Fundraising & Development

Non-profit development and fundraising leaders today face an increasingly competitive ‘giving market’ and challenges in connecting with and cultivating different donor segments – yet have fewer resources with which to secure the funds their organization needs to accomplish its mission.

The difficulty is that every funding development challenge is open-ended –
it presents many possible solutions. The key
to success, then? We follow two guiding principles.

First, to adapt the old adage, a fundraising partner with only a hammer – direct mail, web development, etc. – will tend to view every challenge as a nail. When you assess how to tackle each challenge and objective, work with a partner who offers a full toolset.

Second, we constantly advocate research to our clients, but when lots of variables are in play, it’s essential that you learn as you act. Take an incremental approach, and structure each project or program so you test specific variables and learn something that you can apply in the next round,
to improve your ROI.

Our multi-disciplinary team serves charitable, issue-based and religious non-profits in both Canada and the USA. Our team has a wealth of experience in sensitively and creatively applying marketing and direct marketing principles
in the non-profit sector.

Consider working with us…

Research and Planning
From interviews and surveys with existing donors to targeting prospective donors, we can help you to define, collect and use the information you need to understand where you fit on donors’ giving maps, to learn what you must change or improve, and to strengthen both your acquisition of new donors and cultivation of existing donors.

Donor Acquisition
Donor acquisition is essential but costly and risky. The danger is not learning expensive lessons, but learning no lessons at all.  Work with us to profile your high-value donors and why they give to you, to target potential donors matching this profile, and to take highly creative but rigorously testing-based approaches to reaching and converting potential donors and to improve your donor acquisition performance over time.

Appeals and Campaigns
For individual appeals and larger campaigns, our team can help yours to sharpen your messaging and to conceive and design compelling, best-practices-based appeal and campaign materials for direct mail, web/email communications, events, and other media.

Donor Engagement & Cultivation
Increasingly, across all demographics, donors’ giving is less monolithic – more driven by their specific affinities or ‘hot buttons’. Connecting with and cultivating donors – including major donors, who typically begin as minor donors – means taking a more personalized approach. How to do this efficiently and effectively? We can help.

Donor Recognition
Work with us to plan and execute donor thanking and recognition programs that fit your donor segments, make the desired impression, and support your cultivation and major gift teams.

Events
Most non-profit teams run fundraising events and conferences on various traditional models and have some genuine expertise in doing so.  Yet, when you want to breathe new life into an event, or create a different kind of event that supports your development strategy, our outside perspective and expertise can be very useful.

We guarantee that working with us will be a refreshing change from traditional “suppliers”.

Talk to Us about your fundraising and development challenges and goals. We’d love to help you succeed.

Got a challenge? Get our team’s opinion!
Tell us your challenge and we’ll send you back
a thought or two! What do you have to lose?