Inside the 30 Days

What Actually Happens in the Year-End Appeal Kickstart

Renata is an executive director—and the only staff member—at a local nonprofit. She’s opened the Year-End Appeal Kickstart page three times this month. She wants in — but the last two programs she tried turned out to be a binder of templates and a Slack channel nobody used. She’s not asking if this works. She’s asking what do I actually get.

That’s a fair question. So here’s the honest, week-by-week answer.

Week 1: Get clear and grounded. Before you build anything, we look at where you are right now — your goal, your resources, your timeline. You leave the week with a clear, realistic picture of what you're working with and what you're working toward.

Week 2: Set a goal you can actually reach. We look at your past appeal performance — what worked, what didn't, what the numbers actually say. Then you set a revenue and donor goal grounded in reality, not wishful thinking.

Week 3: Build a plan that works. This is where it all comes together — action steps, budget, timeline, and a hard look at resource gaps. Not a generic template. Your plan, built around your organization's real capacity.

Week 4: Finalize and get buy-in. You leave with a complete appeal plan and a clear path to getting your board and leadership aligned. No loose ends. No "we'll figure out the rest later." A plan that's ready to execute.

That's the whole 30 days. Four weekly 60-minute Zoom sessions, starting September 8th. Spots are limited and a few are already spoken for.

If you've been circling this program the way Renata did, this hopefully helps clarify what you've been circling.

Ready to head into year-end with a real plan?