Tag: nonprofits

It’s OK to Tell Your Donors When You’re Behind on Your Fundraising

Steven Screen  |  Ask
Broken pig.

If your organization is behind on its fundraising goals, you’re allowed to tell your donors.

If you’re behind your budget right now, you’re probably feeling a little sick about it.  I’d like to help with that because in my experience, telling your donors is one of the best things you can do!

Of course, this feels dangerous.

So when an organization is behind its fundraising targets, here’s what tends to happen: someone offers up the idea to share the budget gap with donors, and someone else says, “We can’t do that, people will think we are bad at managing money, and our leadership will never approve it because they think it makes them look bad.”  (And if you have a Marketing or Branding department, they’ll say you can’t do it because it’ll hurt the long-term image of the organization.)

The instinct to hide a shortfall comes from a good place – staff and leaders want to protect the organization’s reputation, and you want donor confidence to remain high.

And there’s a layer that makes the whole thing even harder: even though shortfall campaigns happen all the time, nobody ever talks about them.  The organization doesn’t want to share that they had to do one.  Shortfall campaigns never get talked about at conferences.

And so we find ourselves operating in the dark on this issue, afraid of some consequences that we’ve never actually seen happen.

But (and this is a big “but”), please let me share with you the results of the 60 to 70 times I’ve run campaigns where nonprofits let their donors know that they were behind their fundraising goals.

Here’s what actually happens:

  • The campaign almost always raises significantly more than the nonprofit’s regular campaigns.  It’s usually the best campaign of the year.  One of Better Fundraising’s clients usually raises about $150k at year-end, and their shortfall campaign raised $650k.  Here’s that story.
    • Specifically, response rates and average gifts are higher than average.
  • The feared negative consequences don’t happen.  I’ve measured – there’s no drop in retention rates, and there’s no drop in long-term giving.
  • The number of calls the organization gets from “concerned donors” is usually less than five.

In a nutshell, here’s why a campaign that lets donors know a nonprofit is behind their fundraising goals or budget is usually so successful: donors know that the organization is a nonprofit.  They know that funding is uneven.  They don’t want any of the nonprofit’s services to be cut.  A shortfall is a clear, urgent need – and humans respond to clear, urgent needs.

And if this is something you are open to, it’s the conversation with your boss or your Board where the idea to share the shortfall gets killed.  Here are three things to say to your boss, in this order, to help them be more open to the idea:

“I know this feels risky.  I had the same instinct.  But shortfall campaigns have been run successfully for a long time, it’s just that nobody talks about it.  Here’s what one experienced fundraiser saw as he ran more than 50 of these campaigns… (show them this blog).”

“Our donors know that we’re a nonprofit.  They know that funding varies from year to year.  When we tell them we’re behind our budget, we’re building trust – we’re treating them like partners instead of just calling them partners.”

“We know our donors care about our work.  Let’s tell them what’s going on and give them a chance to help, not hide it and take the decision out of their hands.”

When you’re behind budget, trust your donors.  They care about what your organization is working on, and they care about your organization.  They want you to keep going.  Give them the chance to help.  You don’t have to hide what is happening.

Your donors can handle the truth.  They will thank you for telling them.  And they will surprise you with their generosity.

Presence Implies Importance

Steven Screen  |  Repeat
Being present.

If your cause and your nonprofit are always showing up in the lives of your donors, your donors come to believe that your organization is doing important work.

Think about this in your own life: it’s likely there’s a nonprofit that you “run into” all the time because you see their fundraising and regularly hear about the cause they are working on.  And it’s likely that you, perhaps without even realizing it, come to believe that those nonprofits are doing important work.

Contrast this to the organizations that show up in their donors’ lives just once or twice a year.  One of the messages “showing up a couple times a year” sends is that the work and the organization must not be that important.  Because if it were important, they would show up more often, right?

I’m not saying this is fair.  But it sure is true.

What does this mean for you?  It means that if your nonprofit wants to grow, part of your job is to be present in donors’ lives, in a relevant way, often.

Two TED Talks

Steven Screen  |  Tips
Ted talks.

Today I’d like to share two videos with you.  Both are easy watches and contain “ideas worth spreading.”

The first is Dan Pallotta’s TED talk from a few years ago.  (It has 1.1 million views, but it should have a lot more, in my opinion.) 

It’s called “The way we think about charity is dead wrong.”  Essentially, Dan argues that by focusing so much on “revenue to expense ratios” we end up kneecapping our growth and impact.

Second, here’s a helpful video from Kara Logan Berlin.  She helps people see the importance of fundraising, and provides plenty of fundraising advice that jives with what we’ve seen to be successful. 

Speaking to nonprofits, Kara says, “We have to be as committed to the art of funding our work as we are to the art of doing our work.” [emphasis added]

Both of these videos lead a person to a deeper understanding of fundraising.  And in my experience, if you have a deeper understanding of fundraising itself, and the role of fundraising, you’ll be more likely to create fundraising that works.

Build a Longer Table

Samantha Swaim  |  Repeat
Long table.

The following is a hand-picked guest post from Samantha Swain. Enjoy, and you can read more about Samantha below.

***

In times of uncertainty, the most powerful action nonprofits can take isn’t to retreat, it’s to gather.

The Big Idea: Community as Resilience Strategy

The organizations that will thrive in challenging times aren’t those with the most resources, but those that have woven the strongest web of human connection around their purpose. Your most valuable asset isn’t your funding or even your programs – it’s the community that believes in your mission.

When people physically gather around shared purpose, something transforms. Science confirms what we intuitively know: face-to-face connection builds trust, generates empathy, and creates the neural foundation for collective action.

Building Your Longer Table

In a world pulling apart at the seams, building a longer table isn’t just a concept – it’s essential. Every time you bring people together around your mission, you create:

  • Sustainable fundraising rooted in relationship rather than transaction
  • Deeper volunteer commitment grounded in belonging, not obligation
  • Responsive programs shaped by community wisdom
  • Authentic advocacy powered by diverse voices

Your Immediate Next Step

This month, host one gathering designed explicitly to extend your organization’s table. Structure it not for efficiency but for connection. Create space for stories that reveal why your mission matters to each person present. Start small like a dinner with your board, a tour with a donor.

Remember: In times of scarcity, we must resist the urge to contract. Instead, build your table so long and so welcoming that people can’t help but be drawn to your work—not just for what you do, but for the community you create.

The most resilient organizations aren’t building higher walls. They’re building longer tables.

***

Steven says, “Samantha Swaim has more than 20 years of event planning and fundraising expertise. She is the co-author of Planning a Successful Major Donor Event, is the founder of the annual Elevate fundraising event conference scheduled for March 3-4, 2026 and is the co-host of The Fundraising Elevator podcast – which I recently appeared on: check it out!”

The power of ignorance in fundraising

Jeff Brooks  |  Repeat
Ignorance.

The following is a hand-picked guest post from Jeff Brooks. Enjoy, and you can read more about Jeff below.

***

Scene: Board meeting for the very small organization where I’m a board member.

The all-volunteer fundraising committee is presenting a plan to launch a monthly giving campaign. After years of struggling to do this, we finally had an online giving platform that made it easy.

People are nodding. It looks good. After the presentation, it’s time for Board comments.

One board member speaks up: “I really hate the subscription model. I just tune it out whenever I see it. We should not do this.”

Another board members chimes in: “I know what you mean!”

The group teeters for a moment on deciding against monthly giving. Because one member thinks they don’t like the subscription model.

A significant opportunity could have been gone. At least until enough board turnover will allow a reconsideration.

It happens all the time: Board members or other nonprofit leaders make ignorant, harmful decisions based on gut feelings or “intuition.” Often, there’s nobody at the table with knowledge to warn them away. Or worse, leaders are not interested in knowledge and unwilling to listen to it.

As long as leaders choose to remain ignorant, fundraising will suffer.

Part of your job as an awake, aware fundraiser is to fight the good fight for knowledge over ignorance. I’ve seen it work many times – leaders’ eyes opening. Fundraising programs blossoming as a result. It happens. And if you can make it happen, it will be a source of joy and pride you’ll treasure.

In those cases where it cannot happen – where leaders simply won’t listen and actively choose ignorance… you have a choice: Keeping fighting, or go someplace with proper leadership.

I don’t advise that lightly. Creating change is better. If it’s possible. You are gifted with time, talent, and knowledge. Don’t let someone waste it because they can’t listen.

***

Steven says, “Jeff Brooks is the brilliant author of Future Fundraising Now (which you should subscribe to).  I’ve been lucky enough to know Jeff since we both had hair that was longer and browner.  He’s the best, clearest voice on direct response fundraising that I know of.”

How You Can Get Comfortable Using the “F” Word

Jonathan Steck  |  Repeat
Man shocked.

I recently heard a client tell me, “I find it hard to even talk about fundraising at work. It’s like it’s a dirty word.”

Do you feel like this, sometimes?

It’s a common struggle among fundraisers as we work to educate our co-workers and internal teams to the necessary, yet nuanced world of fundraising.

And yes, the “F” word is Fundraising.😀

The misconception in many organizations is that fundraising isn’t really a function of our mission. Instead, fundraising is the activity that nobody likes to talk about.

And it’s you, the fundraiser, who suffers.  Often times folks in fundraising feel the internal tension that their task is simply not seen as important as the boots-on-the-ground work that the organization is doing.

I’m sure you’ve heard some, or all of these objections when using the “F” word in your organization…

“That story is too sad, we can’t share it with donors.”

“We’re sending too many letters to our donors, we should stop.”

“We should be telling the donor more about the good things we do.”

“We don’t need to raise money for the programs you want to talk about.”

“This letter implies that we need help.”

Well, here are 4 tested and proven things you can do right now to help remove the internal tension and get folks more comfortable with using the “F” word.

1. Meet With Your Teams

To help educate internal teams on the importance of fundraising at your organization, schedule a short meeting that gives folks a simple overview of what fundraising is, and why it’s necessary for the mission.

This doesn’t have to be a long, bloated meeting.  In fact, I would recommend to keep it short and use visuals, like a PowerPoint presentation to get your point across.

Donuts help, too.

Better Fundraising regularly does these presentations to programs teams, leadership, and boards, and find that folks walk away with a much clearer understanding to what fundraising is, and why it’s not a dirty word.

2. Share Your Appeals with Internal Teams

It’s often overlooked, but taking some time to walk around and literally handing internal staff a copy of your next direct mail appeal works wonders.

That’s because a common complaint from many internal teams is that they don’t know what’s happening in fundraising, and what donors are receiving. 

So, handing out a copy of your next appeal gives you opportunity to build relationships, answer questions face-to-face, and develop goodwill with all stakeholders.

3. Run a Kick-Off Meeting

It’s a great idea for your Fundraising Team to have a kick-off meeting for every campaign. 

The kick-off meeting is a great way to provide non-fundraising staff with an overview of the campaign, its components (letters, emails, events, etc.), the fundraising offer, story, and messaging, plus internal goals and objectives.

This meeting is not designed to be a discussion about “how” or “why,” but rather answering the “when,” “what,” and “where” for the campaign. 

Set the expectation at the start of the meeting, and invite participants to stay behind after the meeting for questions and clarification, if needed.

4. Food

Folks working in nonprofits generally don’t need a reason to share morning tea and snacks with each other.  Food brings people together, so take advantage of it!

If the weather is nice outside, consider having your fundraising team host a BBQ or picnic. Or have fundraising staff each bring a pie, cookies, or something delicious to put in the lunch room.

The key is to email your organization staff and let them know that the Fundraising Team is doing this, and to come and grab something to eat.

These ideas sound simple, and in many respects they are.  But they are proven ways to educate folks to the importance of fundraising in your organization, remove tension with internal teams, and get you confidently using the “F” word, again.

Imagined Constraints Can Lead to Real Revenue

Steven Screen  |  Repeat
Boy in a box.

The following is a guest post from Mike Duerksen of Buildgood in Canada.

The exercise he proposes is a GREAT way for your organization to uncover (quickly, in my experience) actions you can take next year to help you raise more money and keep more of your donors.

Think of the exercise as making your fundraising healthier & more robust and increasing your organization’s immunity to difficulties.

The little boy isn’t limited by the shape of the cardboard box.

Yesterday it was a secret cave. Today it’s a plane flying through the skies. Tomorrow it might be a pirate ship.

His only constraint is his imagination, not the four walls that box him in.

And that’s the power of constraints: they force creativity.

Right now your nonprofit might be in a cardboard box. And you feel stuck. And you’re waiting for the day when the walls come down again.

But what if the pandemic is giving you a rare chance to think creatively about how you can free yourself of the ways you’ve always done things?

What if you can use the new limits imposed on you to re-imagine the ways you show up in the world?

And what if you can actually improve your fundraising and future-proof your revenue to protect yourself from the next crisis?

Chances are you can…by playing a game of constraints.

What Is A Game Of Constraints?

A game of constraints is a simple exercise where you imagine a scenario that might seem impossible or unlikely.

Then you brainstorm as many ways as possible to overcome the problem.

You’ll be surprised how quickly you can free your mind from thinking:

  • “We can’t do that!” to
  • “This is tough, but maybe not impossible” to
  • “Here’s one way we could respond that would solve the problem”

You can have a lot of fun playing these games and stretching your imagination. But you’ll also feel energized about the opportunities ahead.

You’ll be more confident in your ability to solve potential problems. And you’ll identify where you are weak today, so you can become more resilient for tomorrow.

Ready to play some games?

5 Games You Can Play Today

Here’s a few scenarios to get you started…

1: A WORLD WITHOUT THE MAIL

Imagine a world where the postal service is no longer operating. From one day to the next, you can no longer reach your donors by mail. How will you communicate with them?

This is a great game to start with because we have seen postal strikes before. And when COVID hit, some print houses weren’t sure at first if they would keep operating

Chances are the options you came up with were to email, call or use social media to reach your donors.

Now ask yourself: How many emails do we have on file? What’s our email open rate? How many phone numbers? How many cellphone numbers? What do we need to do today to make sure we increase emails and phone numbers on file?

What you’ll discover: You likely need a better strategy to harvest donor email addresses and phone numbers.

2: A WORLD WITHOUT EVENTS

Imagine a world where you are no longer able to host any fundraising events in person. How do you engage current donors so they feel like they are still part of a community of givers? How do you attract new donors? What tools or approaches do you use instead?

This one hits close for many nonprofits right now. Some are finding success (and profitability!) moving to online formats.

Others are discovering that simply moving your event online is not a sound strategy — you have to re-invent the entire experience.

And some are letting go of events altogether, replacing them with something else.

What you’ll discover: There are many ways to draw donors closer to your mission outside of special events that may yield higher net revenue, save you time and give your donors a greater sense of connectedness.

3: A WORLD WITHOUT GRANTS & GOVERNMENT FUNDING

Imagine a world where you can no longer get funding from public and private foundations, governments and other institutional funders. How will you raise your yearly budget? How much more will you need to raise from individual donors? How many more individual donors do you need to get there?

This is one of the most important games you can play if you rely on applying for large grants and government funding every year.

Priorities for funders change. Governments change. Key relationship players at foundations change.

Don’t wait until you are denied funding before creating a strategy to diversify your income.

What you’ll discover: You may need to invest in your individual giving program a lot more in the coming years to protect your mission from future volatility.

4: A WORLD WITHOUT MAJOR DONORS

Imagine a world where the largest gift you can secure from anyone is $10,000. How many $10,000 donors would you need? How many $5,000 donors? Or $2,500? How would you identify who in your donor file can upgrade to give close to $10,000? How would that change the way you treat your donors?

Some organizations are getting the highest gifts in their history right now. Others are seeing major donors sit back a bit while they evaluate the situation.

Meanwhile, foundational donors — those in the “mass” file — are stepping up. Many just needed to be challenged with a clear and urgent problem to solve.

What you’ll discover: You likely have hidden value in your middle donor file — and you likely need a strategy to help each donor in your mass file give the best gift they can.

5: A WORLD WITHOUT DONOR ACQUISITION

Imagine a world where you can no longer acquire new donors. All you have to work with is your existing records in your database. How will you ensure your active donors don’t lapse? How will you convert your loyal donors to monthly givers? How will you upgrade your active donors to middle donors? How will you upgrade your middle donors to major donors? How will you re-activate your lapsed donors?

The point of this game is to help you realize that you can grow the value of your current donor file. You just need to pay some attention to the donors you’re at risk of losing.

Because the donors you already have are a lot more valuable than the ones you hope to acquire.

After playing this game, you’ve probably identified a few ways you can become a smarter fundraiser using the resources at hand.

What you’ll discover: You have a lot of room to improve your donor retention, and win back donors who haven’t engaged in a while.

Your Next Steps: Play A Game With Your Team

Now it’s your turn.

  1. Pick one of the games above. Or create your own scenario. Then gather your team.
  2. Split into smaller groups and brainstorm. Make sure each person knows there are no bad suggestions, as long as they stay within the given constraints.
  3. Share your answers. Have each team read out their answers to each other.

What you’ll end up with is an invaluable source of raw ideas that will help you uncover better ways to serve your donors, make your fundraising more resilient and position your nonprofit for growth.

And you’ll notice your mindset will shift.

You’ll feel more prepared to meet this moment in time. You’ll be more optimistic about your ability to raise funds.

You’ll start to see the cardboard box you’re in not as a limitation, but as an opportunity to create something new.

And you’ll feel more confident that you can emerge stronger…thanks to the power of constraints.

Big thanks to Mike for letting us share his post with you. And if you’re interested in more from Mike, here’s a link to his podcast that’s focused on practical fundraising tips and strategies.

The Evolution of the Ask

Steven Screen  |  Ask
Evolution of ask.

I want you to identify which part of the circle your organization is currently in.

And before I go too far, let me just say that the graphic above doesn’t apply to every organization. Nor is it exactly right.

But it’s still true.

At their founding, organizations tend to have remarkably simple and powerful asks / calls to action.

These are phrases like:

  • Help save the grizzlies!
  • Will you give so that the Opera can put on the next performance?
  • Will you help the Quilting Museum keep the doors open?

Simple. Clear. Powerful.

It works so great that the founder’s idea, plus their passion, raise enough funding to become an organization. That’s an incredible transformation!

And then, as organizations get bigger, they move around the circle to the right. Their fundraising and the team creating it gets more complex. Their ask evolves.

It’s a well-worn path.

Internal forces cause the asks above to evolve into less effective asks like:

  • Our work in the local ecosystem with multiple bear species is such a success, will you join us?
  • Will you support the light, drama and majesty of this art form we call “Opera”?
  • Please join the beautiful patchwork of the human quilt!

Let’s be clear: these things happen for good reasons with good intent. Creative and passionate people, with little-to-no training in direct response fundraising because our industry doesn’t do a great job of that, do the best they can.

And it works. The team works hard. Donors are generous and support the things they love. The organization raises money.

But in the context of direct response fundraising (your appeals, e-appeals, newsletters, etc.) it doesn’t work as well as the simple, clear, powerful approach.

This graphic exists so that your organization can skip a few steps on the journey back to simple, clear, powerful fundraising that works like crazy.

So, go back to the graphic and locate your organization again. Think about where you currently are, and what steps you can skip. If you can skip a step or three, you’ll rapidly increase your organization’s fundraising capacity!