David Sharken, Rainmaker Consultant has had extraordinary success working with groups doing capital
campaigns. Not only have the organizations obtained or surpassed their financial goals; they strengthened
their Culture of Philanthropy by building deep donor partnerships.
Here’s what David has to say about it:
Imagine this: your organization needs to embark on a major fundraising campaign, and your leadership
wants you to do a feasibility study. Hear me out: please don’t hire a consultant (even me!) to interview
your priority donors. If you do, you will miss an important opportunity. If you want to know the
willingness of your donors to support your vision – meet directly with them, share your vision and ask them
if this vision resonates for them! When you put your own efforts into deepening donor engagement, you
are building your organization’s Culture of Philanthropy.
A few years back, I coached the Executive Director, Development Director and three board members of a
group wanting to do a feasibility study before the board approved the launch of an historic $4-5 million
capital campaign. Utilizing past donor history and donor research, we identified 25 priority donors to meet
with. As the outside consultant, I only interviewed one person who wanted the “third party” objectivity. I
coached the team to have personal meetings with all the other high potential donors. I trained them to walk
the donors through the future program, vision, and the need for capital.
One meeting really surprised us. The Executive Director was in the living room of a couple who had
consistently given $3-5,000 gifts in the past, but research illustrated they gave very big to their alma
maters. The Executive Director was half way through the meeting, when she was interrupted.
“We know why you are here,” the donors explained, “your board wants to ensure that this
campaign can succeed. We relish this very moment; when a leader takes the time to meet with us
personally to discuss our shared vision for our community. We want you to go back to your board
and tell them we are committed to $450,000.”
If I, as the outside consultant, had been in that living room, the couple would not have pledged such an
amount to spark the campaign. It is only due to the intimate relationship planted and nourished by, in this
case, the Executive Director, that the large gift burst forward.
The campaign took off – and with many, many hours of authentic connections with donors, this
organization raised over $6 million- more than at any one time in their 50-year history. Most importantly,
these meetings strengthened the engagement of and partnership with their donors that will pay dividends
for years to come. This is an example of a key tenant of a Culture of Philanthropy: We Build and
Maintain Deep Donor Partnerships.
If your organization is priming for a major funds campaign, get trained to do those critical feasibility
interviews yourselves! Don’t hire someone else to spend precious time with some of the most important
members of your community.
Postscript: The folks who pledged the early large gift were originally NOT on the list of high priority
donors. Their past giving ranged well under $5,000 annually. However, using DonorSearch, a company we
at Rainmaker Consulting find very helpful, we discovered that this couple had given multiple six figure
gifts to a variety of other charities and so we moved them to the select group to be interviewed. Lesson
learned: combining research with personal attention may result in bigger gifts!
