Major Gifts Without Personal Visits
Major Gift fundraising requires personal relationships and in-person visits, leaving some Major gift Officers and non-profit executives wondering how they can keep their donors engaged during social distancing and self-quarantines.
There is good news on this front, however. With a bit of creativity, you can create very meaningful engagement and build a donor’s relationship with your organization without personal visits during this time. In fact, your non-profit’s good news might be exactly what your donors are needing right now.
While the 24-hour news cycle has many of us craving good news, the clients who benefit from your mission are messengers of hope. Each non-profit and their donor base are different, but I’d like to share a few examples of meaningful cultivation and stewardship opportunities you could try this week.
Invite an important donor to meet a recipient/client in a video call. For example, if your non-profit is a school, invite a scholarship recipient to join a video call with a scholarship donor. As the student and donor learn more about each other, they feel a connection that can’t be replicated with a visit from your staff. If your non-profit helps cancer patients navigate their cancer experience, invite a survivor to meet a major donor by video call. As the survivor shares his/her story of how your organization impacted him/her and helped through the cancer experience, your donors will experience a level of hope and pride that cannot be replicated! I encourage a member of your team to set up and join video calls and help orchestrate the conversation, posing key questions on the call. You can use Zoom, FaceTime, Facebook Messenger and other free services to conduct video calls with multiple parties.
Have a recipient/client create a video message for a specific donor. For example, a family receiving food from your food bank might take a home video of them at the dinner table thanking Mr. Smith for ensuring they have enough to eat. The more the recipient family is willing to share about themselves, the more meaningful it will be. Getting to know the personalities and interests of these family members will help those donors feel incredible joy about the impact they are having when they give to your food bank.
Tips to Maximize Impact
It’s not quite as easy as scheduling a call and letting fate take its course. Much like a donor visit, these will only move your donors along the fundraising relationship journey if you spend the time in advance scripting the questions you want to ask. Your clients/recipients should speak off the cuff, honestly and openly. But your staff should do the advance work of creating a script of questions to maximize the experience for your donors.
A sample list of questions might include (I am using a food back as an example. Questions should be edited to fit your mission):
(Donor), I’m delighted to introduce you to Jennifer and her family. I met Jennifer in October, and I could not be more proud that our food bank was able to provide assistance to Jennifer and her family at that time. I’m even more grateful today, knowing food deliveries are helping families like Jennifer’s stay safe and healthy during COVID-19. (Donor), would you mind sharing with Jennifer how you first became involved with our food bank?
(Recipient), how are things in your home today? Who else is with you as you self-quarantine?
(Recipient), what have food bank’s deliveries meant to you and your family this year?
Your conversations should not feel jilted or scripted, so limit your scripted questions to no more than 5 or 6, and allow free-flowing conversation in between. The goal is for your donor and recipient to genuinely feel as if they’ve gotten to know one another, not as if they were part of an interview experience.
Wrap up your videos with your own expressions of gratitude for both recipient and donor. Sharing your personal “why” for working at your non-profit will help both call participants feel your true passion for the mission and gratitude to both of them for being a part of what you love doing so much.
I’d love to hear more about how you are connecting with donors and creating meaningful engagement. Comment here, or email me at hollisconsulting.com to share your stories.