Monthly giving programs are becoming more and more popular revenue sources. If you want to nail your own monthly giving strategies to ramp up your nonprofit’s revenue, then join our Monthly Giving Intensive with Erica. You’ll get two jam-packed webinars, slides and handouts full of tips and specific strategies for building a robust, profitable monthly giving program. Erica will also give a live Makeover session of monthly giving materials.  You...

Earlier this week, I was talking with a client about their newsletter. It’s mailed to their monthly donors as a cultivation piece, with wonderful stories about how their gift has made a difference. It also goes to their active and major donors. The communications department creates the piece, and, of course, it looks absolutely amazing! But it is probably also going to mail a week or more late. The review process involves numerous people inside...

“If you don’t have a monthly donor program yet, you’d be wise to make that part of your plan for next calendar year and perhaps even sooner than that.” People often ask me why you should focus on this now? Well, if last year’s Harvey hurricane disaster is any indication: Monthly donors provide sustainable revenue, no matter what happens. Their gifts keep coming in, rain or shine! In essence, it’s an extra insurance policy for your...

“If you can’t fly, then run. If you can’t run, then walk. If you can’t walk, then crawl. But whatever you do, you have to keep moving forward.” — Martin Luther King, Jr. I love this quote because it’s so very true, especially when it comes to sustainers—no matter where you are in your monthly donor program. If you have a small number of them, you always want to be moving toward growing that number: to the next 50, to the next...

A colleague consultant asked me this question last week, and I was discussing this very same thing with another organization myself. Great timing! A nonprofit in the process of launching its monthly donor program has its annual gala coming up this spring. It’s a fancy event—heavy hors d’oeuvres, silent and live auction, including a “fund-a-need” focused on something they need for their program. Donors typically pay $100 to $150 for a...

St. Nick (or Sinterklaas as we called him) was part of my tradition growing up in Holland. Dec. 5 was when we received our gifts as kids. The night before, we’d put our shoe with some straw and carrots for St. Nick’s white horse in the corner of our living room. And he and his little helper black Pete would come and drop our gifts near our shoes. Here are two links to the explanation of this tradition. here or here. As we got older, we’d draw...

  Every year, the military base theater near us (Joint Base Cape Cod) organizes the annual Christmas tree lighting. It’s a fun event, with hot cocoa, peppermint sticks and a short visit of Santa, of course! As a military spouse myself (married to a 32-year Airforce veteran), we love our little theater, and this event is always a lot of fun. It’s so wonderful to see the little kids and adults enjoy themselves. The tree lighting is followed...

November is almost here. Many of you are probably working on your #GivingTuesday campaigns, or you may have other giving days you’re focused on. And of course everybody is on board with sending out several emails in the month of December. The question always comes up: Should we ask for monthly donors in our giving day emails and social media messaging? Well, if it were up to me, I’d say: Yes, absolutely! Try to get as many sustainers as you...

Yes, it’s true! Prime giving season is here. Everybody is on high alert. Printers are buzzing. Letter shops are stuffing appeals in overtime. Email drafts for #GivingTuesday and December are flying left and right. You’re pushing board members to commit to calling at least a few donors to say “thank you.” Some have said they’d be willing to come in and write personal notes on some of your appeal letters. And it all has to drop by Thanksgiving!...

This post was first published on the Charity How To blog. Before I got ‘hooked’ on monthly giving, I was already a direct mail ‘aficionado’. Why? Because direct mail works. Because people respond to it. Because you can measure what you’re doing. You can see how many fundraising messages you mail out and how many donations you receive back. But yet, so many people are no longer ‘trained’ in direct mail. They think that all donations are...

This post was written for and published by Bloomerang  More and more organizations now have a sustaining donor (monthly, quarterly, etc. donor) program. That’s great! Unfortunately, there can be a tendency not to continue appealing to them. But should you continue asking them for money? Can you send an appeal to your recurring donors? The answer is a resounding: YES, YES, YES! If you don’t, you’re missing out. The typical small shop that I have...

This post was prepared as a guest blog for Michael Rosen.  How can Nana Murphy make you a better fundraising professional? This is a post based upon the session I attended at the recent AFP International conference in Boston. Thank you, Michael, for sharing this post with your audience. The session I attended was called: From Ireland with Love, presented by Denisa Casement, CFRE, Head of Fundraising, Merchants Quay Ireland, Dublin,  Lisa...

A question fundraisers often ask me, is: “Can I send appeals to my monthly donors?” My answer is a resounding YES!! Sending annual appeals should be part of your ongoing cultivation and recognition process. Typically there’s this pause. Then they tell me: “But wait,  they’re already giving me a gift monthly. Wouldn’t these donors get upset and think we’ve become too greedy if we sent them an appeal with...

This post was also published as a guest post on About.com  Fundraising, thanks Joanne Fritz! As you know, I’ve been writing about what to do when starting a monthly giving program. Recently, I’ve been talking to a lot of clients about their programs and helping them become more successful. What I found was that those organizations that were struggling to grow their program, undoubtedly were doing one or more of the following 7 no-no’s. The good...

Another Monthly giving myth debunked… You do not have to have a large staff to run a monthly giving program! You can certainly start small by just offering the program online.  But you must be committed and everybody must understand that everything you do is aimed at generating long term revenue growth. It’s less important what the size of your staff is, but rather the commitment that counts! I recently did a presentation for a group of...

  I just came back from a conference, attended by some 1,700 people and I’m so excited! There were 4 (yes, four) sessions on monthly giving aka sustainers!! More and more organizations are finding that ‘sustainers are retainers’. Thank you Dan Allenby for this great word cloud. Many donor base systems are adding monthly giving options to make your life as a fundraiser easier. And research is growing. For example:...

I’m a true Direct mail junky! And I’ve been one for many years! Once I started working at Reader’s Digest, I got totally hooked. There’s a lot more to it than we know. Psychology, who are you mailing to, checking how people read, where do we put the picture, what’s a good headline, what’s the best story? Who signs the letter? What are we doing with the ask amounts, and so much more… But what I...