Moving From Fundraising to Financing

I’ve had a lot of great questions about the upcoming Financing Not Fundraising E-Course for nonprofit leaders. So I created a video that breaks the e-course down and explains exactly how it will work.

The Financing Not Fundraising E-Course is an excellent opportunity for nonprofits stuck in the starvation cycle to figure out what they can do to more effectively raise money and then create a plan for a more sustainable financial engine. The registration fee is per organization, so if you would like your executive director, development director and a board member, for example, to participate, they all can for one fee. You will just simply appoint one person as representative of the organization to participate in the coaching calls, and the others are free to “listen in” and help you with each step along the way.

The total time commitment over the course of two months is approximately 10-15 hours, which includes the webinars, coaching calls, Google Hangouts and homework assignments.

This E-Course is truly an investment in the future of your organization. By making the investment of the time and cost you will transform the money engine of your organization and recoup that investment many, many times over.

Watch the video below (or click here) to learn more. And if you have additional questions about the E-course, don’t hesitate to send me an email at nell@socialvelocity.net.

Register for the Financing Not Fundraising E-Course here

I hope you can join us!

Tags: financing not fundraising, fundraising plan, fundraising planning, fundraising training, nonprofit board of directors, nonprofit development director, nonprofit executive director, nonprofit fundraising, nonprofit sustainability, nonprofit webinars, training for nonprofit leaders

Announcing New Financing Not Fundraising E-Course for Nonprofit Leaders

I’ve been talking lately about nonprofits needing to make more investments in their organization, in their sustainability, and in their future. Well, I have the perfect opportunity for you to do just that. I’m excited to announce the newest Social Velocity tool — the Financing Not Fundraising E-Course. Over the course of two months I will be leading a group of 15 nonprofit Executive and Development Directors to determine what’s holding them back from raising more money and create a comprehensive financing plan for their organizations.

This e-course will take you from Fundraising to Financing. We’ll start with a fundraising assessment of where your organization currently is in your efforts to bring money in the door, and we’ll end with a comprehensive, actionable financing plan to move your organization forward.

Here’s how it will work:

• We’ll kick off with a webinar to help everyone understand what a fundraising assessment looks like and what it includes.
• Everyone will be sent away to complete the detailed fundraising assessment I will provide them.
• I will then analyze each individual fundraising assessment.
• The 15 participants will be split into two groups. I will lead a 90-minute coaching session with each group to go individual-by-individual to explain what their fundraising assessment revealed and where they should focus their change efforts.
• After the coaching sessions I’ll host an informal Google Hangout where participants can discuss questions, hurdles they are encountering, where they need help.
• Then I’ll lead a second webinar to explain how to create a financing plan.
• I’ll give everyone a Financing Plan template and detailed instructions on how to create their own financing plan.
• Then I’ll analyze everyone’s completed financing plan.
• We’ll do a second round of coaching sessions where I will go individual-by-individual to explain where their financing plans can be improved.
• We’ll end with a final Google Hangout where everyone can discuss, ask questions, get support and move forward.
• And throughout the process you can always reach out to me via phone and email with additional questions or for guidance.

The registration fee for the e-course is $499.

Of course I’m biased, but to me this investment just makes sense. With this e-course you can set your nonprofit on a path to a much larger, more sustainable financial engine. This is about making an investment now in order to enjoy a much larger payoff down the road.

If you want to learn more about the e-course and register click here. Or, if you have additional questions or wonder if the e-course is right for you, email me at nell@socialvelocity.net.

If you’d like to join us, register soon. The e-course is limited to 15 people, and it’s already filling fast.

I hope to see you there!

Register Now for the Financing Not Fundraising E-Course

Tags: financing not fundraising, fundraising strategy, nonprofit executive director, nonprofit fundraising plan, nonprofit fundraising training, nonprofit investment, nonprofit roadblocks, nonprofit strategy, nonprofit webinars, overcoming nonprofit hurdles, raising more money

Investing in a Sustainable Nonprofit Future

I wrote last month about the crippling nonprofit fear of investment. Related to that, nonprofits need to understand and embrace the concept of Return on Investment. Nonprofit leaders often exist in such a world of scarcity that they don’t recognize that an investment today can have a huge payoff down the road. And not recognizing the value of a return on investment, particularly when it comes to a nonprofit’s fundraising function, can keep nonprofits in starvation mode.

One of the ways I consult with nonprofits is coaching a development director or executive director to increase money flowing to the organization. We work on getting board members to bring money in the door, identifying new donors, crafting a compelling message, launching new revenue streams, developing an overall financing plan.

This work could have a huge future payout:

• Board members no longer sit on their hands but actively recruit new donors to the organization.
• New donors are acquired through a thoughtful, strategic major donor campaign.
• A compelling case for investment convinces foundations and major donors to invest at higher levels and for longer periods.
• A new earned income stream brings in unrestricted revenue.
• An effective financing plan puts scarce resources to their highest and best use.

If you think of this in terms of return on investment it’s a no-brainer. You have two options:

1. Continue to struggle day-to-day for the foreseeable future, or
2. Make an investment today in order to dramatically increase funding and sustainability tomorrow

Let’s do the math. If a nonprofit with a budget of $1 million were to spend, say $5,000 on hands-on coaching to develop a financing plan, create a compelling case for investment, get their board engaged in fundraising, and launch a major donor campaign those elements could translate into well over $100,000 of new money annually for the nonprofit.

Here’s how:

• A financing plan clarifies and marshals resources so staff and board know exactly where the money flows and who will do what to make it happen. The very act of creating and monitoring a financing plan could increase funding by 5%, or $50,000.
• A case for investment, when done well, becomes the backbone of any and all money-raising efforts. It can be integrated into your website, your social media efforts, your donor letters, your presentations. Telling a concise, compelling story makes donors sit up and take notice and adds perhaps another 2% increase, or $20,000.
• If your entire board starts (in their own unique ways) bringing money in the door that could increase your bottomline as well. If each member of a 15-person board starts to increase their own giving and/or the giving of those in their network by $1,000 each, that’s another $15,000.
• A major donor campaign charts a logical, strategic way for you to identify and acquire new donors. Getting strategic about how you find and recruit those donors will ensure much greater success, perhaps a 5% increase, or $50,000.

So with very conservative estimates the original $5,000 investment in coaching translates to $135,000 in new money every year thereafter.

My favorite example of this is when I helped KLRU, Austin’s PBS station use $350,000 in capacity capital to do many of the above things. After 3 years of implementing a new financing plan, using a new case for investment, and more, they were raising $1.6 million in NEW REVENUE each year. That’s a huge return on investment.

If you make a smart investment in improving the money engine of your nonprofit, that investment will pay off many times over, creating a more secure financial future for your organization.

If you’d like to learn more about how I coach nonprofit staff to bring more money in the door, check out my Coaching services, or send me an email to schedule a time to talk further.

Photo Credit: MeckiMac

Tags: case for investment, case for support, foundation donors, fundraising function, individual donors, major donor campaign, nonprofit development director, nonprofit executive director, nonprofit fear of investment, nonprofit financing plan, nonprofit fundraising, nonprofit fundraising plan, nonprofit return on investment

Do Nonprofit Leaders Have Time to Be Bold?

A reader of my blog post earlier this month, From Nonprofit Scarcity to Social Change Abundance, took issue with my argument that nonprofit leaders need to be more bold. He believes that I, and others, should stop telling nonprofit leaders to chart bolder goals because nonprofit leaders simply don’t have the time or resources. I think his comments and our subsequent exchange (you can read the whole comment string here) illustrate the self-imposed limitations that hold some nonprofits back.

In his comment on my blog post, Dan Owens argues that nonprofits are not at fault for limiting their goals. Nonprofits’ very lack of resources holds them back, and it is unreasonable to try to push nonprofits to be more bold:

Nonprofits everywhere are working incredibly hard to solve some of the toughest challenges our society has to offer. Even truly great nonprofits…are stretched to capacity, and even those who embrace all the latest trends and business models cannot solve all the problems they seek to address. The money doesn’t exist, and without sustained and increased federal funding for nonprofits and those they serve, we will not be able to solve the problems we hope to achieve, including childhood hunger…Nonprofits need more resources. You’re right in saying that nonprofit leaders often design plans based upon last year’s fundraising figures. But they have very good reasons to be afraid, and to worry for the future and the clients they serve. They don’t have the freedom and money to make those “pie in the sky plans”…most nonprofit have to fight and scrap for every dollar they have, contributed, earned or applied for. And then they have to do it all again the next year. Is it any wonder they operate as they do?

But my point with the blog post, and really my point with the entire blog and Social Velocity in general, is that nonprofits have to break out of the starvation cycle of never having enough to do more. Instead of embracing the fact that the nonprofit sector is incredibly under-resourced, nonprofits must see past that and envision a future where they have everything they need to accomplish bold social change. It is the very act of turning scarcity on its head that creates abundance, as I point out to Dan:

You have clearly delineated many of the funding problems inherent in the nonprofit sector. There is no doubt that nonprofits need more resources. But the only way that will happen is if nonprofits become more bold, not just with “pie in the sky plans” (which I, by the way, think are absolutely critical) but also by being more bold with funders, government regulators…board members. My whole point with the Financing Not Fundraising series, and really this blog overall, is that nonprofits must break out of the cycle of “fighting and scrapping for every dollar they have.” That is an unsustainable scenario. Instead of accepting the shortcomings of the current funding for the nonprofit sector, let’s get bold about asking for more. But that request must be made in the name of bold goals for social change.

Still seeing the current hurdles standing in the way of bold goals in the nonprofit sector, Dan wonders if the solution might lie in separating nonprofit leaders from the day-to-day work of their organizations so that they have the time and space for envisioning true social change:

I believe one of our greatest challenges is to get those in the nonprofit sector with the real knowledge (usually EDs working on the ground) to have the time and space to work up the bold (and yes, fearless) ideas. Everywhere I have worked I have had the all-too-rare conversation with the ED or program director who can articulate the overall bold vision but cannot see how that can be achieved within the current framework and particularly without harming those they currently serve- because the disruptive innovation necessary would take resources away from current programs…I heard a great speaker recently who [had a great idea for change] but she never really had the chance to build the idea out until she took a few weeks off from her job and was able to really focus on specifics and practical considerations. Perhaps that is what we need more of — sabbaticals, and then planning to implement the bold ideas.

Again, I believe this is the wrong approach. Bold action must be part of the day-to-day work of the organization. We can no longer separate big picture strategy from the day-to-day work of the nonprofit sector. Every effort, every resource, every staff member must be engaged in the larger vision of social change. It must become part of the everyday culture of the nonprofit sector, not just the purview of the elite few at the top, or an exercise conducted a few times per year.

If we are going to truly break free of the hamster wheel and make social change a reality, we must make bold vision part of every day life in the sector.

What do you think? Do the resource constraints of the nonprofit sector stand in the way of big, bold goals?

Photo Credit: cdrussorusso

Tags: challenges of nonprofits, fearless nonprofits, financing not fundraising, nonprofit bold goals, nonprofit executive director, nonprofit hamster wheel, nonprofit overhead, nonprofit planning, nonprofit starvation cycle, nonprofit strategy

Reader Question: How to Make Time for Strategy

I announced last month that I was recommitting to the Reader Question Series on the blog. I received some really great questions, thanks to all of you who submitted a question. As I read through the questions, I thought it might make sense to combine two of my new year’s resolutions (the relaunched Reader Question series and using more video on the blog) into this new series. So I’m going to start answering the Reader Questions via video. Below is my answer to this great question from a reader:

“The executive director is often so busy putting out the day-to-day fires that they lose time to work on the big strategic goals. How can an ED break the cycle of jumping from crisis to crisis?”

If you have a question you’d like me to answer in an upcoming Reader Question video, send it to info@socialvelocity.net with the subject heading “Reader Question.” I look forward to reading your questions. Thanks!

Tags: blog questions, nonprofit board of directors, nonprofit challenges, nonprofit executive director, nonprofit leadership, nonprofit management, nonprofit questions, nonprofit resources, nonprofit roadblocks, nonprofit strategic planning, nonprofit strategy