Ask most small nonprofit teams for their fundraising plan and you'll usually get one of two things: a budget line with a number on it, or a year-end appeal timeline. Sometimes both.
Neither one tells you what to do in April.
Here's what that looks like in real life. One of my clients needs to raise $500,000 to $750,000 a year. For years, the pattern was the same. The year-end appeal went out, and then nothing happened in the spring. By May and June, with the fiscal year about to close, the whole team was scrambling to hit the number.
Once they had a plan, they launched a Spring Appeal. Their annual fundraising went up 50%.
Same mission. Same donors. The spring finally had something in it.
A 12-month plan that works has four parts.
1. Your numbers, by stream. One total goal tells you how far you are from the finish line. Goals for each revenue stream tell you where the money is supposed to come from, and when to start worrying.
2. A calendar for all four quarters. Campaigns, communications, stewardship, major donor touches, and year-end, mapped before January starts. This is the part that would have saved my client's spring.
3. A few key performance indicators (KPIs) you'll actually check. A handful of numbers, reviewed once a month in about 20 minutes. That's enough to tell you in March that June is going to be tight, while there's still time to do something about it.
4. A donor strategy. Your donors grouped in a way that's useful, and a clear sense of what to say to each group. Without it, every appeal goes to everyone with the same message.
Then there's the piece most plans skip: a way to keep it alive. A monthly and quarterly check-in, and a plan for what you'll do when something goes off track. Because something will.
If you read that list and thought, "We have maybe one and a half of those," you're in good company. This is fixable.
Want to build all four with me?
That's what the Annual Fundraising Blueprint is for. It's five live working sessions on Wednesdays, January 13 through March 10, with office hours every week in between. You build each part of your plan with your own numbers, and you leave on March 10 with a 12-month plan your team can actually carry.
It's 12 seats. Plan on three to four hours a week while we're in it.
The waitlist gets first access on Tuesday, November 17, plus waitlist-only pricing: $1,497 (or four payments of $374.25). Public enrollment opens November 20 at $1,997.
To get first access and the waitlist price, join by Monday, November 16.
