The fundraising ecosystem in the world has changed drastically over the years. A fundraising strategy that keeps current trends in mind becomes all the more important to nonprofits. A robust fundraising strategy is crucial in reaching out to and encouraging individuals to donate. There are numerous factors that must be considered – the number of human resources, the target audience, time constraints, the budget, and the goal of the fundraiser.

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Creating a Strategy

When you are setting out to create your nonprofit’s fundraising strategy, here are the elements to keep in mind!

Step 1: Keep Vision in Mind

Your principles and values that govern the fundraising efforts must come from the vision of your organization. For instance, nonprofits can choose to keep a campaign independent of powerful political entities or avoid partnering with industries and companies that are known to violate labour regulations. This allows you to choose which sources of donations are acceptable and which are not.

Step 2: Assess Goals

The next crucial step is in understanding how your nonprofit’s budget for that program over the next 5 years would look like. This is usually an iterative process, starting off with big goals, and slowly bringing them down based on the external context, internal capacity, and other actors. This will give you a realistic idea of what gaps your fundraising strategies and efforts need to fill, keeping your future investments and current commitments in mind.

Step 3: Consider the Fundraising Mix

Diverse project funding is critical in ensuring that you have a steady stream of donations from numerous sources. A diversified fundraising strategy is crucial in maximising the donations that you receive from the various fronts. Here are the 4 types of funding and the resources you need to obtain them.

CSR Funding

This type of funding is usually program or theme-focused and is in shorter bursts (such as 1 year). There is a specific focus area, and the projects are centred around this.

The first step to finding the right companies is to map out the landscape of companies and the sectors that they support. Corporate friends and board members with good connections are crucial in finding out this information.

Typically, corporates like to involve their own members and employees in the program. Several corporates prefer to set up programs in the vicinity of their offices and factories. They are also looking for ways in which the programs can benefit their own employees.

Institutional Funding

These grants are typically received from philanthropic trusts and foundations. Usually, these entities have some thematic focus, and they look for projects coming under these areas. They can add an incredible amount of value to grow and expand certain programs, and could potentially cover the cost of the whole project.

A critical element in effectively fundraising on an institutional grant is to have a project proposal writer who thoroughly understands the program. They will have to map the various international and domestic opportunities and apply them at the right time. There must be a consistent point of contact for all the donors. Different parts of the program can apply to different grants. Finally, they must be able to report on time and update the donors regularly about key milestones.

Retail Fundraising

Retail fundraising involves collecting small donations from a large number of people, on a fairly regular basis. It is usually done by speaking to several people in a day and convincing them to join your community of donors. The best part about retail fundraising is that the amount of money you can raise is unrestricted since it isn’t tied to any project or activity.

The challenge with retail fundraising is that it is resource-heavy. You will need a team that can reach out to potential donors and retain current ones, on a regular basis. A data analytics team is also needed to identify how to improve the retention and acquisition of donors using data.

Most nonprofits outsource this work in the beginning and then choose to build the team after they understand how to carry out the functions.

Digital Fundraising

Using digital mediums such as websites and social media to raise money is becoming increasingly popular. Driving traffic through both online as well as offline engagements to your platform is something every nonprofit must do in 2021.

For digital fundraising to be successful, it is important to create campaigns that narrate powerful stories to people, to encourage them to take action. A robust digital marketing team is a must, who actively push out messages on social media and other online platforms.

Step 4: Involve Your Whole Team

Perhaps the most important step with any fundraising strategy is to have the buy-in of the entire organisation. All the individuals and teams involved in the project must believe in the program or campaign so that they can pick themselves up and try again if they fail.

 

Final Notes

Now that you have a better understanding of how to create an effective fundraising strategy for your nonprofit, you can go ahead and draft one that is in line with your organization’s goals. With the right planning and execution, you can be assured of attracting donations from multiple avenues, while still retaining your old donors!