Do the Word

Our theme this week is ‘Simple steps you can take to move from transactional fundraising to Transformational Giving in your existing development program’.

Yesterday we highlighted a cool brochure (I think that’s the first time I used those two words in the same sentence).

Today we visit the wonderful world of thank you receipting in order to give a quick shout out to Amy Karjala, the Director of Development of Seoul USA,  the organization my wife and I founded that has soooooooo moved beyond that I need to stop referring to it that way.

(Amy also helped me to write the Coach Your Champions book, so when it comes to Transformational Giving she knoweth of what she speaketh.)

In any case, Amy’s doing something really cool with the Seoul USA thank you receipt letters: she’s using them to grow champions, not just thank them.

Thank you receipt letters are far and away the most opened pieces of mail we send to champions. Weird, then, that we slave over our fund raising appeal letters and acquisition letters but typically spend about 2.5 minutes writing the thank you note for the month.

Not so Amy.

Amy is jettisoning the time-honored (and thus nonsensical) practice of writing thank you letters by month (e.g., the May thank you letter, the June thank you letter, etc).

Instead, she is writing a thank you letter series, in which champions receive letter #1 in response to their first gift, letter #2 in response to their second gift, and so on. Each thank you letter is oriented toward providing the champion with a progressively practical bite-size growth morsel related to the cause and how the champion can impact it.

Most nonprofits do a specialized thank you letter for first-time givers. Many do specialized thank you letters for designated gifts. Amy’s approach takes that to the next level by enabling the first paragraph to be customized related to the gift intent before transitioning to an intentional lesson or equipping moment in the rest of the letter. She balances the thank you and the coaching lesson very nicely, and the lesson never comes across as an ask but rather as a ‘Since you sent us all that money, you might be interested in this opportunity to further impact the cause in your sphere of influence’ moment.

This is a great example of how coaching your champions can be scaled for a nonprofit with a large network of champions.

(Of course, a large nonprofit might respond by saying, ‘Yeah, but our receipting process doesn’t enable us to customize thank you letters that way.’ To which I respond, ‘If there’s ever a process worth reworking to enable maximum personalized interaction with your champions, it’s the receipting process.’)

As Seoul USA champions recognize that the thank you letter contains something even better than a receipt for tax purposes or a Crackerjack toy surprise, I expect the piece to assume even more primacy that it already does in the typical development program.

Brochures and DVDs are typically my two favorite whipping boys for what’s wrong with our fundraising programs. Nonprofits spend way too much time and money on them and frequently mistake a good brochure for a fundraising program.

So when I find a brochure I actually like, it’s a rare day indeed.

But I actually like this Hand_in_Hand_brochure from Joshua and Kelly Hallahan, missonaries with World Gospel Mission.

The Hallahans have done a nice job spelling out the covenantal nature of the relationship that I like to see typifying Engagement-level relationships with champions. In addition to listing resources about missions for the champion to read and study (with the assumption being that by partnering with the Hallahans the champion is committing to a path of growing maturity and involvement in missions), the Hallahans spell out how they intend to partner withthe champion, specifically:

· We will pray for your missionary efforts in your corner of the globe. Keep us posted!

· We will help you figure out what God is calling you to do in relation to your own missions service.

· We will hold you accountable to what God is calling you to do for missions in your own life.

· We will keep in touch, serving as your mutual accountability partners related to missions.

· We will come teach your small group or Sunday School class about being missions-active.

· If you are already involved in a mission of your own we would love to come serve with you!

Heartening predictions for Transformational Giving devotees in fundraising guru Mal Warwick’s May 2009 newsletter:

• Large charities clinging to enormous donorfiles will lose ground to those that emphasize donor quality over quantity.
• Major donor or foundation consortia will flourish, issuing Requests for Proposal (RFPs) to nonprofits and businesses alike to tackle specific problems.
• Small donors will flock to mutual-fund-like investment vehicles, by-passing individual nonprofits to address broader issues.

This is more than a ‘donor-centric’ future, by the way–much more than just a call to treat donors well. The tables are turning: champions are more and more comfortable acting to impact causes independent of nonprofits, and they’re increasingly beset not by compassion fatigue but by institutional fatigue–that is, they’re tired of nonprofits instisting that the road to impacting the cause goes through them.

Increasingly, a nonprofit earns its status as a respected expert and coach one champion at a time. It’s a great day that we need not fear: after all, it’s how Jesus worked, and it’s the environment in which Paul ministered. The only thing we need to toss off are the secular fundraising weights that beset us.

Teach a champion today how to better impact the cause they love–therein lies your path to success in development.