382: The Donor Journey – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guest this week:

Taylor Shanklin, vice president of marketing at Pursuant. 

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

378: Turbocharge Your Grants Fundraising – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guest this week:

John Hicks, principal and founder of DLBHICKS LLC consulting.

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

370: Recruiting Your Next CEO – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guest this week:

Dennis Miller, author of “A Guide to Recruiting Your Next CEO: The Executive Search Handbook for Nonprofit Boards.” 

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

316: 8 Areas Of Nonprofit Excellence – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guests this week:

Sharon Stapel, president & executive director of the Nonprofit Coordinating Committee, and Melkis Alvarez-Baez, deputy director.

Here’s the transcript

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

285: 8 Areas Of Nonprofit Excellence – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guests this week:

Michael Clark, former president of the Nonprofit Coordinating Committee of New York, and Melkis Alvarez-Baez, deputy director.

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

227: Design Strategy & Digital Strategy – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

tony_martignetti_300x300-itunes_image2Tony’s guests this week:

Matthew Scharpnick, co-founder & chief strategy officer at Elefint Designs.

Also, Amy Sample Ward, our social media contributor, CEO of Nonprofit Technology Network and co-author of “Social Change Anytime Everywhere.”

There’s more at tonymartignetti.com

110: Abbondanza Alliances and Claires Cliches – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

Tony’s guests this week:

Rosanna Imbriano, principal of RI Consulting and contributor to “Big Bold Business Advice from New Jewsey Womeon Business Owners”

Claire Meyerhoff, principal of The Planned Giving Agency and creative producer of Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

Read and watch more on Tony’s blog: http://tonymartignetti.com

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Zoho dahna oppcoll hello and welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for your for the other ninety five percent. I’m the aptly named host. Oh, do i hope you were with me last week? I’d be in distress if i learned that you had missed last week’s show, which started with small shop planned e-giving claire meyerhoff is the principle of the plan giving agency and this show’s creative producer. We talked about marketing gift planning in ways that are not same old, same old for small and midsize charities. Claire turned the tables and interviewed me at last year’s national conference on philanthropic planning and last week events technology, scott koegler was with me to help you with event planning, he shared free tools to collaborate with the volunteers, employees and vendors who were putting your events together. Scott is our regular technology contributor and the editor of non-profit technology news this week aban danza alliances roseanna imbriano a true italian and principle of our eye consulting encourages you to secure strategic alliances that expand your marketing and save your marketing budget because they cost you nothing and claire’s cliches. Claire meyerhoff returns two weeks in a row it’s too much already she’s, principal of the plan giving agency on dh, still creative producer of this show this week, she’s got cliches, plenty of cliches for you to avoid and simpler words to replace them. Jargon. Jail is sure to be overcrowded this week between the guests on tony’s take to my block this week is seven tips for small shop planned e-giving. I don’t think that requires any explanation. Are you on twitter while you’re listening? If you are, use the hashtag non-profit radio to join our conversation at this moment, we take a break, and when we returned roseanna imbriano and a bonanza alliances stay with me. They couldn’t limp dick, dick tooting, getting thinking, you’re listening to the talking alternative network, itching to get anything. E-giving, you could joined the metaphysical center of new jersey and the association for hyre awareness for two exciting events this fall live just minutes from new york city in pompton plains, new jersey, dr judith orloff will address her bestseller, emotional freedom, and greg brady will discuss his latest book, deep truth living on the edge. Are you ready for twelve twenty one twelve? Save the dates. Judith orloff, october eighteenth and greg brady in november ninth and tenth. For early bird tickets, visit metaphysical center of newjersey dot, or or a h a n j dot net. Hi, i’m donna, and i’m done were certified mediators, and i am a family and couples licensed therapists and author of please don’t buy me ice cream are show new beginnings is about helping you and your family recover financially and emotionally and start the beginning of your life. Will answer your questions on divorce, family, court, co, parenting, personal development, new relationships, blending families and more. Dahna and i will bring you to a place of empowerment and belief that even though marriages may end, families are forever. Join us every monday, starting september tenth at ten a m on talking alternative dot com. You’re listening to the talking alternative network. Welcome back to big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent with me now is roseanna imbriano. She is a marketing strategist and consultant, she’s, the owner of our consulting, which you’ll find it r ight consulting llc dot com she is past president of the essex chapter of new jersey association of women business owners and his marketing director for the center for italian and italian american culture. Mary-jo no, senora, welcome, amjad no, tony, actually bump a gritty joe. Oh, i’m stumped already. What does that mean? Good. I mean, good afternoon. Okay. Thank you. I said, well, good one, john doe is ok. Can i use that? Anytime? Of course. Okay. There’ll be plenty of opportunities for you to correct me, so don’t don’t don’t jump it small, small things that i get the half right. Well, you’ve already tagged me as a true italian, so i have to live with that. All right, all right. We’re talking about strategic alliances. Abbondanzieri, alliances. What is your definition of a strategic alliance? Ah, a strategic alliance. Our two entities that are committed to each other’s success. It’s that simple. That simple. Okay, what do they what sort? Of things, do they do they do together? What? Where they committed to each other’s success. Well, uh, first of all, because it’s beneficial to both of them, uh, you want to start when you’re dealing with a non-profit teo, look at where are their supporters coming from eyes their common thread. Is there something that is unique to both of them? And you start to develop a plan of what do they need to do together? What are their goals? What? What were they looking to accomplish? Okay, so i put it down on paper. Okay, so we’re starting to look. We’re sorry. Look, for commonalities, something in common maybe could be same constituency could be related. Work would be one’s work and maybe one’s interest in in joining that work. But they’re not currently doing it. Would that be acceptable, partner? Yes, acceptable. Someone whose mission statement is similar. Okay, i pulled the listeners before the show and asked, have you looked outside your organization for other charities or cos you can ally yours with? And i think it’s very positive. One hundred percent said yes, they have done that. And the other option was no, i better listen to the show, hopefully people other than the survey listeners are listening to the show because it is only that i mean the survey completed because it was only a survey complete er’s then they wouldn’t be listening to the show unless they wanted to get even more than just strategic alliances from it. So hopefully there’s other people, but i’m sure there are no yes, and it also is that maybe those people who actually doing things on and have developed these strategical lines can do it more efficiently. They want to learn more exactly it’s where they’re listening to the show. What? What a business development person you are for me. Thank you. So now we have identified that we can save some money at this too. These don’t need to be costly, right? Yes. It is a miss in the marketing community. Uh, that in order to create business or create revenue, you need to throw money at marketing. Okay, you don’t really have to spend thousands of dollars. Some of it is right underneath your nose in terms of developing business, it’s just a different way of thinking outside the box. And so for little. Or no money. We can also get sort of ah, multiplier effect, because you’re going to be learning and gaining from your your alliance partner correct, i have actually had non-profits i’m working with or have worked with in the past that have increased their donations, or they’re giving ten percent with a one strategic alliance, okay? And but of course, it doesn’t end with increased giving. You could maybe increase volunteers or maybe gained new board members, right? I mean, there’s other things besides just giving go ahead so well in the nonprofit world, we’re always looking to do a lot more with less, and we all know that if you have been in non-profit you know that especially in these economic times, so you’re trying to think outside the box of what can you d’oh? How can you multiply your success? Whether it’s having people attend an event, whether it’s donations, whether its membership, um, there’s so many different ways and you can have strategic alliances in different areas, they don’t necessarily all have to result in just donations. So that’s the in the box thinking you need to step out of the box. Okay, so are there. Other things than the ones i mentioned that could be gained from a strategic alliance. Yes, um for instance, who you definitely have membership. You have donations. You have attendance at different events from you. If you’re doing a huge fundraiser, uh, and you want to have two hundred people that will how do you get for hundred people there? So it’s it’s different things that you want to look at? You wantto align yourself with maybe a different venue vendors that air providing services to the non-profit different other organizations that have the same mission statement. It’s endless. Okay, okay, way have just about a minute before a break. So why don’t we just start to talk about how do you start to find these partners? And then we’ll take a break and continue it. Okay, what i usually do when i’m working with non-profits has asked them where their supporters are coming from and kind of get a baseline of what they’ve done in the past and what they haven’t tried. And then then i go a little bit further and then start to do the creative part. Okay, the that thinking beyond what they’ve been doing, correct. Okay, all right. We’re going to take our break when we returned. La senora, the true italian. Rosana imbriano stays with me, she’s, a marketing strategist and consultant, and we’re going to continue talking about strategic alliances. Stay with us, talking alternative radio, twenty four hours a day. Are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three, that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. Dahna are you fed up with talking points, rhetoric everywhere you turn left or right? Spin ideology, no reality, in fact, its ideology over in tow, no more it’s time, join me, larry shot a neo-sage tuesday nights nine to eleven easter for the ivory tower radio in the ivory tower. We’ll discuss what you’re born, you society, politics, business and family. It’s, provocative talk for the realist and the skeptic who want to know what’s, really going on. What does it mean? What can be done about it? So gain special access to the ivory tower. Listen to me, larry sharp, your neo-sage tuesday nights nine to eleven, new york time go to ivory tower radio dot com for details. That’s, ivory tower radio, dot com e every time i was a great place to visit for both entertainment and education. Listening. Tuesday nights nine to eleven it will make you smarter. Hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business? Why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com wait! Duitz honey. Way i see the marquis. Miree tim that’s not booker t and the mgs that is michael castaldo, he’s singing brooch piela terra the theme from the godfather the reason i decided to play that is because michael introduced metoo roseanna and i wanted teo give a shout to michael. You can hear more of his music at michael castaldo dot com sabelo j c senora altum piela sabelo chairman’s what a beautiful grayce voice, of course, let’s see, i’m all i’m all a flutter now with different music. I’m i’m used to booker t and the mgs singing jelly jelly jelly roll okay, way. We’re talking about how you start too find the strategic partners are going to be that are going to be with an alliance with you. So how do we how do we get started with that? Well, we definitely have tio have a baseline when i’m working with a new non-profit you need a baseline, you need to know what they’ve done in the past and what they have not tried, according to to the strategy i implement with them and start to look at, uh, alliances that they currently have and then look at alliances that they may need to. Develop uh, i am definitely in the frame of mind to understand and teo latto isolate that this doesn’t does not need to be a process in which you need to spend a lot of money to do. You may spend the money in furthering relationships, but not necessarily to develop them on. And then once you’ve identified, you know and you’ve identified a partner, you want to know what their goals are, what goals are what your goals are. Wait, let’s, not go let’s, not go too fast. We still have to need some help identifying the right partners. You and of course, a consultant could be indispensible for this. But there are small charities that may need to do it on their own. I would think networking is a part of trying to find the right organization, right? You want to be out there in the community? Absolutely. You want to have a very professional web presence? Some of the charities that i have work with, uh, have excellent websites. Very easy to use. Very that you can maneuver and find them very easily. They have very clear, clean look, help them. Whatever makes the process simple and if you make it difficult for feeding people to find you, they’re not going to find you, obviously, and and while they’re looking for you, you could be out on the web looking for for for partners as well. How would that research where’s that research look like? Well, it depends on, you know, again identifying what you’re looking for, that’s half the battle on, once you identified the type of person that the type of alliance that you want, then it makes it easier to search the web, of course, okay, and we’ve been talking about outside partners, but this you could have an alliance with people that are already known to you, they’re just they’re not sure how to how to help you write direct or they’re not sure how to help you. So when you have these partners, they act as an advisory board as a board of directors that can help you grow your business and buy-in versa. Okay, i got to send some live listener love out. Troutdale, oregon welcome carrollton, texas welcome, dalton, georgia. Welcome, welcome live listener love going out to the pacific northwest. This and the south, mid and southeast. You talked? A little about goals. What might some of our goals of these strategic alliances b the goal for any non-profit of courses is donation worships? Uh, getting people out to events, tendencies if you have a gal, a golf outing and you have no one that comes so you know, it makes it’s no use or if you’re promoting that gal thought in three weeks before the event it’s not working, but if you take your database and within the database, you have organizations that you are aligned with that have, um, you know, an email database of ten thousand each, then multiplied your success. Okay, right. So, there’s, your multiplier, because you’re going to be sharing marketing in your example, you’re going to be sharing marketing with them, and they’ll be sharing with you and correct there’s, your there’s, your multiplayer. Okay, those of course, our relationships that are concrete that are developed and there’s a win win for both parties, right? What? So now, how do you translate some of your goals or your specific goals for the alliance into the right strategic alliance partners? Well, because you’re you’re going to determine what the goal is for both. Parties, you’re going to determine what are what are both parties looking to get out of the relationship? And is it feasible? Okay, i’m going to evaluate that over a period of time. But, i mean, as you’re doing your research to try to find the right partners, how do you go from the goal of, you know, we want more people at our golf outing next year to finding the partners that are going to help you do that to researching, you know, finding the right potential partners, right? You’re going to see if you can find the people who are commited the people who are have a vested interest in your organization in your mission and may be a partner for that particular event. A corporation, you know, a donor aa sponsor. Okay. Okay. Um and when we have identified the right alliance partner or partners, then i assume there’s some negotiation that goes on, say little about that. Yeah, you want tio? I don’t get too involved in the process. What i’d like to do is basically to write the goals down and tow. Have both parties sign it so that we know six months from now. What have we committed to and what was your portion of the deal? And what is my portion of the deal and agreed to that? Because over a period of time, people tend to forget what they promised each other, right, so and then evaluated. Okay on, we’ll get to those steps, but but the process of negotiating what’s going to be in the agreement, you know, you’ve got to give some i’ve got to give some and there’s just going, tio, we’re trying to accomplish i’m sorry. So based on what gold both parties are trying to accomplish, okay, right? And now you said you like to see this in a assigned writing should both parties actually be signing this? I believe that you should have the commitment. Yes, my my attitude has changed quite a bit over the last couple of years on that tony on ly because, like i said, i people have short memories. Sounds like you got your client’s got screwed is what you’re saying. Well, now, you know they’ll say, well, now i didn’t promise you that. Well, yes, you did. Uh, people forget what they always sit down when you’re having a meeting. And people forget so a one page document of both parties. Responsibilities signed by both parties, i think, makes more sense. Okay. And isn’t usually the executive director seo’s that you see having these conversations or is it somewhere lower or board level? What, depending on mott non-profits it’s usually the executive director? Yes. Okay. Okay. And of course, there’s an important something else you touched on evaluation, of course. So you say something about evaluating this? Well, in order for this strategic aligns tow work, both parties have to be committed. It has to be a win win if one party is winning and the other one is losing than over a period of time. It’s just going to fall apart. So you want to make sure that you evaluated every three months hyre so that neither one of the parties is wasting too much time. If the alliance is not working or if the alliance is working, just how do how do we make it work more efficiently? Okay, so we’ll go back to that written document and evaluate based on that correct and then makes the adjustment. Okay? And we can’t be afraid. Teo cut ties when things aren’t going so well, correct? There is not working for either party. It really is not it’s a waste of time and money. Okay. You have, ah, client example of successful alliance that you want to share. Yeah, actually. For the non-profit i am currently involved with, uh, which is the centre for italian? Italian american culture is an organization that has been in existence twenty one years. Um, i been in my position for the last three and a half. Last year. We were able to produce for our annual fundraiser events seventy two thousand dollars in one night. Okay. And that was significant increase, i assume, over past years, correct. It was one of the most successful in twenty one years. Okay, so it’s, not like the year before was seventy one thousand five hundred. Okay, we probably took it to the point where we did double or tripled. Um, the success. Okay. Okay. I pulled listeners for their own success around strategic alliances. And about eighty five percent said either they’ve done this either very successfully or somewhat successfully. About fifteen percent said no, not not so successful. What? What problems have you seen that we can help listeners overcome onda void when you’re developing these alliances, they both parties need to be committed. Okay, sometimes you have situations in which one party is not as committed as the other, and so there’s sort of an imbalance there. So even though even though they commit, they’re not really committed, correct? They make promises, they don’t promise, they promise and don’t deliver. Yeah, okay. Okay. So how do you how do you make sure that you’re alliance partner is serious. Ah, well, you start by choosing the right partners. It’s, just like a marriage. You start by choosing the right partner, right band. If if if. If you’re not choosing the right partner from the beginning, it really makes no difference how much effort of time or money you’re putting into it. It’s really not gonna work? So, exactly. But how do we do? Make sure that we’re getting the right partner, like instinct and research of you know what? What’s your advice around, making sure we got that right, partner. You have to kind of feel it out. It’s every every relationship is different. Every it depends on whether it’s a new relationship or something that has been there’s a history there. You have to really evaluate each individual situation is different, but you want to trust your gut instinct if your instinct for me it’s instinct, not for a lot of other people, i can pretty much read whether the relationship is going to work or not work for the non-profit or a client. Okay. On dh. Probably a good idea to maybe start small in your alliance. Start with a smaller project to do together is what i mean, something like that. Something maybe that works that way. But there many times, like in your particular industry, finding a person who has ah, ah, lot of money that they want to donate to a tower charity would be wonderful. Uh, and you know, something like that. How do you start small? You really don’t it’s a person who either want to do it or they don’t. So it’s. Very simple, simple process and my job as a consultant to these entities, there’s, just to make the process simple for both parties. Okay. Um rosanna, why don’t you share with us? What? What is what is it that you that you really love about bringing? The right parties together what really moves you about this work? Okay, we’re fortunate to live in the united states of america where non-profits thrive and that there’s a non-profit so for every mission, every possible issue out there and what what brings me the satisfaction i had for many years and continue to have a client who every christmas donates to annoy organization called oasis in patterson, and the client donates thousands of dollars every year to this non-profits the women and children could have a wonderful christmas, which they wouldn’t ordinarily have. And for me, those kind of matching up people to for a greater good is really what i live for. Ok? And how long have you been doing this work? I’ve actually been doing this all my life, but in my own business for about twelve years. All right, now you contributed to a book by new jersey women business owners. Why don’t you tell people what? What about that book and where they can find it? Okay, the book is called jersey women mean business. The big both business advice from new jersey business women owners, business owners. I’m sorry. And they could get the book at. Uh uh. Woodpecker, press dot com www dot woodpecker press dot com it is a compilation of seventy two business women across the state of new jersey. It was the brainchild of the publisher, dahna thompson. Yeah. To bring all these business women and their expert teeth to the economy and to grow the economy. Okay. Now all the contributors are not italian, though, are they? They are not, but added seventy two, we have about twenty one, twenty two women that are italian in italian american descent. Dahna third. Okay. That’s pretty good. Right? Was still still recommend the book. Okay? Yep, yep. Way. Okay, you’ll find that it woodpecker press dahna dahna thompson, by the way, is italian american. So is our editor, joyce christine. Oh, and our graphic design who person? Richelle bonem isa. So all these women together are a force to be reckoned with. Okay, alongwith you. Rosana imbriano is a marketing strategist and consultant. You’ll find her at our eye consulting. L l c dot com assume our eyes is not rhode island. That’s who’s on imbriano. Okay, it’s. Quite a coincidence. If you were in rhode island that we even better. That would be even roseanna, thank you very much for being against tony is my pleasure, it’s, always a pleasure to spend some time with you, and i think what you’re doing for non-profits is is a tremendous asset said in that industry. Oh, thank you, thank you so much, although buttering me up is not going to get you on the show. So it’s too late for that, but thank you for your kind words. I’ve gotta send live listener love, teo, somerset, new jersey, mountain view, california. Cool rest in virginia, all these different states, i love it, live listener, love out, tio, california, virginia and new jersey, where rosana imbriano was from stay with me. And when we returned, it’s tony’s, take two, and then claire’s cliches. Told you. Hi, this is nancy taito from speaks been radio speaks been radio is an exploration of the world of communication, how it happens in how to make it better, because the quality of your communication has a direct impact on the quality of your life. Tune in monday’s at two pm on talking alternative dot com, where i’ll be interviewing experts from business, academia, the arts and new thought join me mondays at two p m and get all your communications questions answered on speaks been radio. Have you ever considered consulting a road map when you feel you need help getting to your destination when the normal path seems blocked? A little help can come in handy when choosing an alternate route. Your natal chart is a map of your potentials. It addresses relationships, finance, business, health and, above all, creativity. Current planetary cycles can either support or challenge your objectives. I’m montgomery taylor. If you would like to explore the help of a private astrological reading, please contact me at monte at monty taylor dot com let’s monte m o nt y at monty taylor dot com how’s your game want to improve your performance, focus and motivation? Than you need. Aspire, athletic, consulting, stop second guessing yourself. Move your game to the next level, bring back the fun of the sport, help your child build confidence and self esteem through sports. Contact dale it aspire, athletic consulting for a free fifteen minute power session to get unstuck. Today, your greatest athletic performance is just a phone call away at eight a one six zero four zero two nine four or visit aspire consulting. Dot vp web motivational coaching for athletic excellence aspire to greatness. Hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business, why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com if you have big ideas and an average budget tune into the way above average tony martin any non-profit radio ideo, i’m jonah helper from next-gen charity. Welcome back, it’s, time for tony’s take two at roughly thirty two minutes into the hour. My block this week is seven tips for small shop planned e-giving and i want to focus on just the very first one of those seven, which is you don’t have to be big to be successful at planned e-giving lots of opportunity in planned giving for small shops you basically to start with big quests or iras or something that’s, just simple for people to understand and easy for them to execute and that’s very common in people’s lives like a will or like an ira or a pension, and you just encourage people to include your charity buy-in one of those methods, you don’t have to have expertise and sophistication either on your board or as consultant, or even now in your development staff. I just want to break down the the perception and the myth that you have to be a big shop to be successful in plant e-giving it’s just not so, and there are six other tips for small shop planned e-giving on my block, which is that tony martignetti dot com and that is tony’s take two for friday, september twenty first, the fortieth show of the year. Now at the break, i had a text message. Someone requested that i play mala femina which again, my bad italian. But i’m gonna soon. Mala femina means bad lady and here’s our bad lady clare markoff climb arika half. How are you? Welcome. Hi, tony. Thanks for having me on the show. It’s. My pleasure always to have you back. Claire’s, of course, principal of the plant e-giving agency and she’s, creative producer of this very show. And this week we’re talking about claire’s cliches. Why are cliches bad, claire? Well, cliches, they’re bad because they’re old and they’re tired and they’re worn out and when you’re a non-profit trying to inspire people to volunteer for your cause, care about your cause and especially donate money your cause then you’re writing should not be tired and worn out. It should be fresh and vibrant and draw you in ok, but these air phrases that we phrases and sometimes just single words that we all understand that is a is a common understanding, even if there may be a little wordy. What’s what’s the problem with everybody, you know, if you’re using something that everybody, everybody grasps easily, well, you know, it depends on every single situation, so in some situations, when you have no time to think and you’re in a real hurry and, you know, a cliche is what comes to mind? Well, yeah, then just, you know, spit it out and use it and if your audience is, you know, inspired by that word great, but for the most part, what i find is that when people do use cliches and these air things like, you know, staying ahead of schedule or, you know, there’s millions of them and we’ll go through a list, but when people use cliches often times it’s just because they were in a habit, right? It’s a habit of using it and a lot of times what it signals to me is that if you’re in, like, a habit of using these phrases over and over, like, make a difference, make a difference, maybe it’s time for something new, and perhaps you need to re think your entire communications system and what you’re doing and what you’re telling people if you’re falling back all the time on cliches and jargon, okay, i assume you would you also would argue for economy of words, maybe using fewer words sometimes to say the same thing. Like you said the example you gave forget which phrases but another one at the present time or something you like. You like it exactly, because tony, think about how most people learn how to write you learn how to write when you’re in school, especially when you get to college so your college freshmen and you have to turn in a paper and the teacher wants fifteen pages. So as you write, you’re just like your so effusive you do just like all these words come out of you because, you know, gosh, i’ve gotta fill up fifteen page if i need to sound smart and important, so you start writing like that. But then when you get to the real world, not that many people are looking for a fifteen page paper from you’re either a five page paper from you, bennett, he needs five words from you write like a really nifty thing on a twitter or facebook or or in a postcard or something that you’re sending to your donors just a few lines to really? Did someone excited about something? It’s, not a fifteen page paper, even a two page paper. So economy aboard is really, really important to sort of change your whole mindset from that writing for writing sake to writing for, you know, being exciting and being interesting and really making your point in in a clear way that paints a picture in the person’s mind, okay? And you’re not being paid by the word. No, you’re not being paid by the word, not at all. A matter of fact, you should be thanking yourself is being paid for the fewer words, maybe you get a bonus instead of getting paid like, you know, ten cents a word instead, you’re getting paid like you know, one hundred dollars if you khun, if you could do it in half the words or something, if you think about if you think about okay, you want you want charity clarity, right? Hey, that’s! Good. I like that charity clarity. Okay, cool. You’re always pointing new phrase change one letter. I know charity clarity school alright. Came up with one the other day with one of my clients at the national wildlife federation and we had something that at first seemed terrible. This thing happened right with the letter we were sending out, and we thought it was a terrible thing. But then, all of a sudden, we realize, wait a minute, maybe that’s. Not a bad thing to think that through. And so the phrase we came up with horror and hope. Of course, i’m a fan of alliteration, ze mean, we’re here talking about claire’s cushions, so horror dankmyer strikes, right, right? Uh, right. So what? You’re gonna run time with something you think? Well, maybe there’s hope in this first you’re horrified, but maybe there’s, hope, horror and hope. Um, let’s. See? So your your interest in this goes back because you’re old radiohead, u did radio journalism? I mean that’s ah, you got to be concise in radio journalism, don’t you? Absolutely and that’s where? That’s where i come from, i’m a non-profit girl through and through mostly and fund-raising especially with plan giving, marketing and that’s what i do now, but my background is i was a in the broadcast duitz business, so i worked in radio news as a reporter and anchor it all news radio station, and i’ve also worked at cnn as a news writer, writing especially on some of the international shows, so but i always like to tell people, is when they say, well, gosh, i don’t think that i can explain our mission, you know, in in three sentences final it’ll go on and do that. I always say, you know what? I think if i could explain the ethiopia eritrea border conflict in three sentences and tell you the latest what’s going on with that conflict, give you some person effective and some background and what’s next, if i could do that in three seconds, if i think we could talk about your food pantry and i love your drop names to national wildlife federation, cnn, you know, so she squeezes those in there it’s but their admirable well, they’re the truth that our revolution and and that’s the thing and it’s details and and when you talk about writing details are actually what make it interesting, because as soon as i say, like i was a writer at cnn, like, you know what that means, like you picture that you’re like, wow, you know, when i see the person reading that on tv and i see the person covering that story, yes, someone has to write that. So when i say national wildlife federation that’s so it’s a big non-profit that you know, that has a has a big old mission. You know exactly what it is. So details are really important and writing rather than a bunch of fluffy. Words aren’t any details? Ok? Charity clarity what i always love about cnn is the people who write the the crawl i always admire, but the you know, for listeners, i don’t know what the crawleys keep myself out of jargon jail that that those words at the bottom of the screen that air that air crawling across and describing you said, you know, ethiopian eritrean border conflicts, but they’re doing it in the twitter space one hundred forty characters or less. That’s that’s really amazing, right? Sort of the original twitter when you think about it long before twitter, you had the crawl across the bottom of the screen and crawl started pretty much with breaking news, even in your local television station, maybe dio something going on, you would see that it would be like, you know, weather alert, you know, tornado warning in effect for these areas so that’s really where the crawl started and then when cable news became all the rage, you know, they started doing crawls to and, you know, think about the crawl right it’s like you’re listening to a story about the economy and business, but then there’s a crawl on the bottom that’s telling you like fifty other things, including the fact that lindsay lohan has been arrested again. So it’s it’s it’s the crawl you khun and she just she just hit somebody in new york city i think just just, she said, but it is always time latto proportion he was just looking for the money. Ok, well, really interesting that you’re non-profit involves lindsay lohan called go for what we were talking about the crawl and we were talking about writing for writing for broadcast and here’s the really important thing that you learn what you write in broadcasting and it’s called the teas and it’s a little thing that you say before you know what’s coming up i hate those damn things i hate that cheez its such a tease in the shadows dankmyer get you to stay tuned. For instance, i just thought someone about about writing teases and teases that’s applicability to toe like facebook and to your block and you know headlines for block to get people to come and read your block to read the post so if you tell them what’s in it, if you say like, you know, unemployment is up sixteen percent, you know, or whatever. Then then you’ve already told them the news and there’s no reason st john to read your blood if you say, if you say, you know, fascinating news about unemployment statistics coming up next, you know, like, oh, god, i need to hear that e i know you’re complaining, but the fact is that work, you’re doing a good job and they were i know i’m complaining because they work, they keep me teased and then what? I really get annoyed with me. All right? I’m so annoyed i gotta send out live listener love because got to counteract my annoyance live listener love staten island, new york welcome international china non jin welcome korea welcome korea welcome china more close to home. Welcome staten island live listener love out to those three as well as we still got california, virginia, new jersey, georgia it’s, incredible, texas okay, i feel better know the reason i don’t like to tease is because it works, but you know, what really gets me about the tease is when they tease it and then there’s the commercial break and then they don’t, then they don’t fulfill and then and then wolf blitzer teases, and then he teases it again before the next commercial. Yeah, that’s, that that is very, very annoying. And i do if i’m going to be teased like that, i want i want to pay for it. And then and then, if there’s no real payoff like if it’s the greatest thing you’ve ever seen, like the greatest video you’ve ever seen in your life, then maybe that’s one thing, but if it falls flat, which a lot of times stories d’oh, it’s like you need to deliver. So let’s, think about that in your non-profit writing. So you have a newsletter and you know, it folded up four ways, right? Put in the mailbox and then it lands on your you know, boardmember kitchen counter with all her mail, and she picks it up, right and and it’s it’s folded over his little piece of tape. So you want her to open that. So if you if it’s really like boring on the outside, well, maybe should not even gonna open it, not gonna open it for days. So the thing is to think about what’s on the outside and that little space that you have right a tease. So instead of saying like news and information inside, well, that’s real estate that you’re wasting writing teams there say, like, you know, what’s what’s, the biggest thing that’s happened lately, you know what? That was totally i just thought of that. I mean, i don’t know what your biggest thing is. So even that’s better than then news and interesting information. You look out the information, look how good clarence c i was ranting about wolf blitzer, and she brings it back to the yurt fund-raising newsletter on the kitchen table so so well, so well, adjudicator so thank you. I know i’m grossly inelegant. That’s why claire’s associated with the show to keep me in. I’d like to give a little shout out to the person who taught me everything i knew and that was built. Torrey william tory who’s, the network newscaster worked in neutral radio news and nbc and everywhere else and is a long time d c news guy. And when i was an american university in the early eighties, i’m dating myself here. Oh, my god, you’re really you’re in college in the early eighties. Oh, my god, i was in college in the early eighties, graduated college in eighty three along with my friends julie malkin and angie column these and these are all people now that work for top notch news agencies, and we were all in the same class together. We were young, twenty twenty one year old students in d c very excited about working in the business. Our teacher was built, torrey. And he came from the business which was so important, because in communications, sometimes you get these teachers that are academics, and they’ve never actually worked in the business. But bill had worked, you know, in news and was probably working at the time we had him and he would say things like the beginning of class you take, okay? Let’s say, something’s happening down on you? No dupont circle. How did you get there from here? And, you know, some of the kids to be like, well, i don’t know i’m not very good at directions, but i would raise my hand and say, oh, massachusetts having to make a left and it was it was really interesting. Way to see, like, who could be a reporter? Okay, that was you. Know it’s, that project stuff, so the writing that he taught us was great, because he would say, just say it. So the classic thing i always remembered, all right, one last shot, and then i got to just say, we got to take a break, go ahead, say it, we got to take a break, okay, we’ll make it really quick with the word used, bill said to us. Well, the last time you heard someone say, i saw three youths running down the street, youth, all right, i’m going to quibble with that one, okay, we got to take a break when we returned the way, come back with claire’s cliches, principle of the plan giving agency creative producer of this very show. You may be surprised to know that we have one, but you’re talking. You’re listening to her stay with us, talking alternative radio, twenty four hours a day. Joined the metaphysical center of new jersey and the association for hyre. Awareness for two exciting events this fall live just minutes from new york city. In pompton plains, new jersey, dr judith orloff will address her bestseller, emotional freedom, and greg brady will discuss his latest book, deep truth living on the edge. Are you ready for twelve twenty one twelve? Save the dates. Judith orloff, october eighteenth and greg brady in november ninth and tenth. For early bird tickets, visit metaphysical center of newjersey dot or or a nj dot net. Are you suffering from aches and pains? Has traditional medicine let you down? Are you tired of taking toxic medications, then come to the double diamond wellness center and learn how our natural methods can help you to hell? Call us now at to one to seven to one eight, one eight three that’s to one to seven to one eight one eight three or find us on the web at www dot double diamond wellness dot com way. Look forward to serving you. Dafs you’re listening to the talking alternative network. Welcome back with claire’s cliches, claire meyerhoff. And i just realized, of course mean, before every break i tease. So i’m a hypocrite. Well, learn. You learn from me. So i helped you build out the show. So i taught you about the cases on the brakes and things like that. But you did teach me that much let’s not get carried away. You talking a few things, but no, he taught me a lot about your hot considerably. Yes, my clock. My time sheet. Okay. So youth, you know, what’s. So what’s wrong with saying we do youth youth development or youth mentoring? Well, i mean, that’s. Fine, if that’s if you’re talking to another person in the nonprofit sector, so say you’re at a conference and you need someone and it’s that’s the easiest thing to say, like, well, you know what is what is? What is new beginnings all about? They see your name tag, right says you’re non-profit beginning what’s new beginnings. Hold over your development agency, that person that works in the non-profit they know immediately what that is it’s shorthand. But now when you’re in the real world, if you meet someone at a cocktail party and perhaps there your next big donor, and they say, oh, well, what do you d’oh? I haven’t non-profit called new beginnings really well, what’s that oh, used development, the person might be like let’s say they don’t work in schools or anything even remotely related to that you’re just gonna they’re gonna tune you out instead of saying, well, gosh, you know, we heat we help teenagers that are really having a rough time, and they come to a failing in school and they come to be of a program where they come every day for two hours and by the end of six weeks there, you know, now they’re they’re getting, you know, degrades and and they all have an after school job, right? A detail much richer. Um and yeah, just you, right don’t write for for people in the nonprofit world because a lot of times, you’re not talking to them, all right? Because, you know, shorthanded fine jargon is fine when you’re talking amongst yourself, and sometimes you come up with your own jargon, like like my my favorite client of the national wildlife federation, we have it, we have a term called block and it just means, like, make stuff like, like, oh, we have this new thing all of a sudden she’ll say what we need to block and that just means we know what that means, it’s like, okay, we’ve got to come up with, you know, like the mailings were going to do, and they were going to write things that were going off. We have all these things, and we already know, like what that means, but i can’t go to someone else and say, let’s, watch, right? Of course, that shorthand that we’ve come up with. Now you have a block post work together, you have a block post on this subject, which has a list of jargon, e words, a big list of words and phrases on we’re going to talk about a couple of them, but why don’t you tell people where they can see your comprehensive list of jargon offenses? Well, i’m i’m a frequent tour or sometimes frequent writer and blogger for non-profit marketing guy dot com, which is run by the marvelous stand kitty larue miller, who was really just a genius, and i tend to write for her all kinds of stuff about the media were related to the media, so i wrote a three part series recently about georgian and cliches and writing more concisely and writing more. Okay, where can we find it? Non-profit marketing died dot com mark non-profit marketing guide dot com con word not, or there may be a link to it on your i’ll have to put it on your page. Well, you’re welcome to put it on the show’s facebook page and also the show’s linked linked in group two don’t forget linked in okay, so you go if you go, you know you go to non-profit marketing guy dot com and you’ll see the block and i’m right now. In the second post, my most recent ones so titled jargon jargon, we got jargon, we just have about ninety seconds left. Claire meyerhoff what’s wrong with despite the fact that despite the fact that it’s just long it’s long, why would does anybody say that when you, when you’re talking, despite the fact that no it’s just but okay, all right, i might quibble with some of these not that one i don’t really like, despite the fact that it’s funny it’s like they were, you know, these are from bill torrey, my college teacher had these years ago. And, you know, they’re collected from different sources, like the bbc, the ap, you know, put together by some of these teachers at american university that he worked with, like lincoln, ferber and and and all those guys. So these air list just kind of had around, and he scanned them and sentence which is and wonderful service. What if we render assistance to people? What? What? Everything render assistance to, would you say, would you say i was driving down the street and i saw this poor woman and she had a flat tire, so i immediately pulled over and rendered assistance. I would not say that. I would probably say something more like help. Yeah, i pulled over and helped her system. I would even say assisted right, helped helped. Right? And the thing is, when you use long stuff like that, you know, you could put more details in there. So instead of saying i immediately pulled my car over to the side of the road, you could say, like, you know, she was she was down on her, you know? She was sitting there on the ground that she looked so sad trying to figure out daddy is jack. So i came over and helped, so i helped her way have to leave it there. Claire meyerhoff, principal of the plant e-giving agency. And this show’s creative producer clare, thank you so much for being on again. Thanks, tony it’s. Always a pleasure. My pleasure as well. Even though it’s been two weeks in a row. Still my pleasure, claire. I hope you’ll be with me next week when emily chan will return she’s one of our legal contributors she’s going to be alone. Jean will not be with her she’s from the non-profit and exempt organizations more group and she’ll have something interesting and we’ll have some fun around the law. Have you joined arlington group? You heard me mention it for pete’s sake. Join the group and i’ll stop saying it. You can post your follow-up questions and the guests will answer on the linked in group i host a podcast for the chronicle of philanthropy. It’s called fund-raising fundamentals it’s, a ten minute monthly podcast. And that one is devoted to fund-raising topics it’s on itunes, it’s. On the chronicle of philanthropy website. If you like this show, please check it out. It’s called fund-raising fundamentals wishing you good luck the way performers do around the world. I’m keeping it up. I did italian a few weeks ago. That was in boca. Lupo, remember? And the answer the answer was crappy lupo in the mouth of the wolf and let the wolf die. But since we had the real italian roseanna imbriano on today, michael castaldo helped me out and we have another version of the italian as we robbed through with the italians today, michael costello taught me in the ass of the whale and let’s. Hope you don’t take a ship which sounds much lovelier as in cool. Oh, allah bolena and the reply would be sperry. Ah, mo can oncology so i wish you this week in cool. Oh, allah bolena, i hope it’s oh, it’s comfortable in there for you, our creative producers. Claire meyerhoff. Hard to believe, but it’s true. Sam liebowitz is our producer line producer on this show. Social media is by regina walton of organic social media. The remote producer of tony martignetti non-profit radio is john federico of the new rules. Oh, how i hope that you will be with me for another live show. Next friday, one to two p, m eastern on talking alternative broadcasting. The singing live at talking alternative dot com. Dahna sending dick dick tooting, getting dink, dink, dink, dink. You’re listening to the talking alternative network. Get anything? Nothing. You could. Hi, this is nancy taito from speaks been radio speaks been radio is an exploration of the world of communication, how it happens in how to make it better, because the quality of your communication has a direct impact on the quality of your life. Tune in monday’s at two pm on talking alternative dot com, where i’ll be interviewing experts from business, academia, the arts and new thought. Join me mondays at two p m and get all your communications questions answered on speaks been radio. Are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three that’s to one to seven to one eight one eight three the conscious consultant helping hunters. People be better business people. You’re listening to talking on their network at www dot talking alternative dot com now broadcasting twenty four hours a day. This is tony martignetti athlete named host of tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent technology fund-raising compliance, social media, small and medium non-profits have needs in all these areas. My guests are expert in all these areas and mohr. Tony martignetti non-profit radio fridays one to two eastern on talking alternative broadcasting are you concerned about the future of your business for career? Would you like it all to just be better? Well, the way to do that is to better communication. And the best way to do that is training from the team at improving communications. This is larry sharp, host of the ivory tower radio program and director at improving communications. Does your office need better leadership? Customer service sales or maybe better writing are speaking skills? Could they be better at dealing with confrontation conflicts, touchy subjects all are covered here at improving communications. If you’re in the new york city area, stopped by one of our public classes or get your human resource is in touch with us. The website is improving communications, dot com that’s improving communications, dot com improve your professional environment. Be more effective, be happier. And make more money. Improving communications. That’s the talking.

089: Get Monthly Givers & Strategic Organizations Raise More Money – Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio

Tony’s guests this week:

Bob Wesolowski, president of Caring Habits

Starita Ansari, president and chief change officer at MSB Philanthropy Advisors

Read and watch more on Tony’s blog: http://mpgadv.com

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Welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. I’m your aptly named host it’s friday, april twenty seventh twenty twelve i sincerely hope you were with me last week. I’d be devastated to learn that you missed the to melanie’s. Melanie schnoll begun from morgan stanley we talked about how to look good when you’re recruiting board members and die end of the day. Melanie west from the wall street journal writes the donor of the day column. She and i talked about how to pitch her to get your donor’s covered in that column this week. It’s get monthly givers bob wesolowski, president of caring habits, helps you get habitual monthly donors through electronic funds transfer. You may know that as ft, who were the best prospects and how do you ask them? How do you upgrade donors? And when should you say thank you that was pre recorded at philanthropy day two thousand eleven, hosted by the westchester county chapter of a f p also today, strategic organizations raised more money. Starita ansari is president and chief change officer at msb philanthropy advisors. She wants you to organize thoughtfully around your mission. Looking strategically at your inputs, outputs and outcomes to boost your fund-raising revenue that’s also pre recorded at flying through the day last year on tony’s, take two between the guests. I don’t know what’s going to be on my block this week because i’m recording in early april, but i will look back at a few recent posts. You can use the hashtag non-profit radio to join the conversation with us on twitter. Right now, we take a break and when we come back, give monthly, get monthly givers, stay with me. You’re listening to the talking alternative network. Are you suffering from aches and pains? Has traditional medicine let you down? Are you tired of taking toxic medications, then come to the double diamond wellness center and learn how our natural methods can help you to hell? Call us now at to one to seven to one eight, one eight three that’s to one to seven to one eight one eight three or find us on the web at www dot double diamond wellness dot com way. Look forward to serving you. Is your marriage in trouble? Are you considering divorce? Hello, i’m lawrence bloom, a family law attorney in new york and new jersey. No one is happier than the day their divorce is final. My firm can help you. We take the nasty out of the divorce process and make people happy. Police crawl. Offset. Two, one, two, nine, six, four, three, five, zero two for a free consultation. That’s lawrence h bloom, too. One, two, nine, six, four, three, five zero two. We make people happy. Hey, all you crazy listeners looking to boost your business? Why not advertise on talking alternative with very reasonable rates? Interested simply email at info at talking alternative dot com. Yeah, geever. Oh! Welcome back to big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent on tony martignetti non-profit radio. Now i have pre recorded interview get monthly givers, and here is that welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of national philanthropy day, hosted by the association of fund-raising professionals westchester county chapter with the edith macy conference centre in briarcliff manor, new york. I’m with bob wesolowski he’s, the founder and president of carrying habits, which is dedicated to building and operating monthly e-giving programs with elektronik funds, transfers and bob’s conference topic is techniques in monthly giving bob wesolowski welcome. Thank you very much. What do non-profits need to know about just generally before we get into details about monthly giving? What? What are they not doing that they ought to be doing? Perhaps? Well, i think the big secret for for this group is that many organizations have heard about monthly giving programs. Goodness knows they’ve been around since the early nineteen eighties, but many organizations have stayed away either because they think they need to be larger or because they think they need tohave more technology to do it successfully and that’s just not the case. Okay, so what can the smaller organization due to encourage monthly gift? Well, i think there are two groups within the smaller not-for-profits i think in in every case all organizations have a core group of constituents. They essentially make a contribution every time you ask. They may be donors, they maybe board members, they maybe folks who are somewhere in between. And so the first thing that will do is help the client identify who those particularly loyal donors are and work with them first. Ok, so loyalty is where you want to start in developing your prospect. That’s, right? Monthly giving that’s, right? I think we live in a world of finite resource is in a in a perfect world. You could send solicitations to all of your donors all the time. But with with finite resource is you have to pay, choose your battles, all right? And when we’re looking at loyalty, which i’m sure is determined by the consistency of the giving that’s correct over many years over is that right? Not necessarily. I think typically when you start to look at a group that says, where should we go? One of the things that will look at is data over the last twelve to eighteen months and will help to identify those donors who have made perhaps two or three contributions over the last twelve to eighteen months and that’s generally pretty good starting point, all right, and only interested in the size of those contributions or does it could be very small and still qualify as a prospect? Duitz this process is geared mohr towards lower donors, donors whose annual giving might be, at a minimum twenty five to fifty dollars, and certainly no more than five hundred dollars. And the reason we put a limit on five hundred dollars is that in many cases, once you get into that kind of atmosphere, those donors are mohr important, they feel more important, they need to be stroked a little bit. Mohr and in general, they don’t like the anonymity that goes with the monthly giving program. All right, are we interested in ages that important in developing our prospect pool? The only if a number assuming non-profit has the well i know relies a lot don’t, but assuming they do have a jj age is an important consideration agent demographics is important when you consider whether you’ll all for the donor, a recurring credit card contribution or a recurring funds transfer contribution. Okay, but the key factor is loyalty to the organization. Once you’ve got that loyalty than their candidate, once you start to look at the demographics, then you’ll have an idea as to whether you want to offer your donor’s credit card or funds transfer or both. Ok, maybe we’ll talk about how to segment in in a few moments, all right, so we’ve developed our prospect pool. We know we don’t have to be a large organization, we don’t have to have special technology and sophisticated technology. What do we do now? We have our prospects pool identified. We have found that most organizations get involved with this through a direct mail campaign. They’re certainly larger ones that do telemarketing, but direct mail is generally the best way to start with us on dh it’s a simple, simple ask the kind of thing that these folks duel the time now there’s some clients who may d’oh three or five four direct mail appeals per year, there are others who do eleven or twelve buy-in if the group is doing fewer solicitations per year, let’s, say, three or four, we’re certainly not going to suggest that they devote one entire repeal to monthly giving. What we would suggest is that this is included as an option. On the other hand, if a group is doing ten or eleven or even twelve direct mail’s solicitations in a year, there are so many going out that in that case, it’s generally far easier to dedicate one of those solicitations to a direct mail campaign. All right? And if it’s not a dedicated direct mail piece about monthly giving, can it be a simple as as a ps yes, in a letter. So how would we would we work that a little? Well, i think what what happens is that and it’s kind of interesting if you go back and look at the pbs and the npr market has, in contrast, goodness knows they’ve been doing this for the better part of two or twenty or thirty years. And i think where a lot of those organizations tend to fall down is that they look at the program in terms of the benefits to the donor. It’s easy. To do no cheques to write no stamps, to buy no trips to the to the post office, in fact, they are particularly core reasons to contribute to an organization. All giving is his mission mission based. And so the first place to start in that solicitation is if you become a monthly geever you help us lower our administrative expenses, if you become a monthly giver, you give us income that we can rely on month tomorrow. So there’s, this kind of fund-raising is no different than any other fund-raising we don’t, we don’t rely on the ease of giving when we’re saying send us a check, you know, or there are, or the ease of giving in other ways, i mean it’s, it’s, mission driven, it’s, almost love of the organization. And by the way, here’s an option that happens to be easy. That’s. Exactly right. Ok, so we can do this in a ps we could say your gift this your gift could be a recurring gift. Would you then include a form for people to fill out? Or is it better to drive them to a website toe? Have them sign up there for monthly giving. Or what’s the best. You certainly want to include the form because donors tend to respond to the media in which you, you contact them. If you give them direct mail, they’re going to respond to direct mail. If you contact them with an email blast, they’ll respond on on the web. Okay, so you certainly want to do that it’s also important to because over the years the banks have been particularly effective in convincing donors of and organizations about how wonderful credit cards. In fact, we have seen changes so that there are different requirements to enroll a donor with funds transfer as opposed to credit cards. That is to say, if somebody wants a recurring gift with a funds transfer that is out of their checking account or savings account, there needs to be a signed authorization in place for credit card you can simply click through. Yes, this is what i’d like to dio and it’s over and done with the garden tending the ending the ending ding, ding, ding you’re listening to the talking alternate network, get in. E-giving you could are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam liebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three, that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. Dahna hi, this is psychic medium. Betsy cohen, host of the show. The power of intuition. Join me at talking alternative dot com mondays at eleven a. M call in for a free psychic reading. Learn how to tune into your intuition to feel better and to create your optimum life. I’m here to guide you and to assist you in creating life that you deserve. Listen every monday at eleven a, m on talking alternative dot com. Are you feeling overwhelmed in the current chaos of our changing times? A deeper understanding of authentic astrology can uncover solutions in every area of life. After all, metaphysics is just quantum physics politically expressed. I am montgomery taylor, and i offer lectures, seminars and private consultations. For more information, contact me at monte m o nt y at r l j media. Dot com talking alternative radio, twenty four hours a day. Hi, i’m kate paler, executive director of dance, new amsterdam, and you’re listening to tony martignetti non-profit radio. Big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. Yeah, let’s, go back to something you mentioned earlier about age being a factor in whether you’re asking someone to do the credit card or the electronic funds transfer from a from a checking account. How does that how does to break down across ages? In in general, what we have found is that donors who are younger, better educated, maura, fluent mohr, disposable income i prefer elektronik giving that is to say, credit cards. Donors who are older, less well off clearly go for funds, transfers. And so, for example, if i would look at a typical catholic client where the age of the donor population might be average about seventy two, seventy three years old, i wouldn’t be surprised if seventy percent of the donors gave with funds transfer as opposed to credit cards. On the other hand, if i was to look at an organization like the union of concerned scientists or some of the other groups, you might expect to see a fifty fifty split. Or you might even see sixty, forty or seventy thirty split in favor of credit cards. And is that just because the older population is less comfortable revealing credit card information? That’s. Exactly. Right. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And in fact, we in an interesting side note we were work with a church congregational church up in aa connecticut. On one of the things they found is that the five o’clock service every day, every sunday was the one that was most crowded. They would have a couple of hundred people in there. That was the one with the younger folks and their role in their thirties. They all had the three year old, four year old five year olds. When it came time to pass the plate around. Even though that’s where most of the commissioners were, those collections were the lowest. Everybody had debit and credit cards. When we introduced a monthly giving program for them, contributions went way up. Where do you find roughly the age demarcation line between willingness to do it by credit card or preferring the electronic funds transferred by checking account. Roughly. Where does that age breakdown? Somewhere in the fifties? Okay. Okay. All right. So we were, uh we were talking about the marketing of really, the solicitation of this direct mail is your preferred method. Can you can you can this be successful? By through email solicitation or that that was not, it certainly can. And in fact, one of the things that i’m going to talk about my presentation today at the conference is that there are any number of organizations out there who have one line giving capabilities and somewhere along the way, someone suggested that they include a monthly giving option in there. Some of these groups would would argue that because they allow monthly contributions, they have a monthly giving program. I would differ with that because in many cases, yeah, you have monthly monthly donors out there, but it’s not really a programme groups don’t know what to do with them, they don’t know how to solicit them, they don’t know how to upgrade, they don’t know how to include them in their program. So it’s just starting to feel their way through. I’m with bob wesolowski, he’s founder and president of caring habits. We’re talking about monthly giving, and i want to tie this into something that i saw about doing earlier here on the exhibit floor, bob was fly tying and he’s a fly fisherman and he’s going out on sunday, we’re interviewing, we’re talking on. A wednesday and bob your comment was that the if you if you do your own fly tying, you’ll pay more attention to what the fish are are after is that? Did i get that right? And that’s exactly right? Okay, and i see an analogy in fund-raising i think if you’re if you’re writing some of your own feels you’ll think more about what your donors and prospects are interested in hearing. That’s true, i think you have to know your donor’s a lot better if you’re going to be writing the copy yourself. Okay, so we’re fly fishing for ah moflow e-giving donors we are okay. We’re looking for the players out there and and i’ll confess that when i saw above on the exhibit for doing the fly fishing time fly tying, i thought he was making jewelry. I thought he was a jewelry maker because he had these precise little tools and a light and a little vice holding his the piece he was working on. I thought you were making hearings, but no, not this time. That’s how much of a sportsman i am right? My head is somewhere in a jewelry store. Let’s, see? So then we now have our donors. How how do we thank monthly donor? Do we thank them every month? Is that annoying? How do we go about stewarding these donors that we now have? We have seen a distinction between our religious clients and non religious groups in terms of how they thank donors. I think by and large, if you look at the religious organizations that we work with and that’s roughly fifty percent of our clients, they feel compelled to send a written acknowledgement every month. Even though these charges will appear on the donor’s, a credit card statement or bank statement, thes groups have been doing these hand written acknowledgments or some kind of acknowledgement for decades and it’s very difficult for them to get away from it. On the other hand, when we look at the non religious groups, i think there’s an implicit understanding by the donors that this’s recurring they do not want to get thanked every month. And so, as long as they see that acknowledgement on their credit card statement each month that’s. Fine. I think the other thing that also happens for some of the larger religious groups is they may start out on that path of giving monthly acknowledgments, and in some cases it may take a year, two years for five years in some cases where they finally get enough negative feedback from the donors who say enough alr right, we know it’s gonna happen every month. Save your time saved savior effort. Don’t bother with this stuff. We know it’s going to happen. What about an annual thank you letter? Something like that right at annual is absolutely very important. Very important. You guys, i think you don’t want to be the organization that that cultivates and solicits and obtains a monthly giving process. Donor-centric to say thank you. Just i know the gift is going to come, so why don’t i have to say thank you once a year? Yeah. And i think what’s really important about it is that once you get a donor who becomes a monthly donor, i think it enables you to change the nature of the relationship. If if you look at a group that’s doing four five direct male contribution solicitations each year, every solicitation is give me give me give me it’s it’s a constant ask once you have. That monthly donor, you know, that they’re going to be there for years in most cases, and so you don’t need that constant ask you can begin to provide mohr programmatic information and begin that upgrade process. Okay, so that’s important too? So someone starts at ten or fifteen or twenty dollars a month. Over time, you’d like to be able to upgrade them. Tio i guess twenty five or fifty dollars? Absolutely. And when is the right time to start that conversation after they’ve initially committed to the monthly donation monthly gift? When is the right time to talk to them about the possibility of upgrading? In our opinion, that needs to be either on their anniversary or a program anniversary and let me provide an example, i think you know, if you’re going to be doing sending these things out let’s use example again afore five direct mail solicitations in a year, you don’t want to be as a fundraiser, you don’t want to be in the position of having all of these anniversary’s coming up throughout the year, so typically what a client will do is is group everybody in and say june one, march one that that’s going to be our anniversary date so everybody who was in the program, graham as of that date that’s their their anniversary program and later on today, i’m going to be doing this this presentation with a client buy-in pat chambers daily who’s with the dominican sisters in amityville, long island and the way said they set up their program, they do the solution solicitations every march. All right, donors tend to enroll somewhere between march, and by the end of may or june, they’ll get a group in there on let’s say, we’re in march two thousand eleven. March two thousand twelve will be their first year anniversary because they consider march to be their anniversary month. And then when their two year anniversary march of two thousand thirteen, everybody in the program gets an upgrade, and so they’ll figure the two years into the program, the donor’s comfortable with with what they’ve seen there in the fold. And now you can begin that upgrade process. Okay? And how much is it appropriate to ask them to upgrade to or do you give options? How does that work groups do it in different ways? But if if you’re a small local not-for-profits it’s. Not uncommon to ask for ten percent or flat. Twenty percent. Great. When? When pat started her program nine years ago, it was simple. Would like everybody to upgrade twenty percent. Okay, um ah. Is it appropriate to ask the donor tto decide how much they’d like to upgrade? Or is it better to give them a target? Teo shoot for it depends on the resource is available. There are a lot of clients out there. Smaller organizations that just don’t have the resource is toe late. Laser in specific e-giving amounts. Okay, from a direct male perspective. That’s. Right. So if they’ve got the capability to do that, then certainly they will laze iran e-giving amounts. If it’s a smaller organization, then they’ll simply go in with that percentage amount. Okay, for center, ten percent. Ok, how do we handle the fees there? Are there going to be fees that the charity is going to be paying on these credit card transaction shins? How do we handle that? With respect to the crediting of the donor? Do they get credited for the net or just or the gross gift? As an analogy? Let’s take a check deposit if a donor writes a check to a not for profit, not for profit does not deduct any banking fees associated with that. They credit the donor for the full amount, and the same is true for monthly giving programs. Okay, if i give if i give ten dollars, i get credit for ten dollars and you’ll get credit for a hundred twenty dollars for the year. That’s exactly right? And any banking costs is simply their cost of doing business. Ok. All right, what else should i be asking you that? What else would you like to convey about the annual giving one of the monthly monthly giving one of the things which is also very, very important about this is that, um, assuming the client is brave enough to go out with these upgrades and i say brave enough because often what clients will find is that the average upgrade amount going from a one time donor-centric upgrade amount that we’ve seen over the last twenty some years is about an eighty five percent upgrade. So a lot of times and not for-profit will look at that and say, oh, my goodness, look at tony. That’s more money than we ever thought we would ever get from that guy s so when it comes time to upgrade their say, how, how is it possible that he could give more and so there’s an awful lot of reluctance. Once we get the client over that hump, there are two parts to that successful upgrade. The first is to ask, but the second part is a soft ask, which says, i’m sorry, i can’t upgrade my monthly contribution at this point, but i’d like to make a one time contribution. Typically, clients find that when the donor makes that one time contribution, it is as large or larger than what the upgrade amount would have been. They back off from that simply because there’s a bit of reluctance to make that long term commitment at that point, but they still want to make the contribution to the organization so it’s important to give that option absolutely and in fact, one of the things that pat’s going to talk about today when she finally started providing donors with that soft ask the onetime contribution on there, she has found that in every year that she’s done that and it’s been eight years in a row. There have been sufficiently large contributions that they have paid on their own for that appeal. Okay, excellent. What concerns you, bob about? About? Ah, annual giving monthly giving. I’m sorry, whillans e-giving that we haven’t talked about what? Well, maybe looking into the future. What? What concerns do you have for non-profits that are that are doing this for thinking about doing this, particularly for smaller organizations. One of the real concerns that we see is credit card security and credit cards are excellent. Yeah. Over the last seven or eight years, the credit card company, starting with visa and mastercard, including amex and discover, have put in place a set of security standards. Pc i the payment card security standards, which govern everyone who touches a credit card. Processors like ch i not-for-profits software manufacturers, hardware manufacturers and everybody who touches a credit card has to live by the standards. One of the things we find, particularly among the smaller groups, is a rather cavaliere concern about credit card security. They’ll get the credit cards in, they’ll process them. They may not keep them in a locked vault area. Now we have a credit card number. We have its expiration date. Women. Maybe maybe we have the secure code on the back. That’s. Exactly. Religious code. All right. So now these pieces of paper let’s say hopefully they wanted some kind of standard form. But now what we gonna do with these forms? What are people doing? What should they be doing? Well, what they should be doing, what we counsel is to keep those forms for about sixty days, because that will give everyone involved an opportunity to process the contribution and let the donor sayid on their statement. So that’s that’s one poke a bit and just mentioning that now we’re keeping it for sixty days, keeping it secure. So we walked. It should be locked out on someone’s desk or in an inbox. Right? That’s. Exactly right. What some clients are also doing is doing a two part form for their needs where they will have the name and address in the mount of the contribution on the top of the form and on the bottom they’ll put the credit card number and the expiration date. And after it’s processed, they’ll cut off that bottom portion of it. And do a confetti cut through a shredder on the sensitive information. And even i like to really get into detail a confetti cut, not a not a quarter inch strip cut that it’s got people could piece together in five minutes of will. Okay, we have just about a half a minute left. What else did you want to say about the security issue? The other part is that under no circumstances should any credit card information ever be entered onto a pc and excel spreadsheet a database, because when machines get old, they get tossed in the trash. And who knows what happens to those hard drives? Bob wesolowski is founder and president of caring habits, which is dedicated to building and operating monthly giving programs with electronic funds transfers. And we also know that he’s, a sport fisherman and expert fly tire bob wesolowski. Thank you so much for being a guest. Thank you for having me. This has been tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of national national philanthropy day hosted by the association of fund-raising professionals, westchester county chapter my thanks to bob wesolowski for that interview right now, we take a break. And when we returned tony’s. Take two. They didn’t even think that shooting, getting, thinking thing. You’re listening to the talking, alternate network, getting anything. Cubine are you stuck in your business or career trying to take your business to the next level, and it keeps hitting a wall? This is sam lebowitz, the conscious consultant. I will help you get to the root cause of your abundance issues and help move you forward in your life. Call me now and let’s. Create the future you dream of. Two, one, two, seven, two, one, eight, one, eight, three, that’s to one to seven to one, eight one eight three. The conscious consultant helping conscious people. Be better business people. Dahna hi, this is psychic medium. Betsy cohen, host of the show. The power of intuition. Join me at talking alternative dot com mondays at eleven a. M call in for a free psychic reading learned how to tune into your intuition to feel better and to create your optimum life. I’m here to guide you and to assist you in creating life that you deserve. Listen. Every monday at eleven a, m on talking alternative dot com. Are you feeling overwhelmed in the current chaos of our changing times? A deeper understanding of authentic astrology can uncover solutions in every area of life. After all, metaphysics is just quantum physics politically expressed. I am montgomery taylor, and i offer lectures, seminars and private consultations. For more information, contact me at monte m o nt y at r l j media. Dot com talking alternative radio twenty four hours a day. Welcome back, it’s, time for tony’s take two at roughly thirty two minutes into the hour. I don’t know what’s going to be on my block this week because i’m recording this show a couple weeks early in an early april so here’s a romp through some recent posts, two of them our irs is helping you. I was on my block. Iris has some good education courses and webinars on their site, which is called irs stay exempt, and one of those courses is applying for tax exemption that’s something that we get a lot of questions about. How do i create a charity? What’s the first step? What’s the second step and applying for tax exemption is one of the irs is seventeen minutes web courses a short lesson on getting your five o one c three designation so that you’re exempt from federal income tax and donations that people make, too. You can earn an income tax charitable deduction, another one of their courses on their site is unrelated business income, and i’ve also talked about that here, with jean takagi and emily chan are regular legal contributors again. The irs site is called iris stay exempt. And their links to all this on my block, which is tony martignetti dot com another post from february was respect small donors. I used the example of the new jersey institute of technology that got a five million dollar gift from ah couple that had given just twenty five dollars, a year, and they have been doing that for about thirty years, and j it was very smart to always thank them and developed a relationship with them, and they’re turned out to be a five million dollar gift in the state of the survivor of the and that couple. So a very good tale about respecting small donors. Both those posts are, as i said on my block at tony martignetti dot com, and that is tony’s take two for friday, february twenty seventh, seventeenth show of the year. Now i have a pre record interview with starita on, sorry from the same conference as the previous interview, and here is my interview with her on strategic organizations. Welcome to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of national philanthropy day, where hosts are the association of fund-raising professionals, westchester county chapter we’re at the edith macy conference centre in briarcliff manor, new york my guest now is starita ansari. She is president and chief change officer at msb philanthropy advisors, and her topic today is why a strategic organization is key to fund-raising success starita welcome. Thank you for having me, it’s. A pleasure. What is a strategic organization? The strategic organization is an organization that understands that passion is not enough in order to fulfill. The mission is an organization that looks at inputs, outputs and outcomes, and make certain that the day today activities are in line with the strategic direction, de fulfills the mission, and eventually, the vision. Okay, inputs, outputs and outcomes. What? What are and organizations inputs. Inputs as an example. Staff finances the thinking, the human capital, the output would be let’s say it’s a homeless oh, program. Okay, so the output would be we fed one hundred homeless people arika but that’s not solving homelessness. That’s a service. But the outcome with would talk about how many people we have placed our strategy and our success and eradicating homelessness. Best outcome. That sounds like there’s going to be quite a process in doing this strategic thinking to become a strategic organization. What what? What is that process like? How does how does this planning and thought process take place? First, one of the core values would have to be critical thinking, being able to evaluate trends in the market and and trends within the community that you are serving. The other piece is making certain that the people that you hyre particularly from a fund-raising perspective is not purely measured on how many dollars that are raised, but whether or not those individuals understand the mission and can communicate the passion. So what that means is that the people who you hyre strategically aligned with the mission and that you look beyond the job description. But you look at the talents that people have that khun strategically aligned with the mission, creating a team based a t jik culture that you would have to assess almost at every staff meeting. So staff meetings are not a discussion about activities. Staff meetings are a discussion about the strategic plan all right? And we’re going to we’re going to talk in detail about some of the things you just raised. But how does all this relate to successful fund-raising? Because that’s, your that’s, your topic out strategic organizations are ki tto fund-raising success philanthropist want outcomes, not outputs? Philanthropists want a return on investment philanthropists i do not want organizations that are chasing after grants to keep the doors open then therefore those organizations ends up mission drift, whether it’s, individuals, funders or the government everyone once out comes, which requires people to be very strategic and cost effective and an efficient that’s what strategic planning does it lets you be cost effective and efficient, and how you’re using money to get where you’re going earlier. Guest on this show has been dr robert penna, who wrote the non-profit outcomes toolbox. Are you familiar with his work and that that book i am not okay is outcomes, assessment or outcomes the attention that outcomes air getting that’s really pretty recent wouldn’t you say within just the past, i don’t know three toe four years or so where outcomes have become so much part of the non-profit dialogue? Yes, before passion and services, you’re doing good and feeling good for decades for generations, that was that was enough, right? That was, that was enough. And then all of a sudden the outcome started creeping in after the enron situation and now it’s ashley, part of the playing field, and so our appeals cannot just be appeals that have you no shows the single female head of household living in a homeless shelter calling on someone’s heart we have to do more than that. People in people are moving from s not meaning services, but s meaning solutions, and another guest has been ken berger, the ceo of charity navigator there now, and other other organizations as well that rank or or assess mission effectiveness for non-profits paying much greater attention to outcomes than then had been in the past, so this is all pretty recent dialogue. But who’s who’s responsible for the strategic planning process is that the executive director’s, that the board is a combination is that the i don’t know, chief fundraiser, the school of thought and theory that msb philanthropy advisors proposes is that strategic planning should be an inclusive process and that you create a culture where everyone understands from the janitor threw the chairman of the board the direction that the institution is going. But most importantly, if someone works for a nonprofit organization that doesn’t have a strategic plan, well, then the vp of institution advancement or director development should push the agenda and create the culture because it’s going to be expected of that person when they are soliciting gifts, particularly the major gifts and a plan gives people want to know where is my money going? Not just today. Three, four, five years from now. So everyone should be involved in the strategic direction for the organization. How do we trickle this down too? You mentioned even the custodian. How do we trickle it down? And then also, how do we continue it? This understanding with people who come to the organization years after a couple of years. After the strategic plan, they couldn’t have been a part of it. They weren’t part of the organization. How do we continue the trickle down the culture and continue it? What i’ve done in my career is that i value everyone when the janet of buildings and grounds you takes the time to talk with everyone internally, to let them know the direction you’re going with your fund-raising you never know who has a relation, shin ship somewhere back and help with the plan that you have for raising money in terms. That’s how you let everyone know part two of your question times what happens when someone comes aboard and after the procedure plan has been developed? I believe in allowing people to bring their talents to the table, show them this a t jik plan and welcome insight that’s one of things i think is important to our success is that we have to move to a model and non-profit sector where evaluation is not punitive and that everyone can have can give a fee back to how the ship is is moving through the waters, and so a new employees should be able to provide feedback and lend insight, but how khun the plan then accommodate that when the person is new to the organization everyone knew presumably is going to have their own insights. How does the plan continue forward if it’s constantly being altered with new in new insights from from new employees? What a plan is not being altered. The goals and objectives are the same. What will alter is additional talent that comes to the table to move the goals and the objectives forward. So everyone, the alumni, the community, the politicians, everyone will know the direction that your institution is moving and everyone hopefully will embrace it and bring what they can to the table. Okay? And if they’re not embracing the mission and the goals, then they it’s probably not the right fit to be working at the organization. Is that right and that’s the point i was making before when people hyre individuals purely based upon pon how much money they’ve raised versus not just the money they raised, but their passion and their understanding, the mission, the goals and the objectives of whatever going backto homes, eradicating homelessness? Well, let’s talk about the hiring process since we’re headed there. How do you ensure that you’ve got someone who is going to be committed to the the mission of the of the organization? When does that does that start out at the advertising stage of the interview stage? The resume screening stage? How do we do this? Make sure we’re getting the right people. We’re going to be as committed as everyone else in the organization, i think it’s important at the job placement stage for and this is going to be challenging. Okay, organize a challenge is good, though it helps us achieve for organizations to be transparent in terms of their core values. That way, you know whether and not that what’s of interest to that individual is of interest to you. Okay, so if there’s space i mean, does this belong in a job advertisement or you really start this kind of transparency at the interview stage? When you’re talking to people the first time you should be on your website, your mission statement should be on your website things that that that demonstrate your vision should be on the website and so people could say, ok, my passion is is social justice after i’m committed to lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender issues, black and brown issues. Disability issues, issues of women. I’m committed to making the world a better place for everyone and valuing everyone and valuing, it said. And we’re talking about sort of coming out in the hiring process. Hyre talking alternative radio twenty four hours a day. Hi, this is psychic medium. Betsy cohen, host of the show. The power of intuition. Join me at talking alternative dot com mondays at eleven a. M call in for a free second reading. Learned how to tune into your intuition to feel better and to create your optimum life. I’m here to guide you and to assist you in creating life that you deserve. Listen. Every monday at eleven a, m on talking alternative dot com. Hi, i’m carol ward from the body mind wellness program. Listen to my show for ideas and information to help you live a healthier life in body, mind and spirit, you’ll hear from terrific guests who are experts in the areas of health, wellness and creativity. So join me every thursday at eleven a, m eastern standard time on talking alternative dot com professionals serving community. Hi, this is nancy taito from speaks. Been radio speaks. Been. Radio is an exploration of the world of communication, how it happens in how to make it better, because the quality of your communication has a direct impact on the quality of your life. Tune in monday’s at two pm on talking alternative dot com, where i’ll be interviewing experts from business, academia, the arts and new thought. Join me mondays at two p m and get all your communications questions answered on speaks been radio. This is tony martignetti, aptly named host of tony martignetti non-profit radio. Big non-profit ideas for the other ninety five percent. Technology fund-raising compliance. Social media, small and medium non-profits have needs in all these areas. My guests are expert in all these areas and mohr. Tony martignetti non-profit radio fridays, one to two eastern on talking alternative broadcasting. Talking all calm. Metoo yeah, for may, i would hyre individuals that demonstrate some type of passion, an experience in that area, in addition to being a plan giving officer clearly so clearly, technical expertise is necessary, but your point earlier, it’s not sufficient, correct. Dr starita. Dr starita ansari is president and chief change officer at msb philanthropy advisors, and we’re talking about how the strategic organization succeeds in fund-raising. What about staff meetings you mentioned earlier? It sounds like you’re unsatisfied with the typical staff meeting in a non-profit she’s, laughing. Now you can laugh out loud. I correct, okay. How? Why? Often, people come to staff meetings with a list of things that they’ve done since the last staff meeting. People should come to staff meetings with things that they’ve done to make gold one goal too, an assessment of how long it took to fulfill gold, wine and gold, too. Looking at gap analysis, are we going to meet the delivery ble on the on the time? God, i’m sorry got now on this show, we have drug in jail, so gap analysis it’s okay, you didn’t know, but you’re you’re treading lightly, you’re shutting closely to it. Um, what is a gap analysis on your strategic plan? There you have a critical path, which are the things that must occur in order for goals one and two to happen and let’s say action item three does not doesn’t occur then that puts puts the other goals at risk, gap announces is is looking at where things are falling through the cracks, where there may be human capital gaps because we haven’t hyre someone for position and how that gap is going to impact our ability for the delivery ble and what i’m saying is that staff meetings should should be analytical and should focus on what’s not working what is working and should be so and we should. Celebrate celebrate our successes as opposed to oh, i met with someone at ford foundation i maybe the program officer danny casey, i met this. I meant that i sent out seven proposals it’s clear, now that that sort of really even may be shallow meeting doesn’t promote the work of doesn’t promote the mission orientation in the goal orientation that we’ve developed around our strategic plan, it just becomes a list of activities, like you said, and that’s, what happens? People go through this a teacher planning process, they hire consultants, and the plants sits there, and no one opens the plan to make certain that is involved in the day to day activities, right? So no more of that let’s go around the table until we’ve done in the past two weeks. O r one week since the last meeting. All right, she’s e-giving the hatchet scientist across her neck, which is that’s not i hope it doesn’t mean end the interview. No, i don’t trends you mentioned being ableto assess trends in the marketplace where the non-profit exists. How does how does one how does your organization do that? One way is if you’re in a community. And i’ll stick with homeless, okay? And, you know, there are x number of shelters in manhattan get a sense of what they are doing, what they’re doing well, maybe opportunities for collaboration, what’s your market advantage, what you are doing well, that they’re not doing well. So when you speak to funders, you can communicate your market advantage. Was the trends in terms of homelessness what’s happening because of the economy? There’s an increasing number, single female heads of households that are homeless? What does that mean when a mother and her children are in a shelter? That wasn’t the case before the economy. So that’s a trend that we bets if you’re in the industry, you should be able to communicate the impact that that trend has over the past three or four years on the children in terms ofthe moving around and the ability to perform well in school, because that night in the same school, in terms of nutrition, how does all of that have have an impact on the population that you’re serving? And are we talking here about the executive director of the agency? Or could this be shared with the board? This this type of being out and looking at what’s happening in the community were, i guess, i’m asking, where does the responsibility life for this? In my opinion, the executive director, senor presidente, is the chief fund-raising officer. Okay, if that person is not comfortable being the chief fund-raising officer than the vice president for development, should equip that person with the tools that he or she needs to rise and fly, which means that development officer, or the advancement officer, needs to give the president of ceo the that data, and take the time to train the board on that information. So when they’re doing friendraising, they can speak about the value that their program brings to the community. We have just about a minute and a half left. Starita how about in performance evaluation? We’re looking at employee performance. How does this all work within that? Snusz egypt planning should be part of everyone’s job description oh, really, okay, i think everyone should be responsible, and i think people should be critical. Thinkers and fundraisers should strategically decide who they’re going to cultivate, why they’re going to cultivate that individual what’s the strategy. Look at a question. Which is working? Listen, i’m an annual fund person which works for my institution, is it the fiscal year end appeal over calendar year and appeal so that’s the evaluation piece, and then you take that and you apply that information to your strategic plan on how you’re going to move forward. Okay? Dr starita ansari is president and chief change officer of msb philanthropy advisors. We’ve been talking about the strategic organization and how important being such is, uh, leads to success in fund-raising starita, thank you very much for being a guest. Thank you. It was enjoyable. I’m glad my pleasure. You’re listening to tony martignetti non-profit radio coverage of national philanthropy day hosted by the association of fund-raising professionals, westchester county chapter. My previously recorded interview with starita ansari my thanks this week, teo, both bob wesolowski and starita and also to the westchester county chapter of a f p the association of fund-raising professionals, especially their philanthropy day organizer, joe ferraro. Next week i’ll be back in the studio on west seventy second street with paul gearan from professional survey group. How do you use surveys as a prospect cultivation tool? Had you craft your surveys? Tto learn what others think about your work i may call that survey satisfaction or maybe survey simplicity or i don’t know, serving up surveys. I’m not sure if you have a suggestion, i’ll take it, but you know i love a liberations, scott koegler keg lor will also be with me he’s, our tech contributor and the editor of non-profit technology news. Keep up with what’s coming up! Sign up for our insider email alerts on the facebook page. If you like the show, please like the page, you know you can listen live our archive to catch us archive go to non-profit radio dot net, and that will take you to our itunes paige. You’ll see you’ll see about eighty seven shows because i’ve been doing this for about twenty one months. Now you can listen anywhere on your computer the device of your choice non-profit radio dot net on twitter follow me or use the show’s hashtag non-profit radio use at hashtag recklessly our creative producer is claire meyerhoff. Sam liebowitz is the line producer. Our show’s social media is by regina walton of organic social media and the remote producer of tony martignetti non-profit radio is john federico of the new rules. I hope you’ll be with me next friday. One, two, two p. M eastern on talking alternative broadcasting, which you always find at talking alternative dot com. I think the dude in the good ending, you’re listening to the talking alternative network. Get anything? 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