Fundraising

The term ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) has shown up in the media a lot lately, but too few people understand what it means or how it relates to their organization.

Nonprofits are constantly being assessed by potential funders who are seeking to understand the impact of nonprofits in the communities they are meant to serve. Without knowing how to clearly evaluate and articulate their impact, nonprofits run the risk of inspiring less support for their mission.

From the beginning of civilization, storytelling has maintained a uniquely impactful position in defining culture, motivating action and bringing people together. Today’s marketers need to be better storytellers than ever before as more and more stories are told all around us. Join Firespring’s Kiersten Hill as she goes through tips, techniques and tools to help the modern marketer tell better and more impactful stories to activate their audiences around ideas and actions.

Key Takeaways:

A fiscal sponsor is a nonprofit organization that provides fiduciary oversight, financial management, and other administrative services to help build the capacity of charitable projects. For further explanation, see: What is fiscal sponsorship?

First Day is a podcast from Indiana University’s Lilly Family School of Philanthropy aimed at development profressionals. "Highlighting current news and research, this weekly 10 minute podcast provides fundraisers with the latest information in fundraising and philanthropy."

Recurring gifts (sustainers, monthly donors) are game changers and provide organizations with ongoing revenue for years to come. In this session, you’ll learn how to implement and grow a monthly donor program using channels and systems you already have in place. You’ll receive worksheets, templates, and a Monthly Donor Road Map with practical tips and examples to help you organize your program, prepare monthly donor plans, acquire new donors, thank and cultivate donors, and prevent and reactivate lapsed donors.

Recording length: 1 hour, 3 minutes

Why do people contribute to a cause? Because their passion for making a difference has been ignited! You can help trigger a donor’s passion for your cause through the fundamentals of storytelling. Whether you’re telling the story through a grant proposal, a video message, a radio announcement, or one-on-one, you can use storytelling structure to help your donor see their role in making your mission a success.

Recording length: 1 hour, 19 minutes

A good ask is a work of art that anyone can master. In this session, you’ll learn the tactics of a successful solicitation – in person or virtually. Working in small teams, participants will role play with real-life donor scenarios, developing a solicitation script and gift proposal, making the ask, dealing with objections, and following up the ask. This session will also cover the solicitation outline, ideal ask amount, and follow-up donor stewardship that can lead to additional and larger gifts.

Just as we use a compass or GPS to show us where we are and where we want to go, the public values of liberty, equality, community, and prosperity can illuminate our positions and guide our decision making as we envision and navigate toward our community’s future.

This session offers an opportunity for conference participants to hear insights from business leaders about trends and issues in supporting North Carolina’s nonprofit sector. Topics may include: opportunities and issues in supporting nonprofits during the pandemic; equity and inclusion; business and nonprofit opportunities and partnerships; sponsorship changes in these virtual times; the future of business support for nonprofits.

Recording length: 1 hour, 14 minutes