We listened to a three hour donor maintenance webinar today that was actually for the ministry we work for, but we couldn't help but draw the personal conclusions since we are in the midst of raising our missions budget.
We have another three hours tomorrow that I think are suppose to be more nitty gritty, so I will be interested to see the details.
A lot of what the firm is suggesting has to do with creating and developing relationship with donors that is beyond asking for money. The good news is that a lot of what we did last time we raised money was instinctively (or left over communications degree knowledge) relational. The only way we knew to work was to get to know people/churches until we finally met our budget.
But now it has to go to deeper. That's what we're learning. Lots of networking, somehow linking your communications medium together (like this blog - or maybe our official missionary one), websites, email etc. Communicating about things that aren't always fund raising. I don't know where to start or how. I want to be really good at helping people know how important their giving is and how much we appreciate their efforts.
What makes you feel connected and want to participate (in a financial or personal way) in a non-profit, charitable or religious organization?
That's got to be tough, since most of the people you are trying to connect with are pastors.
ReplyDeleteI have seen something be very successful for missionaries at our church. They connected to people in the congregation. A great way that this happens more naturally is by asking if there is someone in the congregation you can stay with. It opens you up to all that brings with it, but it also gives you an opportunity to connect with people who will be there longer than the pastor and will speak on your behalf with the next pastors. I've seen that with several of our missionaries, some of them even get personal givings from people in the church beyond what the church gives.
We even have a couple that were missionaries itenerating and they are here now as permanent residents in Linton instead of their home city/state because of the friendship that grew out from them staying with a family in our church. They are vital to the ministry of our church now as retired missionaries.
Don't know if this helps at all, it's what has worked, here. OH, I almost forgot FACEBOOK. That's been another HUGE way some of the younger missionaries are connecting with people in our congregation. They become our "friends" on facebook and we can keep up with how and what they are doing.
So there's a couple ideas, for what they are worth?