Soapbox Engage Blog

Issue 18

By the time you receive this message, my hope is that you've begun a little celebrating for the end of another Giving Tuesday. Congratulations for crossing the finish line!

After you get a chance to recharge the batteries, the latest ideas from your fellow fundraising community leaders will be here. For now, enjoy a moment of relaxation.

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Great Fundraising Posts

Building Your Nonprofit Development Department

Tim Forbes (Soapbox Engage)

No matter the size of your nonprofit (or how long you’ve been around), it’s critical to understand what makes an effective development department so you can build the best fundraising team for your organization. This blog has 5 great tips to help you build or expand your development department!

Stories of How Nonprofits Are Engaging With Donors and Volunteers

Duke Haddad (NonProfit PRO)

Engaging with donors and volunteers is a critical piece of fundraising. This year, with social distancing protocols in place, nonprofits are forced to get creative in how they create opportunities for personal interaction with supporters. This blog offers several stories of how some nonprofits are creating unique ways to have meaningful interactions with their volunteers and donors, instead of relying on large in-person events.

What Do You Say To A Donor?

Richard Perry and Jeff Schreifels (Veritus Group)

It’s a little reassuring to hear fundraising greats like Richard and Jeff admit that it can be really challenging to figure out what to say to a donor to get them to engage with you. You’re definitely not alone! This blog has some excellent, practical advice (and specific examples) of open-ended questions you can ask donors that will help you connect with them and engage in meaningful conversation. (It even has a free download so you can literally keep 5-star questions in your back pocket for your next donor event!)

#GivingTuesday in Reverse: Do’s and Don’ts

Claire Axelrad (Clairification)

#GivingTuesday is upon us but this blog has a bit of a twist to it! What if your nonprofit spent GivingTuesday actually giving to your donors? Literally, everyone is asking for something on GivingTuesday--there’s so much competition for each dollar that you’re actually not likely to bring in new donors. What if you coordinate your year-end fundraising so that GivingTuesday is the day you focus on donor care rather than appeals? This blog offers great insight into why this could be a great fundraising strategy for your nonprofit!

How to Do Year-End Fundraising the Right Way (Part 1)

The Fundraising Authority (The Fundraising Authority)

The final 6 weeks of the calendar year are arguably the most important for nonprofit fundraising. In this blog post, the experts over at The Fundraising Authority share their wisdom about how to do year-end giving the right way. This blog is the first part of a series and will help you understand WHY people make year-end donations so you can effectively target your audience.

5 Alternatives to Help Your Nonprofit on #GivingTuesday

Amy Eisenstein (Amy Eisenstein)

If you’re planning on doing some kind of #GivingTuesday fundraising campaign (and you should), there are a few things you can do to stand out from the throngs of nonprofits sending appeal emails and messages that day. Fundraising guru, Amy Eisenstein shares her top tips for alternatives to the standard, run-of-the-mill #GivingTuesday fundraising campaign (and you won’t need to scrap all the hard work you already did to put these tips into practice!)

Let’s Make Caring Cool Again

Mary Cahalane (Hands On Fundraising)

Whatever your organization’s particular vision and mission, your work is critical--perhaps now more than ever as so many people suffer the impacts of the pandemic and economic turmoil. But it can feel lonely to care so deeply about your cause and wonder who else cares. Mary Cahalane invites us to expand our notion of who cares in these trying times and to practice caring more deeply. Keep reading for a bit of encouragement and inspiration.

7 Ways to Survive the Difficult Months Ahead

Jeff Brooks (Future Fundraising Now)

In his trademark “short-and-sweet” style, Jeff invites all nonprofits to take seven specific steps in order to survive (and even thrive) the challenging months ahead as the world pushes toward a resolution to the COVID-19 pandemic and volatile economy. We appreciate that these are very specific, actionable suggestions that will help you care for your donors and yourself… in fact, doing these seven things may actually set you up for greater fundraising success as things begin to return to normal!

The Three Practical Empathies

Steven Screen (The Better Fundraising Co.)

Good fundraising requires empathy. Unfortunately, empathetic fundraising isn’t what connects with internal stakeholders. So, development professionals must also have empathy for the stakeholders! This blog post offers valuable insights about how development professionals, stakeholders, and others who work in the nonprofit sector must learn to lead with empathy in order to rise to the top levels of fundraising success!