Recently, I ran a survey asking charities about their main fundraising frustrations and challenges. The top 3 challenges were:
The vast majority said that, with regard to their resources, finding the time to fundraise was their biggest challenge (61%) closely followed by finding the time to invest in researching potential donors (44%).
I also asked what charities were going to focus on in 2013 when it came to fundraising and a huge 71% said that making their fundraising more strategic was their main priority. This is encouraging as – if the main challenge is using resources effectively to fundraise – taking a strategic approach by planning and managing your fundraising effectively is by far the best way to determine how you should use resources to bring in the most money. It’s also encouraging as, often, where resources are limited, strategy is the last thing on anyone’s mind – far behind bringing in the money. And 9 times out of 10, it’s the first area that I recommend small non-profits look at in order to structure their fundraising to become more successful.
So taking into account what the main challenges and frustrations are, what are my top 3 recommendations to make your fundraising more successful?
Take a look at my Successful Fundraising video series to get more ideas to help your fundraising to become more strategic; make better use of your resources; and get ideas about where to look for potential donors. And sign up to my regular fundraising tips and ideas – you get a free Fundraising Toolkit to download too – that’ll help boost your fundraising.