attention of your organization’s head
Winston Abbas
Introduction
Personal call w/Stubbs
5/21
honcho. By sharing what you deem as top prioriWynstone Trust
Solicitation
Meeting w/Deagan/Ricks
5/25
ties for your CEO on a monthly basis, you’ll be
President’s Reception
Stewardship
Mingle/remarks
5/28
letting your CEO know what’s expected of him/her
Erlmann Dinner
Cultivation
Mingle/remarks
5/30
Board member Erlmann will have 10 special guests at his home for dinner.
and also help him/her focus on what matters most.
If your boss often gets overly involved in the
Beekman Glass
Special cultivation
Invite to join Advisory Bd
5/31
details of your department, a monthly priorities plan
will help keep him/her focused on the big picture. Use a monthly priorities plan similar to the example shown and make a proactive point to meet with your boss at least monthly to review what you deem as
priorities for him/her. Back up each priority with an action plan and a quantifiable
A full-page version of the form below
objective. Equally important, include deadlines for each item.
can be found in the appendix of this
manual for your use.
Plan for Success
With Business Prospects
What are you doing to maximize
success when it comes to soliciting
support from the business community?
Whether you use a particular prospect
management software or a form such
as the example shown here, your
time will be best used by planning
and prioritizing anticipated calls on
businesses.
The process of identifying key
players, discovering a company’s
recent history of giving, determining
any existing links to your organization
and more, will increase your odds
for success as you map out a
plan of research, cultivation and
solicitation.
You might even consider forming
a business advisory council made up of
volunteers familiar with your business
community to review names and
make calls on businesses capable of
making generous gifts. A form similar
to this would be helpful in providing
ongoing direction to your most capable
volunteers.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Business Prospect Profile & Anticipated Moves Schedule
Name of Business Address City State ZIP C
ompany Contacts
Titles
Phone
_ Known Gift Recipients
Approx. Date
Gift Use
_ Matching gift company?
Published gift/grant guidelines?
Formal gifts committee/process?
 Yes
 Yes
 Yes
 No
 No
 No
Links to our organization:
1. 3. 2. 4. Likely gift/sponsorship opportunities based on what we know today:
1. 3. 2. 4. Anticipated plan for introduction:
Who
When Objective
Anticipated cultivation moves:
When
What
By Whom
Target amount: $_____________
Anticipated solicitation:
When
Gift Use
By Whom
28
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES TO CONSIDER
Share a List of Challenge Gift Opportunities
Why do so many nonprofits have challenge gifts in place? Simple answer: They
work. Especially during these economic times, anything you can do to motivate giving is a plus, and challenge gifts help to leverage giving.
Knowing the power of a challenge gift, there’s no reason why you can’t
attempt to have multiple challenge gifts — directed to different groups and for
different reasons — going at the
same time. The key is finding
Challenge Gift Opportunities
donors willing to establish the
Select from among these and other challenge How your gift might be used
challenge.
• Annual fund support (general
gift opportunities as a way to support (name
To focus on getting multiple
operations)
of organization) in a major way and motivate
challenge gifts in place, why not
• Named endowment gift
others to support our efforts as well.
• Special project (See examples.)
create a simple brochure describ
Keep in mind that the challenge
opportunities shown here can be tailored
ing a number of different types
How matching gifts might be used
to fit your wishes including payout period,
of challenge gift opportunities?
• Annual fund support (general
use of your gift, challenge criteria and more.
Share it with individuals, busioperations)
• Endowment
Who you might challenge
nesses and foundations capable
• Special project (See examples.)
• Anyone
of making significant challenges.
• Board members
Use the sample list shown
Challenge gift criteria (what gets
• Alumni or a particular group of alums
matched)
here as a starting point to create
• Nondonors
• New, first-time gifts
your own list of challenge gift
• Businesses
• Increased gifts
opportunities, then begin meet• Churches
• Gifts of a certain threshold ($1,000
ing one-on-one with your top
• Particular professions (attorneys,
and up)
50 prospects and invite them to
retailers)
select a challenge opportunity
that best suits their interests.
Identify and Prioritize All Endowment Gift Opportunities
Whether you have a substantial endowment in place or you’re just getting started
in establishing one, it’s important to take time to identify fundable endowment
opportunities and prioritize their importance to your organization.
As much as you may be in need of unrestricted endowment gifts, the annual
interest from which will underwrite yearly general operations, many donors prefer to
earmark their investments to projects that can make a noticeable and visible difference.
As you gear up to market restricted endowment opportunities, follow this process:
1. Establish endowment parameters. At what level, for instance, can a donor
have the choice of establishing a named fund? What’s the maximum number
of years donors will have to pay out endowment pledges? To what degree will
you allow donors to spell out endowment restrictions?
2. Identify all endowment possibilities. List any existing restricted endowment
accounts first. Then, review your organization’s budget, first by category, then by
line item. What categories and line items in your existing budget could be endowed?
3. Prioritize each identified endowment possibility based on two factors: 1)
its importance to fulfilling your organization’s needs and mission, 2) its
fundability — its attractiveness to potential donors. After going through this
process, you may decide that some potential endowment projects should be
deleted or tabled.
Set Yearly
Endowment Goals
If it’s your intent to grow your
endowment, then you should
have yearly goals in place aimed
at doing just that. And if you’re
just getting started, set goals that
are challenging but realistic. For
example, one of your endowment
goals may be to secure no less
than 10 $10,000 or more named
endowment commitments.
As you go through the final step, consider inviting small groups or individual
potential donors to review your draft list and offer their opinions. The act of
engaging them in the process at this point will help them to buy into investing in
endowment. Plus, their responses will provide clues as to their funding interests.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES TO CONSIDER
Shrewd Direct Mail Planning
Rather than whipping together a direct mail appeal and getting it out the door at
the last minute, put some thought into your entire year of appeals.
For example:
• Before sending a direct mail appeal, write a brief marketing plan to set
its direction. This marketing plan should cover target audience, audience
demographics, quantity, key messages, appeal package composition, funding
projects, estimated cost, anticipated revenue and other key factors.
• Plan a series of appeals rather than assuming a onetime request will meet your
goal.
Use Timeline to Visualize Your Direct Mail Flow
How detailed is your direct mail production schedule for the fiscal year?
The use of a direct mail production schedule helps everyone in the advancement department see the big picture and anticipate what needs to be done when
and by whom to keep all mailings on track. The production cycle of each direct
mail piece — from writing to drop dates — can be more easily anticipated to
ensure deadlines are being met. Such a schedule also helps planners visualize
when various groups will receive direct mail to better plan broad-based cultivation
procedures and anticipate the flow of incoming gift revenue.
If you’re not already doing so, develop a direct mail production schedule
similar to the example below to aid you in planning and visualizing your mailings
for the entire year.
2011 — DIRECT MAIL PRODUCTION SCHEDULE
Item and Audience
Drop Date Responsible
Planned Gifts
Newsletter
RKP
7/15
General Newsletter
DDS
8/15
Fall Appeal Letter #1
MRT
9/15
Phonathon Postcard
GSC
9/15
Annual Report
JBS
10/1
Follow-up Appeal #1a
MRT
10/20
Invitations to
$1,000+ Club
Banquet
JBS
10/20
Planned Gifts
Newsletter
RKP
11/1
Holiday Letter
MRT
12/1
General Newsletter
DDS
1/15
Planned Gifts
Newsletter
RKP
2/15
Invitations to
Special Event
MMG
3/1
General Newsletter
DDS
3/15
Spring Appeal Letter #2
MRT
4/1
Invitations to
$1,000+ Club Reception
JBS
5/1
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
June July Aug
30
Sept Oct
Nov Dec Jan
Feb
March
April
May
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES TO CONSIDER
Keep Refining Yearlong Direct Mail Appeal Plan
It’s wise to have a 12-month written plan that outlines all direct mail appeals
you’ll be sending to particular groups throughout the upcoming year. It makes
even more sense to refine that plan as you move from one year to another.
Create a calendar that identifies all planned appeals for the year, including
those directed to past contributors and nondonors. Then, as you near the
completion of the current year, formulate a new calendar for the subsequent
year that includes revisions to the previous year’s schedule.
This year-to-year comparison of direct mail appeals helps identify
which segments of your database will be receiving particular invitations to
support your organization.
The example shown here includes
personalized anniversary letters to
those who gave during a particular
month in the prior year.
Sunset Retirement Community: Yearlong Appeals Plan
Drop
Date
Tailor Different Appeals
To Varying Audiences
Some nonprofits tend to send one or
two direct mail appeals each year to
their entire mailing list and that’s it.
Nothing more.
If you’re not segmenting your
database into different groups
and varying the type of appeal
sent to each, you’re missing the
boat. Doing so allows you to send
multiple appeals throughout the
year and test various types of
funding requests.
Here are just a few of the many
ways to segment your database for
various appeals:
•
•
•
•
Donors vs. nondonors
Gender
Professions
Funding interests (based on
past support)
• Constituency type (board
members, businesses,
customers, alums, patients)
• Geographically (ZIP) by
neighborhoods, cities, states,
regions
2011
Appeals
1/3
Anniversary Letter
January ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
January ’10 contributors
1/15
Non-donor Businesses
(50-mile radius)
Non-donor Businesses
(50-mile radius)
2/3
Anniversary Letter
February ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
February ’10 contributors
2/15
Special Memorial Appeal:
Families of former residents
3/3
Anniversary Letter
March ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
March ’10 contributors
4/3
Anniversary Letter
April ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
April ’10 contributors
4/15
Non-donor local residents
Non-donor local residents
5/3
Anniversary Letter
May ’09 Contributors
Anniversary Letter
May ’10 Contributors
6/3
Anniversary Letter
June ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
June ’10 contributors
7/3
Anniversary Letter
July ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
July ’10 contributors
8/3
Anniversary Letter
August ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
August ’10 contributors
9/3
Anniversary Letter
September ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
September ’10 contributors
9/15
Special appeal:
$250 prospects
10/3
Anniversary Letter
October ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
October ’10 contributors
11/3
Anniversary Letter
November ’09 contributors
Anniversary Letter
November ’10 contributors
11/10 General Appeal (entire list
General Appeal (entire list
excluding current contributors) excluding current contributors)
12/3
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
2010 Appeals Anniversary Letter
December ’09 contributors
31
Anniversary Letter
December ’10 contributors
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
FUNDRAISING STRATEGIES TO CONSIDER
Share Your Strategic Plan’s Progress With Donors
Gallaudet University (Washington D.C.), which serves deaf and hard-of-hearing
undergraduate students, recently adopted a five-year strategic plan, “Vision 2020:
A Bold Vision For a Bright Future.”
The plan includes three major elements: The Vision, Guiding Principles, and
Goals and Strategies.
Implementation of the plan began in fall 2009 and focused on strategies
related to enrollment (recruitment and retention) and the improvement of
graduation rates, says Richard Lytle, special assistant to the president and
executive director of strategic planning. Full implementation began in January
2010, around the same time that the university hired a new president.
In addition to posting the strategic plan and progress updates on a special
strategic planning section of the university’s website, Gallaudet officials have
communicated the plan and its progress to donors through gift acknowledgements,
stewardship reports and articles in their magazine, says Marilyn Lucas, executive
director of development.
While university officials have yet to translate the plan into the university’s
fundraising goals, Lucas says they will be working on doing so in the coming months.
“We still need to identify which fundraising priorities will come out of the strategic
plan,” the executive director of development notes. “So far, we have worked with the
leaders of each of our strategic plan’s goals to conduct an internal review of what our
priorities will be and how that will evolve into fundraising opportunities.”
Sharing the plan with donors has several benefits, says Lucas, including the
ability to gain donor perspective on what the university is doing, and how well
that is being communicated to donors. “It’s a great way to engage people, and
engagement helps them see the impact of giving on our institution, which makes
them more interested in being a part of it,” she says.
Plans are for the university’s new president, T. Alan Hurwitz, to eventually
work with Lucas and the chief academic officer to identify priorities in the plan
appropriate for external funding.
“Dr. Hurwitz came from the deaf community and has an excellent
understanding of our university and its mission,” says Lytle. “He is very
knowledgeable about, and committed to, the strategic plan. The board is leading
the vision and is working with the new president to implement it.”
Hiring a new president at the same time as implementing a new strategic plan
presents a fabulous opportunity to share the plan with external audiences, says
Lucas “Sharing the plan is a terrific way to get him out in front of donors.”
In preparation for developing fundraising goals around the strategic plan’s
priorities, the university has been rebuilding its development program, hiring
Lucas in June 2009, and launching a new major gift and planned giving program
in September 2009. “We’ve worked on identifying top prospects that the president
should see first,” she says. “We’ve looked at our six-figure and above prospects
and went through them one by one to determine how to get our new president in to
meet as many as possible.”
Some of the ways they accomplished that, and communicated their strategic
plan in the process, included: breakfast meetings with donors; a letter from the
president with personalized notes to all donors of $1,000 and up, introducing
himself and communicating his excitement about the plan with them; and a letter
from the president to those who have not yet made gifts, introducing himself, and
encouraging them to be part of the university’s promising future.
Sources: Marilyn Lucas, Executive Director of Development; Richard Lytle, Special Assistant to the President and Executive Director of Strategic Planning; Gallaudet University,
Washington, D.C. Phone (202) 651-5410 (Lucas) or (202) 651-5894 (Lytle). E-mail: marilyn.lucas@gallaudet.edu or Richard.lytle@gallaudet.edu
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
32
Developing a Planned
Giving Marketing Plan
Before you launch your next marketing effort, make sure to include the
four processes critical to the success
of any marketing effort, says Ann
McPherson, a marketing consultant
with PG Calc (Cambridge, MA).
“These four processes (detailed
below) should be applied to both your
annual plans and individual marketing
initiatives,” McPherson says.
1. Establish, articulate objectives.
Select both tangible, measurable
goals that you can realistically
achieve, and less quantifiable
goals, she says: “Regardless of
your specific objectives, one of
the most important activities ... is
a consideration of organizational
support, both external and internal.”
2. Define the strategy. Conducting
a SWOT analysis (Strengths,
Weaknesses, Opportunities,
Threats) of your organization’s
mission will help you draft
a precise, carefully crafted
value proposition, position
your organization relative to
its competitors and peers, and
develop a deep understanding
of the target audiences to use
as leverage in the marketing
process, she says.
3. Execute the tactics of the
program within the budget. If
a program’s objectives have been
well defined and the strategic
planning diligently conducted, the
executive phase should proceed
smoothly, she says.
4. Measure, Report, Refine.
“Keep paying attention to
best practices; reviewing,
documenting and improving
upon internal benchmarks; and
most importantly, talking to
donors and prospects about their
thoughts on communications
they receive,” she says.
Source: Ann McPherson,
Marketing
Consultant, PG Calc, Cambridge, MA.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
PUT YOUR PLAN INTO WRITTEN FORM
Once planning has been completed, it needs to be documented as your written guide for the upcoming fiscal year. In
addition to the five key components mentioned earlier — goals, quantifiable objectives, strategies, action plans, timetable
— you may wish to include job descriptions for each member of your advancement team and committee descriptions for
key board and volunteer groups involved with your fundraising efforts (e.g., board development committee, special events
committees, etc.).
Create a Long-range Plan
The majority of non-profit
organizations include annual
fundraising strategies in their annual
operational plan. It’s less common
to employ a multi-year approach
that outlines longer-term plans and
priorities. Using your organization’s
strategic plan as a guide, why not
create a three- to five-year plan
for your development shop? Such
a plan should answer three key
questions:
1. What is required from the
development office to meet the
priorities outlined in the multiyear strategic plan?
2. How much gift income will be
generated five years from now,
and what must occur to make
that happen?
3. How will the development
department be different five
years from now in terms of
personnel, technology, etc.?
Plan to Plan
 When you develop your yearly
operational plan — complete
with a calendar of all fund
development tasks for the
year — be sure to list the date
planning should begin for the
subsequent year. Doing so will
help prevent delaying the next
cycle.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
A Look at the Creation of a Strategic Plan
Southern Illinois University-Carbondale Foundation (Carbondale, IL) underwent a
10-month process in developing its four-year strategic plan (2009-2012).
At its May 2008 meeting, the board, with the assistance of a consultantfacilitator, participated in a brainstorming session to identify five broad strategic
categories, says Rickey N. McCurry, vice chancellor for institutional advancement
at Southern Illinois University and chief executive officer of the foundation.
The foundation board then convened a task force of five to six board members
headed by the foundation board’s immediate past president and board officers.
They invited an academic dean to be a part of the process as well.
Over the next six months, members of the task force were divided into groups,
given a leader and put in charge of conducting a SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats) on each of the five strategic categories, which
they did through teleconference meetings, he says.
At the foundation board’s October 2008 meeting, each task force leader presented to the full board results of the SWOT analysis, and the board members either affirmed or adjusted what was presented. The groups then took that feedback,
refined it and developed goals, says McCurry.
In February 2009, the entire foundation board convened at a two-day off-campus board retreat to work on the opportunities and goals for each of the strategic
categories.
From that meeting, McMurry and the task force chair wrote the final draft of
the strategic plan, which provided specific wording for each strategic category, including goals, milestones, dates and action steps.
The strategic plan was presented to and approved by the full board in May
2009.
The foundation began the strategic planning process as it was coming to the
conclusion of its first-ever comprehensive capital campaign, McCurry notes. “We
felt it was important to engage in a strategic planning process at that time, because we wanted to assess where we were, where we needed to go, and how to get
there,” he says. “A major purpose and goal in developing the strategic plan was to
launch our next campaign. One of our major focal areas in our strategic plan is resource generation and under that is fundraising and the next campaign, which will
have a goal between $250 million and $500 million.”
While the strategic plan is serving as the blueprint to follow over the next four
years, it also needs to be flexible as well, says McCurry: “It is our philosophy and
strong belief that good plans have inherent flexibility built in. The value of a good
plan is shown by providing a solid foundation and framework on which to build —
and from which to adapt as real need and situations dictate.”
Source: Rickey N. McCurry, Vice Chancellor for Institutional Advancement and Chief
Executive Officer, Southern Illinois University-Carbondale, Carbondale, IL.
Phone (618) 453-4900. E-mail: mccurry@siu.edu
33
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
PUT YOUR PLAN INTO WRITTEN FORM
Your Printed Plan Should Be Used Throughout the Year
A well thought-out operational plan will break down lofty goals into achievable
increments. It allows one to establish challenging but attainable goals.
Keep in mind that an operational plan refers to goals that are to be achieved
throughout a given year. A strategic plan, on the other hand, is longer-term and
more comprehensive. It becomes your organization’s vision for the future.
A yearly operational plan should be linked to your institution’s larger strategic
plan. The operational plan should address the strategic plan and help make it a reality.
There are five key components to a written operational plan:
 Goals. Goals are larger in purpose and often institution-wide, crossing
departmental lines. They are an outgrowth of the organization’s mission
statement and help to define what hopes to be achieved throughout the course
of a year. They tend to be more broad and less quantifiable.
Examples of goals might include: “to become less dependent on tuition”
(for a college), or “to provide the best possible care in the most cost-effective
way” (for a healthcare organization).
 Objectives. Objectives are quantifiable and spell out what will be done to
address each goal. It’s common to have several quantifiable objectives that
address each of the organization’s goals.
For development offices, examples of objectives might be: “to generate
$500,000 in unrestricted gift support throughout fiscal year 2010-11” or, “to
generate $6 million in lead gifts and pledges toward the $15 million capital
campaign this fiscal year.”
 Strategies. Strategies represent another step down in the planning process.
They often represent individual programs that define how a portion of an
objective will be achieved. It’s common for one objective to include a number
of strategies.
 Action Plans. As we move into more of the detail of how to address goals and
achieve objectives, action plans provide the recipe for each strategy and delineate
who is responsible for doing what and when. An action plan could be described
as a checklist of what needs to happen. While each strategy will include only one
action plan, each action plan will include many step-by-step points.
Sometimes one individual is responsible for managing the entire plan, but
many of the staff team are assigned to certain tasks. This form of management
allows each staff member to be in charge at various times and for various
programs and also encourages everyone to work together knowing they will
each be dependent on one another at some point as they work to achieve
common objectives.
 Timetable. Once all strategies and accompanying action plans have been
determined for the year, those involved can go back through each program to
pull out dates of everything from “get annual fund brochure copy to printer”
to “alumni board meeting” to “send phonathon reminder postcard to entire
constituency.”
The completion of this master calendar of what needs to be completed
and when serves as the centerpiece of activities throughout the entire year.
This annually printed operational plan then becomes a working tool that is
referred to and monitored each week throughout the year. Often additional information is included in the document –– job descriptions, organizational charts, gift
acceptance and acknowledgment policies and more.
The existence of an operational plan also allows staff to better evaluate existing programs throughout the year and at year-end. This ongoing evaluation process
enables the following year’s planning to take place with much greater understanding
and ease and helps to build on the successes of the past to achieve even loftier goals.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
34
Yearly Plan Needs Focus
Your development shop
undoubtedly has a written plan
identifying the year’s objectives,
what needs to happen by when,
and who is responsible. Still, it’s
important for every team member
to agree on what matters most. To
accomplish this, create a primary
focus that takes precedence over all
other objectives. Examples:
 To increase by 10 percent the
number of annual contributors
of $1,000-plus.
 To increase the number of firsttime contributors by 20 percent.
 To initiate strategies that
generate more business
community support.
 To produce and present
more individualized funding
proposals that will generate
more major gifts.
Selectively Share Your
Operational Plan
Once your operational plan is printed, make a point to share it with key
employees internally and selected
board members and/or volunteers
externally.
Sharing your plan, as an advancement team, will accomplish
two important goals:
1. Those with whom you work
will gain a better understanding
and appreciation of what you
do for the organization.
2. You and your staff will come
to own your plan even more by
sharing it and discussing it with
others.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
PUT YOUR PLAN INTO WRITTEN FORM
Have Yearlong Timeline for Each Development Team Member
How detailed is your yearly operational plan? Your plan
should include one or two broader goals, quantifiable
objectives that fulfill those goals, action plans that detail
fundraising strategies, plus a master calendar that spells out
everything that will happen in the development office by a
particular date and who’s responsible for each detail.
In addition to that master calendar, it’s helpful to have
a separate yearlong timeline for each member of the development team. The individualized calendar clearly shows
the responsible person what needs to be completed by what
date and serves to keep each professional on track with his/
her responsibilities. It may also include more detail than the
department’s master calendar.
Consider producing a timeline using Microsoft’s Excel
spreadsheet software or other software that allows you to
arrange a calendar in various formats (e.g., by project, by
deadline date, etc.).
2010-11 FISCAL YEAR DEVELOPMENT CALENDAR
Margo Hudson
Team member____________________________
Special Events Coordinator
Position_________________________________
Although a typical calendar may
include far more detail, the example
shown here illustrates the format
of an individualized calendar
arranged by project.
Project 6/20
7/7
7/20
8/29
9/23
Fall Hoedown Fundraiser ................. Recruit committee, chair
5/23
Committee meeting
6/6
Location confirmed
6/27
Committee meeting
7/28
Committee meeting
8/18
Entertainment arrangements complete
8/22
Catering arrangements complete
8/26
Committee meeting
9/1
Send invitations
9/26
Committee meeting
9/29
Auction items secured
9/30
Committee meeting
10/20
Event setup 10/27-28
Event
10/28
As you plan your year in advance,
be sure to incorporate opportunities
for professional growth.
Conferences, books and periodicals, internal training sessions and
membership in professional associations all help employees prepare to
take on new and more challenging
goals. And yet, opportunities for
professional growth often tend to
be overlooked in spite of increasing
demands.
Professional development
opportunities will be perceived as
rewards and will result in big dividends for your agency.
Deadline
Houston Reception ......................................... Recruit committee
Committee meeting
Secure location
Send invitations
Event/follow-up visits
Incorporate Professional
Growth Into Your Plan
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Action Dallas Reception .............................................. Recruit committee
Committee meeting
Secure location
Send invitations
Event/follow-up visits
9/16
10/4
10/25
11/21
12/15
Holiday Open House .................................... Committee enlisted
Committee meeting
Invitations sent
Catering, entertainment finalized
News release sent
Event
10/25
11/7
11/28
12/1
12/2
12/20
San Antonio Reception ................................. Recruit committee
Committee meeting
Secure location
Send invitations
Event/follow-up visits
1/17/12
2/2
2/23
3/31
4/20
35
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
PUT YOUR PLAN INTO WRITTEN FORM
Cultivation Helps Explore Next Moves
Going after major gifts often requires a much
more sophisticated series of cultivation
moves than is needed for lower-end gifts.
And because you can’t use the same friendraising strategies with every prospect —
they should be tailored to the interests and
circumstances of each — it’s important to
select from many alternatives.
To help you plan individualized
cultivation moves for each of your
major gift prospects, develop a menu of
cultivation categories, such as the example
here, to guide your decision making.
These categories can be used as a tool
by individual development officers or in
a group setting as a way to brainstorm
what cultivation moves would be most
appropriate with particular prospects.
Use of a cultivation possibilities menu
also forces you to ask, “What’s my most
important objective with this prospect at this
point in time?”
CULTIVATION POSSIBILITIES MENU
Prospect____________________ Date____________
Objective Steps To Be Taken
To involve one or more family
members
of the prospect....
1. ______________
2. ______________
To recognize or honor the prospect.... To help the prospect more fully understand and appreciate the work of our organization....
A full version of the
chart shown on the
left can be found in
the appendix of this
manual for your
personal use.
1. ______________
2. ______________
1. ______________
2. ______________
To make the prospect more aware 1. ______________
of the level of gift required....
2. _ ____________
To better determine the prospect’s 1. ______________
potential funding interests....
2. ______________
To engage the prospect in realizing 1. ______________
greater ownership of our agency 2. ______________
and its programs....
Other objectives/steps....
1. ______________
2. ______________
Prioritize Funding Needs, Amounts
Those persons responsible for developing grant proposals at your institution
can benefit from having a one-year (or multiyear) operational plan that not only
prioritizes funding needs, but also quantifies deadlines and target amounts.
As you map out quantifiable funding objectives for a year or more, categorize
them within the following groups: program goals, equipment goals, project goals
and personnel goals. Here is a template to get you started:
Program Goals:
For What By When For How Much
1.______________________________________________
2.______________________________________________
3.______________________________________________
Equipment Goals: 1.______________________________________________
2.______________________________________________
3.______________________________________________
Project Goals:
1.______________________________________________
2.______________________________________________
3.______________________________________________
Personnel Goals: 1.______________________________________________
2.______________________________________________
3.______________________________________________
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
36
Spell Out How You Plan
To Increase Gift Revenue
Let’s say your organization generated $400,000 in unrestricted gifts
last year. This year’s goal has been
set at $420,000 — an 8 percent
increase.
In addition to preparing a written operational plan that spells out
how you intend to raise $420,000,
include a quantitative section that
outlines how you intend to generate the $20,000 in increased gifts.
Overcompensate with planning to
allow for any shortfalls.
Spelling out what needs to occur to realize $20,000 in additional
gift revenue will keep everyone
keenly aware of those important
strategies.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
PUT YOUR PLAN INTO WRITTEN FORM
Strategies Define How You Plan to Achieve Objectives
Strategies are fun. They get into just how you plan to achieve
quantifiable objectives. Often a strategy may represent a
particular program.
As an example, let’s identify possible strategies you
might have to achieve the following annual fund objective: “to generate $500,000 in unrestricted annual fund gifts
throughout fiscal year 2010-11.”
Examples of possible strategies might include:

Meet with board members and invite them to each approach three new prospects for membership in the President’s Order of Distinction.

Expand our existing special event, building attendance by
___ new participants.

Create a new special event with anticipated first-year attendance of ___.

Increase the number of solicitation calls to new prospects
by ___ percent.

Provide ___ presentations to civic groups to generate ___
new donors.

Generate ___ more memorial and intribute gifts over the
previous year.


Develop three targeted direct mail appeals aimed at nondonors on our mailing list.
Enlist one civic group to take on our organization as a
yearlong service project and raise funds (and new donors)
on our behalf.

Conduct three direct mail appeal tests aimed at individuals or groups not currently on our mailing list (e.g., a
particular ZIP code, those with memberships in a particular organization, those in our area who subscribe to a
particular magazine, etc.).

Create a wish list of specific funding opportunities with
the intent of generating ___ new contributors.

Enlist a volunteer committee to review lists of nondonors
and make ___ calls per volunteer per month.

Initiate a campaign among last year’s donors to recruit a
new contributor for the upcoming year.
There are any number of strategies you can develop depending on the type of organization you represent, the make-up
of your constituency and your organization’s past gifts history.
Action Plans Define Quantifiable Objectives
A yearly operational plan should include goals, quantifiable objectives and action
plans that define how and when those objectives will be
fulfilled.
Action Plan: Fall Phonathon
Although all three components are important, action
Supports following Objective: To raise $350,000 in 2010/11
plans really spell out the how to of each fundraising
fiscal year
strategy and, therefore, should be well thought out in
Fall Phonathon Target:
$85,000 in gifts and pledges
advance. The generic example shown here illustrates what
an action plan might look like.
Action Steps
Date(s)
Be sure to include these four elements in your action
Secure phonathon challenge gift
April/May
plan:
Recruit cochairs
June 20-24
Recruit team captains
July 11-15
Team captain meeting
Aug. 1
Recruit callers
Aug. 8-26
Phonathon postcards to print
Aug. 19
Prepare caller cards
Sept. 12-30
Send phonathon announcement postcards
Sept. 16
Room setup
Oct. 3-7
Training sessions
Oct. 9-10, 16-17
Phonathon
Oct. 9-13; 16-20
Call-back/follow-up session
Oct. 23-25
Volunteer party & awards
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Oct. 27
37
1. Goals: More lofty in nature; support the organization’s overall strategic plan.
2. Objectives: Quantifiable; tie directly to goals.
3. Action Steps: Key fundraising strategies for how you intend to achieve each objective.
4. Calendar: Detailed schedule of who is to do what, by when.
If your organization has used a particular fundraising
strategy in prior years, it will be easier to document what
needs to occur and when. For instance, if you had a
10-day phonathon in prior years to help meet your annual
fund objective, creating a phonathon action plan should
be relatively easy. It’s a matter of putting the steps on
paper and fine tuning any changes.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
PUT YOUR PLAN INTO WRITTEN FORM
Plan a Year of Special Events
Although special events can be more intensive than some forms of fundraising,
there’s no doubt they provide obvious benefits including adding greater visibility
to your nonprofit and reaching out to new contributors who might not give
otherwise.
To make the most of special fundraising events, plan a series of them
throughout your fiscal year.
1. Decide how many special events you can realistically hold throughout the year utilizing a different group of volunteers for each event.
2. Once you know that number, determine the types of events you will have that
appeal to different audiences: golf classic, gala, raffle, wine tasting, etc.
3. Set up a committee of volunteers for each of your events. Enlist committee
members who best fit each event and give them latitude in planning and
shaping their events.
4. Work with each committee to provide the support and direction they need to
do their jobs.
5. Create a master calendar that allows you to visualize what will need to happen and when throughout the year.
2011 Special Events Calendar
November ‘10 — Event committees formed
Nov. 20 — 1st CSB committee meeting
Jan. 10, 2011 — CSB corporate sponsors secured
Jan. 20 — CSB invitations dropped
Feb. 15 — Corporate Spelling Bee (CSB) — Goal: $70,000
Feb. 1 — 1st C&A committee meeting
Feb. 20 — CSB evaluation meeting
March 1 — 1st GC committee meeting
April 15 — Sponsors secured for GC
May 1 — Newspaper ads appear for C&A
May 1 — Invitations to select audience for C&A
May 10 — 3rd Annual Crafts Auction & Sale (C&A) — Goal: $15,000
May 15 — C&A evaluation meeting
June 1 — Newspaper ads appear for GC
June 1 — 1st TB committee meeting
June 15 — 15th Annual Golf Classic (GC) — Goal: $30,000
June 20 — GC Evaluation meeting
July 20 — Entertainment and caterer secured for TB
Aug. 1 — Sponsors secured for TB
Aug. 25 — Invitations dropped for TB
Sept. 15 — Tame the Bull Fundraiser (TB) — Goal: $50,000
Sept. 20 — TB evaluation meeting
Oct. 15 — Recognition/celebration event for all event volunteers
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
38
Look Beyond
The Dollars
Financial objectives address gift
dollars to be raised, but nonmonetary objectives help focus
fundraising processes and systems,
says Patti Lyons, executive partner at
Pride Philanthropy (Alpharetta, GA).
The metrics Lyons identifies,
many of which can help board
members strengthen fundraising
efforts, include:
• Percent of constituency
contributing during the year.
• Percent of constituency
solicited by mail, as well as
face-to-face.
• Average gift size.
• Number of new donors over
prior year.
• Percent of new donors over
prior year.
• Percent of pledges paid.
• Number of volunteers from year
to year.
• Number of major gift prospects.
• Number of planned gifts.
• Number of planned gift
expectancies.
• Number of gifts matched by
employers.
• Number of donors moving to
higher levels.
• Number of new members.
• Number of event attendees.
• Cost ratios for each special event.
• Percent of successful grant
applications.
• Number of corrected addresses.
• Number of renewed lapsed donors.
• Percent of previous year’s donors.
• Number of board calls and/or
referrals.
Source: Patti Lyons, Executive Partner,
Pride Philanthropy, Alpharetta, GA.
Phone (888) 417-0707.
E-mail: pattilions1@aol.com
Website: www.pridephilanthropy.com
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
PUT YOUR PLAN INTO WRITTEN FORM
Make Volunteer Involvement a Part of Your Plans
As you prepare an operational plan for your fiscal year, be sure to include a
volunteer component. Volunteers can really allow you to accomplish more if you
have put ample thought into planning for their involvement. And by delegating
tasks to volunteers, you’ll have more trained staff time available for other duties.
Pencil volunteers in to your year plan for any number of tasks, including:
•
Making solicitation calls.
•
Reviewing, rating and screening prospect names.
•
Making phone calls.
•
Calling donors to say thanks.
•
Taking photos.
Objective No. 4: To manage the work of annual awards committee (five members).
•
Helping coordinate special events.
Objective No. 5: To coordinate and manage the annual community campaign made up
of no less than 40 volunteers who will seek gifts from throughout the community. (Community campaign goal: $50,000)
•
Serving as centers of influence.
•
Assisting with behind- the-scenes duties such as stuffing envelopes.
•
Staffing informational booths at community events.
2011/12 Operational Plan
Manilla School
Volunteer Involvement Objectives
Objective No. 1: To manage the board development committee (six members) and
support them in generating $4,000 in new annual fund gifts.
Objective No. 2: To coordinate two phonathons (fall and spring) that include no less than 35 volunteer callers. (Phonathon goal: $18,500)
Objective No. 3: To coordinate and manage the golf classic planning committee made
up of no less than eight volunteers. (Golf Classic goal: $10,000)
Volunteer Programs Calendar
Month June
Action
Recruit phonathon co-chairs
Responsible
Miller
July
Recruit phonathon callers (20-plus)
August
Recruit community campaign chair, leadership
Miller
Gray
September Recruit community campaign volunteers
Gray
September Board meeting — meet w/development committee
Gray
September Hold fall phonathon Miller
October
Community campaign kickoff
Gray
January
Board meeting — meet w/development committee
Gray
February Recruit phonathon callers (20-plus) Miller
February Recruit Golf Classic chair, vice-chair Fennel
March Meet w/ Golf Classic chair, vice chair; recruit committee members Fennel
April Hold spring phonathon Miller
May Board meeting — meet w/development committee Gray
May Annual Golf Classic Fennel
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
39
Your written
operational plan —
complete with goals,
quantifiable objectives,
action plans and a master
calendar for the year of
who does what and by
when — may have various
volunteer-related actions
scattered throughout, or
you may choose to have
a separate section that
focuses solely on volunteer
plans.
A generic example
of volunteer planning is
shown to the left.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
PUT YOUR PLAN INTO WRITTEN FORM
Consider a Yearly Operational Plan Based on Giving Levels
There are many ways of creating a yearly operational plan complete with goals,
quantifiable objectives and action plans. One way of doing that is to use your gift
clubs or levels as the foundation, creating strategies that attract new contributors at
each level and move current donors up the giving ladder.
Development shops that use these gift clubs as the centerpiece of their yearly
operational planning should identify quantifiable objectives and accompanying
action plans for each gift level. This allows the development team to allocate time
and resources more appropriately, with prospects at the lowest gift level receiving
the least amount of time and resources, and those at the top end receiving the most
attention.
Review the accompanying operational plan objectives as a way to understand
how gift clubs can become the focus of planning.
2011-12 Operational Plan Objectives
The President’s Guild — Annual Contributors of $5,000 and above
Objectives
1. To host the annual President’s Guild dinner.
2. To create a yearly cultivation/solicitation plan for each member of The President’s Guild.
3. To personally call on and renew each President’s Guild member.
4. To provide special seating for President’s Guild members at the annual gala.
5. To invite all members to the quarterly Susan Haines Society receptions.
6. To increase the number of new guild members by 2 percent.
Susan Haines Society — Annual Contributors of $1,000 to $4,999
Objectives
1. To host quarterly receptions for members of the Susan Haines Society.
2. To personally call on and renew all current Susan Haines Society members.
3. To personally cultivate and invite no less than 20 percent of Susan Haines Society members to join
The President’s Guild.
4. To encourage all current society members (through various means) to enlist one new member.
5. To increase the number of new Susan Haines Society members by 3 percent.
The Emerald Club — Annual Contributors of $500 to $999
Objectives
1. To identify those Emerald Club members who should be solicited through face-to-face calls.
2. To direct two personalized renewal letters to Emerald Club members who are not seen face-toface.
3. To invite no less than 40 percent of Emerald Club members to become Susan Haines Society members.
4. To increase the number of new Emerald Club members by 3 percent.
The League of Ridgemont — Annual Contributors of 100 to $499
Objectives
1. To identify those league members who should be personally contacted.
2. To renew all current League members through the annual phonathon and/or direct mail appeals.
3. To invite no less than 30 percent of league members to contribute at The Emerald Club level.
4. To increase the number of new league members by 4 percent.
Ridgemont Members — Annual Contributions of Less Than $100
Objectives
1. To renew all Ridgemont members through direct mail, the annual phonathon or personal calls.
2. To invite no less than 50 percent of Ridgemont members to contribute at the
League of Ridgemont level.
3. To increase the number of new Ridgemont members by 10 percent.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
40
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
MONITOR PROGRESS & EVALUATE SUCCESS
The creation of an operational plan isn’t intended as a one-time procedure that occurs prior to the onset of a new fiscal
year and then gets no further attention.The plan should be reviewed individually and collectively by every member of your
advancement team on a regular basis throughout the course of the year. It should serve as your fundraising instruction
manual all year long. An ongoing review of the plan will help to point out if fundraising strategies are on track or if other
actions should be taken.
Your written document will also allow you to evaluate what’s working or not working and will provide valuable
information as you prepare the subsequent year’s operational plan.
Conduct Financial Assessment of Your Fundraising Programs
Track Your Yearly
Acquisition Average
2011
2010
2009
2008
2007
2006
One part of creating a yearlong development plan for your organization is
conducting a financial assessment of each of your fundraising programs, says Alice
Are you really generating more
L. Ferris, partner at GoalBusters Consulting, LLC (Flagstaff, AZ).
revenue from your annual appeals?
“As much as possible, make sure you can track all the money that comes in
Or are you spending more and
to your organization for each fundraising program,” Ferris says. “For example,
netting less?
you will want to know how much you have raised from special events, annual
Monitor your yearly
mailings, advertisements, etc. If you can track it back to the program it originated
average gift size as one way to
from, that will help you analyze those programs later in the development of your
measure direct mail acquisition
fundraising plan.”
effectiveness. If your average yearly
In addition to identifying the revenue from each of your fundraising programs,
gift is on the rise, for instance, you
you will also need to calculate the expenses, says Ferris. She shares two ways to
can assume your direct mail appeals
do that:
have become more effective, thanks
1. Calculate your expenses based on true net. The true net of an event or
to current donors giving at higher
program includes two additional things that organizations don’t always
levels, first-time contributors giving
accommodate for, she says. They are 1) how much staff time it takes, and 2)
at higher levels, or both. Whatever
how much volunteer time it takes. “When we calculated the true net for one
the case, however, tracking yearly
organization that conducted an annual four-day event held over a holiday, they
average gift size should help you
ended up netting somewhere in the neighborhood of $6,000 to $10,000 for the
draw conclusions about future direct
event,” she says. “That was not worth the four days of heavy staff work.”
mail efforts.
One word of advice: Consider
2. Benchmark your expenses against other programs. Some sectors have
pulling larger one-time gifts out
benchmarks you can compare yourself against, but if you don’t have a benchof the equation to provide a more
marking tool in your nonprofit area, Ferris recommends segmenting revenue
accurate representation of average
by individual giving, planned giving, foundation giving and corporate giving,
gift size.
then determining what percentage of your revenue comes from each area. “For
instance, some organizations are going to have a huge percentage of revenue
coming from foundations,” she says. “Others will have a large percentage
of revenue coming from corporate support.”
Average Gift Size — 2006-2011
What you’re looking for, says Ferris, is whether your percentages line
$60
up with the GivingUSA statistics. These statistics are available online at
www.givingusa.org.
$50
“GivingUSA (Glenview, IL) tracks charitable giving in the USA in
$40
four areas — individual, corporate, bequests and foundations,” says Ferris.
$20
“You want 75 percent, or at least the majority of your contributions, to be
$10
from individuals. Individuals are going to be your most stable source of
$0
renewable income. If they aren’t right now, that will give you an opportunity to plan for the future and try to move things toward that 75 percent.”
Source: Alice L. Ferris, Partner, GoalBusters Consulting, LLC, Flagstaff, AZ.
Phone (928) 606-1692. E-mail: alice.ferris@goalbusters.net
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
41
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
MONITOR PROGRESS & EVALUATE SUCCESS
Complete a Year-end Report
Whether your fiscal year ends in December, June or July, make time to complete
a year-end written report that summarizes and analyzes your development shop.
Both the process and final document will provide insight into planning future goals
and objectives.
The report should include:
1. Data on gifts — Total revenue raised over/below goal; percentage increase/
decrease over previous year; where the funds were directed (general
operations, endowment, capital, etc.).
2. Data on donors — Number of donors compared to previous year; number/
percentage of unfulfilled pledges; percentage of funds raised from various
sources (businesses, individuals, foundations, board members, etc.); number/
percentage of first-time gifts.
Conduct a Year-end
Gift Comparison
If you haven’t yet done so, do
a comparison of all annual gifts
received last fiscal year prior to Dec.
31 to see who’s missing from this
year’s contributors. Then contact
them now.
3. Summary of fundraising methods/programs — Direct mail appeals;
telesolicitation; community campaign; face-to-face calls; special events; etc.
4. Budget issues — Line items that were significantly over/under budget and
why.
5. Personnel issues — Employee vacancies; key performance issues; instances
in which the staff/individuals exceeded or failed to meet expectations.
6. Summary of shortcomings/disappointments — Programs/fundraising
methods that failed to meet expectations; internal/external factors impacting
fundraising efforts.
7. Summary of key accomplishments — First-time initiatives; instances in
which goals were met/exceeded; department/individual awards; individual
performance accomplishments.
8. Key recommendations — Specific changes recommended for upcoming
fiscal year.
Are You Working Your Plan?
It’s a significant accomplishment to prepare a written operational plan that outlines
fundraising strategies for the year. But it shouldn’t stop there. Be sure to work your
plan as your fiscal year unfolds. Do that by:
 Referring to it at regularly scheduled staff meetings.
 Setting benchmarks throughout the year that compare the document’s
deadlines to actual results.
 Making notes on your operational plan that should be discussed or can be
incorporated into next year’s document.
Monitor Progress of Your Fundraising Efforts
On a monthly or quarterly basis, produce and review a report that shows who gave
last year by this date but hasn’t given yet this year. By regularly comparing that
data, you can follow up with nondonors before too much time elapses.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
42
Regularly Review Your
Top 100 Prospects
Your top 100 prospects represent a
dynamic, ever-changing group of
individuals.
To properly rank and steward
this important group, review your
list regularly — at least monthly —
and prioritize who should remain,
who should be added and who
should be moved to a lesser priority
(or inactive) level.
Include in this review process
criteria related to both capability
and inclination to give.
Give staff and highly involved
board members a list of your
current top prospects, along with
additional names not presently on
that list. Instruct those persons to
first review the list individually,
assigning a rating of 1, 2 or 3 beside
each prospect’s name — 1 meaning
keep on the list, 2 meaning discuss
for possible change in status, and 3
meaning recommendation to add to
the list.
Then, meet as a group and
compare your thoughts, and
adjust your top 100 prospect list
accordingly.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
MONITOR PROGRESS & EVALUATE SUCCESS
Complete a Comparative Analysis of Key Fundraising Actions
Whether you do it twice a year or once at the end of each fiscal year, it’s helpful to
compare key fundraising actions with what
was accomplished during the previous one Development Calls Evaluation
2007/08
2008/09
2009/10
to three-year period. These measurements
NUMBER OF FACE-TO-FACE CALLS
indicate — to both the person being mea Introduction to new prospects
sured and his/her supervisor — how actions
Individuals
stack up compared to previous years.
Businesses
If yearly fundraising results are up
Other
or down over a previous year, these results
Cultivation calls on former contributors
may give some indication as to why that
Individuals
may be the case. The annual comparison
Businesses
can also serve as an incentive to beat last
Other
year’s numbers.
Solicitation calls on new prospects
The chart pictured left shows some
actions you may wish to include in an indi Individuals
vidual’s comparative numbers.
Businesses
Other
Solicitation calls on former contributors
Individuals
Businesses
Other
Stewardship calls (thank-you calls)
Individuals
Businesses
Other
A full-size version of the chart can be
found in the appendix of this manual for
your personal use.
Track Last Year’s Contributors’ Current Year Giving
Your periodic gift report
may look something like this.
Sounds simple, but you’d be surprised by the number of development shops that
don’t track their last fiscal year’s contributors. Whether you have a computer program that will do it, or it’s done manually, develop a report that lists, alphabetically, every one of last fiscal year’s donors along with his or her gift amount and the
current year’s target amount. Then, as you proceed through the year, periodically
mark everyone who’s been solicited and has given to date. This helps to better
visualize where you’re at in gift retention and helps prevent past contributors from
falling through the cracks.
2010-11 Donor Retention Report
2009-10 Contributors 06/10 Amount Abbas, Richard
Acme Printing
Anthony, Susan
Bedell, Richard/Emily
Bosco Pharmacy
Byron, Noel
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
$ 150
$ 400
$ 250
$ 75
$ 250
$1,000
05/11 Target 05/11 Actual
$ 200
$ 200
$ 500
$ 500
$ 300
$ 100
$ 75
$ 300
$ 1,500
43
Comments
Fall phonathon
Personal call: 8/7
Community campaign
Fall phonathon
Community campaign
Personal call: 11/10
www.stevensoninc.com
The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
MONITOR PROGRESS & EVALUATE SUCCESS
Form Provides Helpful Way to Monitor Activity
All too often, procrastination and other distractions prevent development personnel
from carrying out those functions that are most critical –– making regular contact
with prospects and donors.
Recording that activity weekly helps to reinforce its importance among all
involved.
If you manage others who are responsible for calling on prospects and donors
as a part of their responsibilities, it’s important to have them regularly record their
activity.
Why? For several reasons. First, doing so helps them more accurately analyze
how their time is being spent. Second, it helps you, as the manager, to monitor how
their time is being used. And finally, the written report provides a lasting record
that can be used to improve effectiveness as you plan subsequent years’ goals and
objectives.
Whether staff track cultivation and solicitation activity via computer software,
their PDA or with a simple pen and notebook, the report should include the kinds
of information provided on the weekly calls report depicted below.
A similar blank weekly calls report can
be found in the appendix of this manual
for your personal use.
Weekly Calls Report
Methodist Medical
Center
Name_________________________________________ Week of_ ______________________________________
Name of Appt. Corres- Phone Intro. Cultivation Solicitation Stewardship
Prospect/Donor Date Set pondence Call Call Call Call Call Comments
Monitor Progress of Operational Plan at Staff Meetings
After you and your staff complete the important process of establishing a yearlong
operational plan — including goals and quantifiable objectives, strategies, action
plans and a master calendar — how do you monitor its progress throughout the
year?
To be sure you’re on track, include notebooks at regular staff meetings that
can serve as a way to measure progress toward fundraising and other related goals.
The notebooks should include:
A copy of your operational plan.
q
Each meeting’s agenda.
q
Assignments that grow out of each meeting (with corresponding deadlines).
q
Periodic reports (e.g., annual fund updates, evaluation summaries of events, etc.).
q
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
44
Evaluation Tip

Send a memo to all employees
quarterly asking them to share
accomplishments related to
their departments and those
served by your organization.
These accomplishments may
provide fodder needed for an
upcoming appeal letter.
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
MONITOR PROGRESS & EVALUATE SUCCESS
Compare Completed
Calls at Weekly Meetings
If time doesn’t allow you to review
individually completed calls during
staff meetings, you should at least
review the number of face-to-face
calls completed that week.
Some development teams will
use staff meetings to review who’s
called upon whom, what action
took place and what type of followup should occur. But available time
doesn’t always allow for group
review of each prospect’s current
status.
Reviewing a summary of
face-to-face calls, however, should
be a must for any development
office. Doing so on a regular basis
illustrates:
1. Who among your staff is
completing the most calls
for a given week. (A little
competition can be healthy.)
Make Board Contacts Regular and Meaningful
How often do you make contact with board members on an individual basis?
If building a can-do board is a priority for you, then making time to meet oneon-one with board members should be a priority as well.
Individual contacts with board members helps you strengthen their relationship with your organization in many ways, including:
1. Educating board members on matters you consider to be priorities.
2. Demonstrating your interest in and appreciation for them.
3. Enabling you to learn more about your board members’ skills, interests and circles of influence that may be of value to your cause.
Individual contacts with board members should be regular, but at irregular intervals and appropriate, not contrived. Each meeting should have a clear objective
in mind: to ask for a commitment of time, to clarify an issue or to seek the board
member’s advice, for instance.
By planning and monitoring your meetings with individual board members,
you will not only create a more cohesive board, but also motivate members to new
levels of involvement and ownership of your cause.
Springhill College
YEARLY BOARD MEMBER
CONTACT REPORT
Board Member ________________________________
For Year Ending ________________________________
DATE OF
CONTACT
CONTACT
TYPE
OBJECTIVE
FOLLOW-UP
COMMENTS
JAN.
2. What type of prospect/donor
action has taken place (e.g.,
cultivation, solicitation).
FEB.
3. Total team accomplishments
with regard to face-to-face
contacts.
MAR.
APR.
Maintaining weekly call statistics over time also provides an
historical measurement from which
to establish future goals.
MAY
JUNE
JULY
AUG.
A full-size version of the chart shown to
the right can be found in the apprendix of
this manual for your personal use.
SEPT.
OCT.
NOV.
DEC.
Contact Type
V = Personal Visit
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
T = Telephone
45
C = Correspondence
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The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
MONITOR PROGRESS & EVALUATE SUCCESS
Identify Who’s Not Giving and Why
Since it’s a proven fact that it’s far less costly — both financially and in terms of
time — to retain donors than it is to acquire new ones, doesn’t it make sense to pay
close attention to who’s not giving and to know why?
Whether you’re evaluating current fiscal year donors or analyzing those from
the past year, it’s important to identify all lybunts — those who gave last year but
not this year — and attempt to understand why they chose not to support your effort.
Doing so may yield clues to changes that may be needed in the way you conduct
certain development functions and also point out how you can reverse nondonors’
giving decisions in the upcoming year.
Maintain a monthly or quarterly lybunt identification report, such as the example illustrated here, that monitors who’s not giving throughout the year. Periodic
review of such a report might even prevent some donor attrition during the current
year if you are aware of why individuals are choosing not to contribute at present.
In some instances, it may simply be a matter of timing. Whether or not you are able A full-size version of the chart shown
to save them as donors for the current fiscal year, you will have a ready list of those below can be found in the appendix of
whom you should reapproach in the upcoming year.
this manual for your personal use.
Date_________________________
LYBUNT IDENTIFICATION REPORT
Constituent Donor Type
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Last Year’s Gift Amount
46
Previous Gift Designation
This Year’s
Solicitation Date
Reason for
Not Contributing
www.stevensoninc.com
The Operational Plan: How to Create a Yearlong Fundraising Plan — 2011/2012 Edition
APPENDIX
2011/2012
Appendix of Forms and Documents
Organization is crucial to effective fundraising operations. Feel free to copy the following forms to
systematize your organization, department or office, or use them as a starting point to develop your
own operational plan suited to your specific programs and circumstances.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
47
www.stevensoninc.com
Yearly Operational Plan
KEY GOALS: (Example: To provide 20 percent of XYZ’s annual operating budget through unrestricted gifts.)
1.___________________________________________________________________________
2.___________________________________________________________________________
3.___________________________________________________________________________
QUANTIFIABLE OBJECTIVES: (Example: To generate $570,000 in unrestricted gift revenue.)
Objective No. 1:___________________________________________________________________
Fundraising Strategies That Address Objective No. 1: (Note: You will need to develop an action plan
that addresses each of your fundraising strategies in more detail.)
a)________________________________________________________________________
b)________________________________________________________________________
c)________________________________________________________________________
d)________________________________________________________________________
e)________________________________________________________________________
Objective No. 2:___________________________________________________________________
Fundraising Strategies That Address Objective No. 2:
a)________________________________________________________________________
b)________________________________________________________________________
c)________________________________________________________________________
d)________________________________________________________________________
e)________________________________________________________________________
Objective No. 3:___________________________________________________________________
Fundraising Strategies That Address Objective No. 3:
a)________________________________________________________________________
b)________________________________________________________________________
c)________________________________________________________________________
d)________________________________________________________________________
e)________________________________________________________________________ 2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Objective No. 4:___________________________________________________________________
Fundraising Strategies That Address Objective No. 4:
a)________________________________________________________________________
b)________________________________________________________________________
c)________________________________________________________________________
d)________________________________________________________________________
e)________________________________________________________________________
Objective No. 5:___________________________________________________________________
Fundraising Strategies That Address Objective No. 5:
a)________________________________________________________________________
b)________________________________________________________________________
c)________________________________________________________________________
d)________________________________________________________________________
e)________________________________________________________________________
Objective No. 6:___________________________________________________________________
Fundraising Strategies That Address Objective No. 6:
a)________________________________________________________________________
b)________________________________________________________________________
c)________________________________________________________________________
d)________________________________________________________________________
e)________________________________________________________________________ 2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
PAST METHODS FOR GENERATING FUNDS
-
PROGRAM ESTIMATED COST
ESTIMATED
STAFF TIME
Fiscal Year
PROSPECT POOL
NO. OF DONORS
REVENUE
GENERATED
/
PROJECTION
DIRECT MAIL
1. 2. 3. 4. TELESOLICITATION
1. 2. 3. 4. FACE-TO-FACE CALLS
WEBSITE GIFTS
SPECIAL EVENTS
1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. FDTN/CORP PROPOSALS
TOTAL REVENUE
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
$
$
Potential Fundraising Success
Fundraising Techniques:
Priority:
Risk:
Description:
EasyQ:
Gain Potential:
Advantages:
Notes:
Disadvantages:
Notes:
Typical Prospect:
Prospects:
Resources Needed:
Reminders/ Caveats:
To Do Immediately
Date Done To Do Long Term
Resources:
Done
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Costs
Date Done
MONTHLY ANNUAL GIVING REPORT
for month ending Donor/ProspectNo. of
GroupDonors/Prospects
Amount/
Avg. Gift Size
Increase/Decrease
Over Previous Year
Repeat Donors
Increased Donors
Decreased Donors
First-time Donors
Lybunts
Sybunts
Total Donors/Gifts
/
Annual Gift Goal:
Gifts/pledges To Date:
__________________
Over/under Goal:
Lybunt Potential:
Sybunt Potential:
__________________
Over/under Goal:
KEY 30-DAY STRATEGIES:
1.______________________________________________________________________________
2.______________________________________________________________________________
3.______________________________________________________________________________
4.______________________________________________________________________________
5.______________________________________________________________________________
6.______________________________________________________________________________
7.______________________________________________________________________________
8.______________________________________________________________________________
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Annual Giving Patterns
/ / Alumni Donor retention rate
No. first-time donors
Average gift size
Local non-alums
Donor retention rate
No. first-time donors
Average gift size
Non-local alums
Donor retention rate
No. first-time donors
Average gift size
Businesses
Donor retention rate
No. first-time donors
Average gift size
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
/ / / / Business Prospect Profile & Anticipated Moves Schedule
Name of Business
Address
City
State
C
ompany Contacts
Known Gift Recipients
Matching gift company?
Published gift/grant guidelines? Formal gifts committee/process? Links to our organization:
1.
2.
ZIP
Titles
Phone
Approx. Date
Gift Use
 Yes
 Yes
 Yes  No
 No
 No
3.
4.
Likely gift/sponsorship opportunities based on what we know today:
1.
3.
2.
4.
Anticipated plan for introduction:
Who
When Anticipated cultivation moves:
When
What
By Whom
Gift Use
By Whom
Objective
Target amount: $_ _______
Anticipated solicitation:
When
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
CULTIVATION POSSIBILITIES MENU
Prospect ____________________________________________________________________
Date _______________________________________________________________________
Objective
Steps To Be Taken
To involve one or more family
members of the prospect.... 1. _ ________________________________________
_________________________________________
2. _ ________________________________________ _ ________________________________________
To recognize or honor the prospect....
1. ________________________________________
________________________________________
2. ________________________________________
________________________________________
To help the prospect more fully
understand and appreciate the work of our organization....
To make the prospect more aware
of the level of gift required... 1. ________________________________________
________________________________________
2. _ _______________________________________
________________________________________
1. ________________________________________
________________________________________
2. _ _______________________________________
_ _______________________________________
To better determine the prospect’s potential funding interests.... 1. ________________________________________
________________________________________
2. ________________________________________
_ _______________________________________
To engage the prospect in realizing greater ownership of our agency
and its programs....
1. _ _______________________________________
_ _______________________________________
2. _ _______________________________________
_ _______________________________________
Other objectives/steps....
1. _ _______________________________________
_ _______________________________________
2. ________________________________________
________________________________________
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Development Calls Evaluation
/ NUMBER OF FACE-TO-FACE CALLS
Introduction to new prospects
Individuals
Businesses
Other
Cultivation calls on former contributors
Individuals
Businesses
Other
Solicitation calls on new prospects
Individuals
Businesses
Other
Solicitation calls on former contributors
Individuals
Businesses
Other
Stewardship calls (thank-you calls)
Individuals
Businesses
Other
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
/ / Weekly Calls Report
Name: Week of: Name of Prospect/Donor Date
Appt. Corres-
Set pondence
Phone
Call
Intro.
Call
Cultivation SolicitationStewardship
Call
Call
Call Appt. Corres-
Set pondence
Phone
Call
Intro.
Call
Cultivation SolicitationStewardship
Call
Call
Call Appt. Corres-
Set pondence
Phone
Call
Intro.
Call
Cultivation SolicitationStewardship
Call
Call
Call Appt. Corres-
Set pondence
Phone
Call
Intro.
Call
Cultivation SolicitationStewardship
Call
Call
Call Appt. Corres-
Set pondence
Phone
Call
Intro.
Call
Cultivation SolicitationStewardship
Call
Call
Call Comments:
Name of Prospect/Donor Date
Comments:
Name of Prospect/Donor Date
Comments:
Name of Prospect/Donor Date
Comments:
Name of Prospect/Donor Date
Comments:
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
LYBUNT IDENTIFICATION REPORT
Date________________________________________
Constituent Donor Type
Last Year’s Previous Gift This Year’s
Reason for
Gift Amount Designation Solicitation Date Not Contribut.
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
YEARLY BOARD MEMBER
CONTACT REPORT
Board Member_ ________________________________
For Year Ending_ ________________________________
DATE OF
CONTACT
CONTACT
TYPE
OBJECTIVE
FOLLOW-UP
JAN.
FEB.
MAR.
APR.
MAY
JUNE
JULY
AUG.
SEPT.
OCT.
NOV.
DEC.
Contact Type
V = Personal Visit
T = Telephone
C = Correspondence
2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
COMMENTS
YEARLY TIMETABLE
(Details of who does what when, events, mailings, etc.)
Action/Event Date/Deadline 2011 © Stevenson, Inc.
Person Responsible