Did you catch MemoryFox’s August webinar on year end fundraising with Lori L. Jacobwith? Watch it now!

About the year end fundraising webinar:

This recording took place Tuesday, August 8th, 2023 at 12 pm EDT / 9 am PDT.

Not surprisingly, your donors’ attention span is shorter than ever. And, your donors are likely NOT thinking about how to help you meet or exceed your fundraising goals. So what to do? As effective fundraising and communication professionals, our job is to make certain our asking and thanking messages stand out. 

In this fun, fast-paced session, you’ll learn 5 powerful and simple “must-do’s” to cut through year-end fundraising noise; help increase your Giving Tuesday success; and increase donor retention.

In this webinar, you will learn:

• How to increase donor retention by adding value to donor thanking
• What will make it easy for donors to increase their annual contribution
• How to identify 2 simple tactics to increase your Giving Tuesday success

About Lori: Lori L. Jacobwith is the Founder of Ignited Fundraising. The sweet spot of her work is to help organizations put a face on their impact by sharing inspiring, ethical mission moment stories.

For more than 35 years Lori has had a laser focus on helping nonprofit staff & board members implement fundraising solutions that put ease and joy into raising money.

To date, she’s helped nonprofit organizations raise more than $500 million.

Public speaking & training remain her passion in her quest to fulfill her personal mission of helping as many nonprofit organizations as possible exceed their annual fundraising results.

Full Transcipt:

0:01 hello Dr Kimberly is here hello hello everybody

0:09 thank you for your note you’re welcome thank you for the important work you do I’m just in awe of all that you

0:16 do and I love your organization thank you so much I really appreciate

0:23 that thank you I have a five-year-old granddaughter and um I want her to be empowered and do what

0:32 what you teach and model and play like a girl so thank you thank you you’ve been

0:38 a huge resource and help so I appreciate it especially during the pandemic so

0:43 thank you thank you we got a full house we do yeah and

0:52 people are still coming I’m admitting as people come in but um I think let’s get started are you

0:57 ready to get started I am great let’s do it um so welcome everybody it is so great

1:04 to have you here for our August memory Fox webinar um I’m just in awe of all the people

1:10 that have registered for today’s webinar I’m personally super duper excited to learn from Lori today so I I’m sure you

1:16 all are as well as a reminder you all know the topic today we are talking about the five must dudes of year-end

1:22 fundraising gotta get my hot girl walking

1:29 I’m just gonna mute um some people here okay

1:35 um next slide Lori yep I have to accept the meeting is being recorded it wasn’t

1:41 letting me oh

1:48 okay so then just first a little bit about memory box um we are a storytelling tool that

1:53 empowers non-profits to collect organize and share Community generated content

1:58 we are a veteran-owned company we’re located in Buffalo go bills but we do

2:04 have employees that live all across the nation and then um I would love it if you all would

2:09 stick around at the end and I’ll just give you a quick overview of exactly what memory Fox does

2:15 um so I’ll just now introduce my wonderful guest for today remember Lori

2:20 is a memoryfox partner of ours she is advisor to me I learn a lot from her so

2:26 as I was saying I’m super excited for today’s topic and over to you Lori well thank you yay Carly but Carly didn’t say

2:34 is memory Fox is the best storytelling tool that I’ve ever found that can

2:42 really help especially small shops capture video to be used in about a

2:48 bazillion different ways so if you don’t know what it is stick around at the end

2:53 and get just a little sneak peek into it also follow them on social media because

2:59 they’ve got them they’ve got some cool stuff we are going to use chat uh very

3:04 uh prolifically I do have a poll but I’m going to use chat on the poll so just I

3:11 will keep my eye on chat as best I can but let’s Dive In I know that together collectively we all

3:19 believe in making a difference but what I want to know is just how does your

3:25 what is your personal way you make a difference I know that there are Consultants I know that there are CEOs

3:32 and development professionals and marketing folks so just a quick type into chat how you make a difference and

3:41 while you’re doing that I’ll tell you a little bit about my background and then we’ll read some of your answers I live

3:48 in Minneapolis Minnesota where it is always sunny and warm and if you believe that I’ve got some lake property for you

3:55 in Arizona good I could sell to you I

4:01 have been in this sector for many many years but I started out my family

4:06 started out volunteering long long time ago we volunteered at church at the aquatennial the Summer Festival here in

4:12 Minnesota uh we volunteered for political candidates and I got my fundraising legs by helping political

4:21 candidates and when I was younger I thought I might be governor of Minnesota and told my parents that and they

4:27 laughed and thought that was lovely and I said if I can’t have that job I’d really like to be a flight attendant so

4:32 people would pay me to travel around the world and fast forward many years I got to work for the governor of Minnesota

4:38 and a U.S senator and our attorney general learned a lot about how to tell stories and gather people’s passion and

4:46 support of whatever it is that we believe in but I also got invited to

4:51 travel and speak around the world so both of my work dreams came true and I

4:58 continue to look for ways to help organizations make a difference

5:04 one of the ways I do that of course is helping people to tell powerful stories

5:10 so let me just see what some of you are saying about how you believe in making a

5:15 difference oh hello Andrea nice to see you here uh we Elevate non-profit

5:22 missions through nonprofit storytelling that’s the folks at memory Fox um Big Brothers Big Sisters Making

5:27 Connections that make a difference great listener that’s great I love it Jessica

5:34 um as an individual I tend to do things that others see as Brave or inspiring that’s Sarah she’ll pack up and go off

5:41 to study if the wind decides I’ve decided I’ve done things that years later people still speak of it I’m

5:46 always surprised congratulations that’s that’s making a difference empowering individuals with disabilities

5:53 through sports and recreation connecting with and caring for my neighbors find

5:58 ways to share the great work our organization does so if you’re just joining us type in how you’re making a

6:05 difference helping our donors feel good about the difference they’re making in the world by supporting our programs

6:11 love it our organization makes a difference trying to eradicate you’re not trying to

6:17 you’re eradicating Global poverty starting in Ethiopia with education and

6:22 job creation words matter a lot to me so just know that if I see words that might

6:30 be a little less um uh direct I may give you some options to

6:36 think about all right so it is August we are gearing

6:42 up for year-end fundraising if you aren’t you should be and I kind of think

6:47 at this time of year as taking stock on what have we done in the past that’s been effective and

6:54 what are we doing that’s sort of the same old same old you know what I mean the planning the fall event working with

7:00 well-intentioned volunteers finding a good story making sure our data is clean writing and getting approval for that

7:06 letter unfortunately sometimes getting approval for that letter takes weeks because you’re doing it in committee

7:12 with more people involved then maybe really should be collating the mailing making plans for giving Tuesday I hope

7:19 or if you’re in Minnesota making plans for give to the max day sending thank you letters and more

7:25 all of that with whatever title you have is a lot and if there aren’t even subtle

7:33 changes to what you’re planning it’s sort of the definition of insanity

7:38 doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results I want

7:44 better results for you I want uh certainty for you and so some of that

7:51 means how will we think about and choose to do things a little bit differently maybe a little bit outside the box how

7:58 might we use some tools like memory fox or other tools in a way that

8:04 really has us rise above all the noise that’s hitting people’s inboxes or mail

8:10 boxes so one of the first things I like to remind people is nobody cares about your

8:16 goal but you we can certainly talk about our goal internally but if you put help

8:22 us with our goal in your appeal or on your social media it just becomes a part

8:28 of the noise so make sure that any communication for

8:34 this fall answers the question here’s what you’ve made possible in the past year

8:41 here’s how things are different here’s what we’re up against that may look a

8:47 little different here’s how many more matches or how many more girls we can

8:52 support when we have more Revenue when we reach the next Milestone which is by

8:59 December 31st and here’s how you can fulfill your aspiration to do more

9:06 I’m going to share some words that some of you have heard a number of times this is sort of my signature next couple of

9:13 slides when you change just this kind of language I can

9:20 pretty much guarantee you money in the bank you will change your Revenue

9:25 outcome for this fall so the words we often use donate attend

9:31 help us give more give again our non-energetic not inspiring and everyone

9:37 uses them so maybe think outside the box and choose some inspiring communication

9:43 like invest in ending poverty in ending uh food

9:50 insecurity uh let’s make an impact or let’s make a bigger impact together

9:57 we want to help you fulfill your is aspirations of making a difference in our community and we’ll do the hard work

10:04 all you have to do is a show up at this event or B give dollars that are

10:09 meaningful to you because we’re looking for long-term Partners don’t ever be hesitant to let people know you want

10:15 them to stick around for a while and please please please remove these words from your vocabulary

10:21 it’s too hard there’s donor fatigue we can’t there’s not enough people time

10:26 money our board won’t our staff won’t the community won’t when you tell me

10:32 those things when I’m in a meeting with you when I hear these words I actually get a visceral a physical response of of

10:40 uh annoyance and frustration because I know that you’re setting yourself up for

10:47 more scarcity instead I invite you to use words that have possibility

10:52 we’re learning to be more clear and bold we want to inspire you to take more

10:59 action we want to inspire you by telling you what if we could and fill in the

11:06 blank what if we could do more fill in the blank we’re looking for people with aligned

11:11 values and we want you to stick around for a while tell the truth

11:18 authentic communication cuts through the Clutter authentic communication is different than what we’re used to seeing

11:25 in appeals and social media posts and there are some Superstars out there that

11:30 are doing a great job so go look for them find them here’s a question I like to ask to shift

11:37 from scarcity or Duty and obligation to possibility

11:43 stop being afraid of what could go wrong and focus instead on what could go right

11:50 so let’s make a really quick list just type in to the chat box what could go

11:57 right one thing that could go right with your fall fundraising

12:03 just it would excite you if it went right don’t even know if it could but

12:10 new donors show up love it what else

12:15 create a brilliant new relationship oh that excites me serve the kids on our waiting list tell us that in your social

12:23 media and your appeals new monthly donors I want to know why that matters we could fund more student science

12:30 projects donors increase their giving we finished our gathering space under construction and celebrate together with

12:36 all of our neighbors tell me all of those things in your communication this fall we get to hire more more team

12:43 members to help support the work we’re doing new monthly donors bigger awareness give our community a voice and

12:48 they share they share feelings seen and heard not sure what word was missing there Natalie

12:55 but you’ll fill me in offer medically tailored meals to our seniors ooh Maggie how and how much

13:02 so really truly it’s our choices that show

13:07 what we truly are far more than our abilities are you the most organized person are

13:14 you the best fundraiser in the world Maybe and maybe you’re really good at a lot of

13:22 things and you’ve got that title of development manager director communication manager whatever it is

13:28 make your choices matter so let’s talk about the five must Do’s

13:34 in order to tackle these you might have to shift something that you were

13:40 planning to do or just subtly change something that you’re already knowing you’re you’re doing well but maybe

13:47 you’re going to gain a new awareness today about how you could do it just a little bit

13:53 better and what I invite you before I dive into these is to think about two things one when that thought pops up I

14:01 already know this please think about it as just a little bit of a shift

14:07 what could help me about this today that maybe is a little bit different maybe

14:14 I’ve been actioning what Laurie’s saying but not as and not executing it at the

14:21 level that we possibly could so just shift it a little bit what could I learn from this instead of I already know this

14:28 the second thing is think about if you think it doesn’t apply to you

14:34 think about how could it apply to you or your organization in a different way that shifts your mind to a creative mode

14:41 and you start to think about things that maybe you’ve forgotten that you wanted to do so let’s dive in here’s my five to

14:49 Do’s now we’re going to do a deep dive into them first is look at your data yep

14:54 you got to take a little bit of time to look at your data it doesn’t take that long once you’ve got a system in place

15:00 to do it it will tell you a story and it will tell you who to be talking to

15:06 share your money story and if you don’t know what that is I’ll tell you in a moment but it really is what does it

15:11 take to fully fund your mission and where are you today you want to share it a lot of places it

15:17 is the story we forget to tell make phone calls this little device was

15:24 created to actually reach out to people and connect with them and when I get a

15:30 phone call I just talk to my sister this morning haven’t talked to her in a little while she’s at the cabin I needed

15:36 something from her she was grateful I called we chatted from it’s such a deeper connection and I spent the last

15:43 month making donor thank you calls for an organization an Arts organization I had the best time

15:49 you may not be able to make all those calls but we’re going to talk about who could and what happens when you make

15:54 some of those calls choose the mission moment story that best exemplifies your mission you do not

16:01 need 40 stories for between now and year end you could tell a story

16:08 multiple parts of the story over the next three four months and get us to

16:14 know that person really well and have us feel like we’re insiders maybe you choose a couple of stories

16:21 but do them well it’s not quantity in storytelling that matters it’s quality

16:26 and then plan your gift acknowledgment strategy okay you’ve already got one in

16:32 place but we’re going to talk about how to open it up and that’s a very technical fundraising term how to oomph

16:37 it up a little bit so donor data charts to review I have three that I am sort of a data freak and

16:46 I like to look at whenever I’m working with an organization the first is and over the past five years and since we’ve

16:52 had the pandemic be a part of three of the past five years I’m even going back to six or seven years so we can see some

17:00 of the before and the after uh and compare that so I like to look at individual giving by total dollars in

17:07 specific categories individual giving by number of donors and then your donor

17:13 retention so I have done a blog post a while back

17:19 if you go to my website after this webinar not right now ignitedfundraising.com and type into the

17:27 search three charts the uh blog post will come up about that

17:33 um I know that the folks at memory Fox have some other tools too we’ll share those after the webinar but I want to

17:38 show you what I mean so this is dollars by giving level and

17:44 the giving levels we chose were under a hundred dollars 100 to 4.99 500 to 9.99

17:50 a thousand to nine thousand nine hundred ninety nine and then ten thousand pluses a pretty small organization so we got to

17:57 see in each category how much people had given and notice there’s a lot of money given

18:05 in that big blue light blue chunk there um quite a lot of money given in that

18:10 orange chunk but here’s what’s interesting in those top three categories the 500

18:18 and above that’s nearly eight hundred thousand dollars that’s given

18:24 but in those same top three categories that’s 168 people

18:29 this organization has a lot of donors in the under 100 range

18:36 are they talking to those people at all about what

18:42 five hundred dollars will do how more children will be served more matches can

18:47 be made more medically tailored meals for our seniors can happen when gifts are received of

18:54 a hundred dollars a month or 83 dollars a month which ends up to be a thousand

19:00 dollars a year these people are waiting to do something they dip their toe in the water these

19:08 people are pretty connected usually because this is where we focus our time I like to say this is our whole backyard

19:14 not just the people who give the most because some of these people in this category in this category have probably

19:21 been giving for longer than many of the folks at the top of the charts number of

19:26 you said you would like more monthly donors reaching out to Folks at this level and

19:34 I’m going to tell you a story about how I did this recently she was giving under a hundred dollars a month she became a

19:41 much larger donor after a couple of phone calls so looking at those two

19:47 charts the number of donors or the number of dollars by giving level and

19:52 the number of donors by giving level tells a lot of stories you want to know who all these people are as many of them

19:59 as you can and then looking at the third chart is retention and acquisition

20:05 this is not Apple’s Apples to Apples this is apples and oranges

20:10 um retention is in our country pretty abysmal you

20:15 want yours to be as high as possible this organization definitely has a a problem and a struggle

20:24 um how to calculate your donor retention I’ll share this link uh with the slides after the presentation we have a video

20:31 created that is pretty easy to figure out how to do this or my partner Mark

20:37 will help your organization do it because he just loves to do it so you can always reach out to me for help the

20:42 organization is doing a good job finding new donors they’re acquiring new donors but they’re not doing a good job keeping

20:48 the ones they have so that tells me they’ve got some work to do in who

20:54 they’re talking to who’s making phone calls and why does donor retention matter uh in this country it’s less than

21:02 50 percent the average is about 43 to 45 every year first time donor attention is

21:10 really awful those people go away if they don’t feel special if they don’t feel seen and if

21:16 they don’t know that their gift of 25 or 50 or 100 makes a difference oops let me go back repeat donors if

21:24 they give even one more time retention goes up significantly and of

21:29 course as you have alluded to monthly donors stick around and they stick around for a long time

21:36 so when you could increase your donor retention alone you are fundraising and

21:42 people on your team can help you do that you’ve got some helpers built-in helpers that you may not even realize you have

21:50 the second to do before we get too far into the year-end work that you’re doing

21:56 is to share your money story so where are you today and where must you be to fully fund your mission again

22:04 there’s a link here it’s a bitly link remember all bitly links are case sensitive and we’ll share those links

22:10 with you later but I want to know please type in what

22:15 is left to raise for you between now and December 31st I know that some of you

22:21 are on a fiscal year that starts on July 1 or September 1st or whatever it is but

22:27 what is it so Megan type write in two hundred thousand dollars love it is there any dollars and cents to that uh

22:35 Marty says 180 000 175 000 I love the people know it I like it when you know

22:41 it to the penny uh it sounds silly but donors you get that you are

22:46 detail-oriented and you pay attention when we know that you know to the penny

22:53 I have a few clients I’ve worked with for many many years and their prowess was to share what was left to raise to

23:01 fully fund their mission whenever they spoke whenever the CEO spoke whenever the development director spoke and

23:08 whatever committee meetings they were having so people new to the penny what was left to raise and they always closed

23:17 that Gap in funding about two months before the end of their fiscal year nice job Hannah

23:25 two million nine hundred and eighty four thousand eight hundred and eighteen dollars

23:30 you got that so we have to talk about money to raise more

23:35 in my many hundreds of years in this social sector I’ve watched people like

23:41 you move past that awkwardness of talking about money by turning it into a more

23:48 enjoyable experience and some of that is uh and Marty says it

23:55 well there’s a missed opportunity when there isn’t budget transparency if I

24:00 don’t know what it takes to fully fund your mission and to help with one person or one project or one program or one

24:07 building and where we are together and making that happen I go elsewhere because I don’t get a

24:15 sense of urgency and I don’t know if my 2500 200 500 000 will make a difference

24:22 so it’s it’s true that telling your money story works but I want to tell you

24:29 a story about how it works the folks at Iowa Heartland Habitat for Humanity uh

24:35 reached out to me when they had a large need to increase their services

24:40 they were not serving an entire community in the Waterloo area and they

24:46 wanted to they were at about a 2.2 million dollar budget and so we cooked

24:51 up a couple of things one was we invited people to a bus tour each summer and

24:57 they did three of them one in June one in July one in August and they took them to one home that had been built one home

25:04 that was under construction and that community that wasn’t able to have a home yet and at each of those stops we

25:11 got to meet a person whose life would be changed or had been changed we got to

25:16 maybe meet some children who lived in that house but we got to hear what it takes financially to build a house and

25:24 on a Monday morning uh Ali the CEO here with the long brown hair uh had someone

25:29 stop by and bring a check her checkbook actually and she asked to see Ally and

25:36 she said I wanted to have you tell me again what was the dollar amount that it takes to purchase the appliances for one

25:42 habitat home and because they have a partnership with Lowe’s it only is 987

25:48 dollars to purchase all the kitchen appliances and she said well I want to cover that for the next home and there

25:53she wrote out her check and left it and is still a donor to this day this was many years ago uh that same day

26:02serendipitously the very same day that afternoon this uh Community Foundation CEO and a

26:08few volunteers stopped by and brought this check and they dropped off this hundred and

26:14fifty thousand dollar big check and the real check and said we heard on the tour that it takes a hundred and fifty

26:19thousand dollars to build one habitat home and that you’ve got 13 families waiting so we’d like to fund one extra

26:26this year so you could say yes to one more of those families so this was a wonderful day everybody was celebrating

26:32fast forward about nine months the team at a habitat did a really nice

26:38job of staying connected telling stories keeping their money story front and

26:44center and the same Community Foundation called them after having them jump through some

26:50hoops and fill out some paperwork and not explaining quite what was going on uh Marcia called Ali on a whatever

26:58morning I think it was a Friday morning and she said I have some news I want to share we are going to give you a grant

27:04for three years but we found a partner to match it because we want you to build

27:10all the homes in that community that you’ve been saying no to so we’re giving

27:15you a grant for 1.6 million dollars 800 000 from us and 800 800 000 from our

27:22partner that wasn’t on their radar when they started that calendar year that wasn’t

27:28even on Ellie’s radar to ask for but Ali credits it with telling the money story

27:36clearly boldly often almost she felt like it was too much but people would

27:42come back and say how are we doing closing the gap so I urge you no I invite you and plead

27:52with you to please please please tell your money story because it’s not about how do we get more money

27:58the question to ask is what does more money make possible I want to make sure you and your team

28:07knock it out of the ballpark this fall so a clear money story has these

28:12elements you show how you help one person one kid one senior one whomever

28:17it is I don’t care if you’re an advocacy organization um environmental whatever you are there

28:22is somebody whose life is different because of the work you’re doing could be a board member could be a staff

28:28person just talk make it about one person show the progress to the next Milestone but be clear about what there

28:35is more to do here’s what it takes to fully fund our mission and here’s where we’re at today

28:41then you want to make sure that you’re inspiring making sure that we see the possibility

28:48of together making a bigger impact and you do that through one-on-one conversations and through the other ways

28:55the social media the emails all of that this uh last example I have is from a

29:02newsletter story that was shared after the fundraising event happened

29:07fundraising event happened in May the newsletter got mailed about six

29:13weeks later it was the same exact story about Greg that was highlighted in the mailed newsletter called stories of Hope

29:20but the CEO at the fundraising event had talked about Greg who had been living on the street in a tent and putting himself

29:27through Community College at 55 years old he was doing that because he knew he wanted to change his

29:34life experience and when the organization when Volunteers of America Sacramento learned of this they swooped

29:41their loving arms around him brought him into their family got him housing and he

29:46is employed he it took about ten thousand dollars to do that let their event they secured Gifts of ten thousand

29:53dollars paid over time because of the story but they told it again and again

29:59and again so you don’t have to just tell it one time and hope people get inspired by it you’ve got Facebook

30:07you’ve got Instagram you’ve got reels you’ve got all tick tock whatever it is

30:13make sure that you’re telling stories like Ezekiel walking across his college

30:18campus as a new freshman stepping into the unknown with excitement and confidence what got him there a network

30:25of people like you who plugged him into Community Resources his amazing parents and his own personal Drive always

30:33envisioning a path toward College this organization did not raise 155

30:38377 dollars in the last week of their campaign they raised about

30:44200 and some thousand dollars because they kept selling stories like this multiple times a day or they kept us

30:52updated um I’m one of the days was how ezekiel’s first day went so putting a face on on my impact

30:59telling me how much uh five dollars a month can help someone gain access to water that’s your money story

31:06all right next thing is make phone calls use your phone and have other people use

31:12their phone here’s my poll I’m not going to do it like a real poll I want you to just type

31:18in there’s quite a few of you summing up to read your answers quickly first do make donor calls weekly yes or no

31:28just type in not yet okay a lot of knows that’s okay does I’m not you’re not

31:35wrong yet I I love the yeses and the next question is do you make donor

31:42calls daily I’m guessing if you are not making them weekly you might not be making them daily

31:47I invite you to immediately after this session as soon as you can carve out 15

31:55minutes two times a week to make donor thank you calls please do that it will

32:01change your bottom line it will turn donors into monthly and uh bigger donors

32:08next question do you have your board members help making donor calls this is your bench team that you could be using

32:15yes lots of yeses here good yay wish I had my bells handy I would ring my bells

32:20for you it’s hurting cats well Laura I have some ways I’ll tell you um Rita says no but they’re very

32:27disengaged well I’ve got some ways we can fix that the last is do you track the results of making personal

32:33connections with your donors and this is the part that takes a good

32:38database uh or tracking system of some kind thank you calls are way more fun

32:44than worm cultivation calls yes they are so good I love that some of you do this

32:50um love that this is a question that’s um making you all think just a little bit so let me tell you about Cynthia she

32:57is a real person I was the uh interim development director for a meditation

33:03and Retreat Center in the state of Virginia uh during 2020 and 2021 so at

33:09the really the height of the pandemic this the facility was closed I was there to help increase Revenue because they

33:17wanted to launch an app to bring their meditations to the world it was going to take a couple million dollars to do that

33:23and the organization raised through philanthropy about eighty thousand dollars a year

33:28so work cut out for me I started making phone thank you calls we had about 200

33:35people that had ever given maybe 230 people that had ever given financially over the course of 10 years I called all

33:42of them plus a few more I called about 380 people but I made 900 phone calls in

33:50my nine months there and Cynthia was one person I spoke to a few times she made

33:55an annual or a monthly gift of 50 and I just called and said thank you and we ended up chatting for a bit because it

34:01was the pandemic I asked the question of how she was doing and got a really long answer after we hung up I felt like I had a new

34:08friend she lived somewhere on the East Coast but she increased her gift to a

34:13hundred and fifty dollars a month then I had our CEO caller and thank her she made a increase again to 300 a month

34:22after she had a lovely conversation with Scott I had then our board chair call her and she at the year end after we

34:30made our appeal she mailed a check for six thousand dollars and changed her

34:35monthly gift to six hundred dollars a month I didn’t know because I hadn’t

34:40done any well screening what Cynthia’s capacity was I just tended a relationship with someone that I liked

34:46and it made a huge impact and she knew she was making a huge impact so you want

34:54to build some sort of relationship for loyalty in your thinking process in your

35:01phone call process the way I like to do it is to say I know the board meetings take a really long

35:07time we are going to take five minutes even if we hold our board meetings on Zoom or teams or virtually in some way

35:14you’re going to take five minutes I have prepared a call for each of you with a little bit of information please make

35:21that one call and if you get time make the second call I have for you on the sheet we’ll be staying in this room it’s

35:27going to get noisy just let folks know we’re making uh we’re doing a thank-a-thon in the middle of our board

35:33meeting and share with them that you are a board member simple as that just say thank you and if you happen to get a

35:39person just say thank you to them and ask if they have any questions about the organization they usually don’t it’ll

35:46take you about 30 seconds that’s how you can start to engage your board do not give them lists do not send

35:52them home with lists it is like hurting cats those calls can make a huge

35:58difference in if someone does reach someone and they report out I just

36:03talked to this person and they love us or someone who didn’t want to make the call says well that was painless I can

36:09do that again it makes a difference in the culture that you’re creating around being an organization that supports

36:17philanthropy why to have board members make thank you calls it makes a difference to donors

36:24if it’s a board member thanking a first-time donor their next gift is up to 40 percent higher and they stay

36:32giving two years longer so think about how could we ask our

36:39board to help with fundraising and not have to ask for money and five minutes at each board meeting okay the next

36:47number four to do is to choose your story right we’re always on the lookout for that mission moment story or a

36:53couple of stories that will tug at people’s heartstrings but also honor that person and talk about their courage

36:59and really put them at the center and the face of our organization because

37:04when we’re talking about our organization we want the community to know we’ve we walk alongside real people

37:12every day and we need Partners to do that so

37:18we want to cause people to feel something look for stories that can we

37:23can wrap our arms around our brain around Ezekiel good example uh Brooke’s

37:30question what do you say after thank you there is a um blog post I will I will

37:38make sure that Carly asks me for Brooke and it’s got just a you could have your

37:44board members read it and they’ll know exactly what to say but I always say just have them talk to

37:49the person as if they’re talking to themselves right so if we know that

37:55emotion is the primary Behavior the primary driver of human behavior we do

38:02things because we feel things right then we have to find a story that causes me

38:07to feel something and the more stories we tell the more people will remember

38:12what we do and why we do it and how we do it well and part of what you do well

38:20is you harness people’s courage who walk through your doors you make good matches or you turn

38:28a light bulb on for girls as they’re thinking about who they can be in their

38:33High School career or as they volunteer in the community or when they get to be a parent

38:40my definition of a mission moment is that it’s a short inspirational example

38:45of how an organization is making an impact it could be a donor a staff person a

38:50volunteer a board member a client I don’t care who it is it could be the person who mops the floors

38:56it’s got to be about somebody it doesn’t have to have a real name it can have a name we’ve made up because we can say we

39:04keep our our uh our stories confidential here it’s why I chose this uh image from

39:10Senior Community Services we told a story of a woman we called Rosie who needed help with her lawn or she was

39:17going to have to be fined by the city because she could not mow her lawn anymore but she wanted to stay in her

39:22home and they were able to help her out but it took an investment of about 75 dollars to get the volunteers recruited

39:30out there bring their equipment and show up all summer long 75 bucks to keep someone happy and in their home

39:37success is about one thing you’ve some of you’ve heard me say this before it’s about what we say how we say it where

39:45and when we say it so think about what picture are you painting

39:50this is a picture of someone in Minnesota who doesn’t have a place to

39:56sleep tonight now it might not be winter right now but this was a story and a

40:02picture that tugged at me because I have something that they didn’t have I have

40:07pillows on my Bed and blankets and I had a place to go so does it have to be a

40:13sad story no it can be a hopeful story but there does have to be some conflict so what is the conflict

40:21um is it that someone wants to go to college and they can’t afford it and you provide scholarships at your school I

40:27don’t know what the conflict is but don’t forget to tell me what that conflict is put a face on the impact of

40:35a contribution and share what it takes financially to make that happen

40:41this uh checklist uh that I have here is an infographic you can download later

40:47but it’s choose the story schedule the interview use a release form crafter

40:53three versions of the story highlight the story include the money story say thank you and add to the recap this is a

41:01blog post that I just wrote updated for memory fox you’ll find it on their website

41:07all right the last to do is your acknowledgment strategy it is more than a thank you note or

41:15letter please think of it that way use social media you can shout people

41:21out on social media if you know you have their permission uh you can use short

41:26videos and memory focus is a great tool to do that either short videos about

41:31them or have your community tell you stories about how giving or

41:37participating in your programs has made an impact have board members help you make thank

41:43you calls add that to your strategy for this month you may not have a board that is fully engaged and so you could say

41:49for November and December’s board meetings the way you can make the biggest impact is to make thank you

41:57calls for five minutes at the board meeting because that takes some of the huge weight of making all those phone

42:04calls off of our Tiny But Mighty teen shoulders and you’re going to be

42:10fundraising because when you call a donor you show them that statistic their

42:15next gift can be up to 40 percent higher have a follow-up plan and a welcome

42:21strategy this is hard to do when you’re a small team when you are an office of one and a

42:28half in your fundraising and communication but it doesn’t have to be impossible

42:34what it can be is using your email system that you have whether it is

42:40constant contact or um which whatever system if you use

42:45Bloomerang and you use their email system uh use the automated responses

42:52that are set in there so you can when you when someone takes an action like

42:58makes a contribution they get a follow-up and then you have a timing

43:03that happens that they get another follow-up in those 15 minutes that I’m asking you

43:09to put on your calendar make sure that you’re finding who your first time donors are or your longest

43:15time donors and you’re interspersing those onto your call list and your CEO’s

43:20call list 15 minutes twice a week by two or three people on your team

43:26can change the bottom line like it did when I was calling Cynthia that last is think about engagement

43:33Beyond thinking let people know what’s going on the good news uh what you had

43:41to say no to but talk to us in your e-news on the

43:46phone in your written appeals like this like we’re sitting across from each other and having a cup of coffee that

43:53sort of authentic warm communication can move people’s giving from an obligatory

43:58oh I really love this organization and I always have given so I’ll give the 50 bucks to oh they said it’s 157 dollars

44:06to do that and I want to make that happen for one person

44:11so this true story is about video and I chose it on purpose because of this

44:18video partnership with memory facts when I worked with the Lowell Community

44:24Health Center many years ago in their Capital campaign they secured their one

44:29of their very first gifts was a half million dollar gift for this very large Capital campaign uh like many many

44:37millions of dollars but it was from a Family Foundation The Smith Family Foundation and they were over the moon

44:44but they got it they thought it would be their largest gift and that they may only raise a million dollars total even

44:49though I had told them we were going to raise 5 million well as soon as they got

44:55word that they’d been approved for this gift they called and said so what do we

45:00do I said George their communication person who was the communication person for 450 staff said get your phone and go

45:09make quick thank you go to different offices and have people say thank you on video and snip it all together and send

45:15it off to the the Founder The Matriarch and he did and he did it that day and

45:21she called and she was astounded at how quickly they were thanked and she said

45:27her words were something like we have never been thanked so quickly and so authentically we have an idea for you

45:36when you match our first half million dollar gift we’d like to make a second

45:42half million dollar gift and be your first million dollar donor they went on to raise five million forty

45:48thousand dollars the campaign was a success but I want you to understand the power of that five minutes that George

45:56took and if they had been using memory Fox you would have just given all the staff a QR code and he could have

46:02snipped it together right online makes a huge difference

46:07donor engagement is about sharing contributions uh how sharing how contributions impact one person

46:14contact as many people who give multiple times or for multiple for multiple years

46:19do that before you send your fall appeal meaningful acknowledgment make sure you’ve got that set up ahead of time

46:26invite people to events in between giving and then at any event or meeting share your money story

46:32all right so moving forward we’re gonna wrap things up here fundraising is about

46:38deep profound relatedness but giving Tuesday is just around the corner so

46:43it’s November 28th this year I how many of you are participating just a

46:50quick yes or no yes yes yes yes yes yes a few of you good all right good good good good good

46:56good good so this is a true story uh small non-profits serving uh youth here

47:02in the Twin Cities but their program was a nationwide program they were less than

47:08a million dollar budget they had eight staff and um they asked me to help them increase

47:13their giving at our annual giving day kind of like giving Tuesday here in Minnesota

47:19the year before it had been ten thousand dollars we decided we were going to do three things share the money story for

47:26the six weeks leading up to giving Tuesday and then throughout the day they live streamed and did updates on social

47:32media we we chose one uh City to highlight and then told stories from

47:39that City and then they thanked people within four minutes by phone and we had

47:45a phone bank you just signed up for 10 minutes or 15 minutes and you this is when we’re still going to an office but

47:52we went in and made phone calls and Josh called one of the people who had made a gift and said Natalie we just ran out of

48:01our matching dollars your gift was like the last gift that uh got matched and we

48:07just want to thank you so much for keeping us on the leaderboard we’re so excited about where we’re at this give

48:13to the max day Natalie called back a couple hours later and said hey Josh

48:20what would it take to get you another match I could give a little bit more if I get a few people what would you need

48:26and he said well another thousand dollars would make a huge difference he did something significant he

48:32explained that the match was gone in a way that was fun and exciting and they had another match and then they

48:39had another match and they ended up raising 78 000 in 24 hours

48:44so I want you to have some fun with how will you make your giving Tuesday

48:50different one of the things you can do is plan a few surprise visits those of you who are

48:55in Minnesota know this is largely fled he is a a sneezer someone who is on social media and has thousands of people

49:03follow him when the college possible people saw he made a gift on give to the

49:09max they are are like giving Tuesday they went and visited him he took a picture with them he put it on his

49:16social media they put it on their social media and it blew up lots of people saw

49:21and more people gave so plan a few surprise visits for your give to the max

49:27or you’re giving Tuesday so at this point I want you to think

49:32about what actions will you take from this list of five that will make your giving

49:39Tuesday and your fall fundraising a little bit tighter a little bit more

49:46successful and but where to start I guess is the question right so wait let’s think about

49:53that so type in one thing you learned just type it in real quickly I’ll read a

49:59few off what’s one thing that you learned hopefully you learned a couple of things and or more reminded of some

50:05things and then I want to get to the second

50:11question the importance of a unique thank you phone calls yeah reminder about making phone calls what else

50:19conflict is the oxygen in your stories yes

50:25uh it’s easy but impactful let’s go back to that

50:32any trees down in your neighborhood it’s easy but impactful to call and

50:38thank a donor share your money story honestly let’s mute whoever’s talking there think

50:44about the money picture as it relates to the 30 000 foot view not just smaller projects board calls making it

50:50effortless stories can come from your board and staff nice lots of good things you learned where will you use what you

50:58learned you don’t have to necessarily type that in but that’s what I want you to think about and what this I do want you to type in

51:05what’s your first Next Step and then who do you need to bring on

51:11board with your first Next Step where

51:16will you use it what’s your first Next Step this is what will set you up for success

51:21what I want to know is what is the first thing you’re going to do after you get off the webinar besides go to that next

51:28meeting find out who my donors are and thank them making calls we’ll need the executive director for some data review

51:34got it run some reports yes we’ve got an easy way to help you do

51:40that so make a specific goal down to the penny yep an inspiration to find an inspirational Mission moment story love

51:47it love it love it find the story listen for them all year long collect them meet

51:53with those people get them to sign that release form so you can plug that story in when you need to

52:00the most effective way to do it is to do it Amelia Earhart said

52:06so I know we had maybe a couple of questions Carly I’m going to ask you for

52:12your help here did you add some things to the question area or

52:17did I miss any

52:27and Carly I’m not hearing you so if you’ve got questions go ahead and type them in

52:34otherwise what I want to make sure is you know how to find me I am caring truth teller on Instagram uh

52:43ignited fundraising on Facebook which I’m not posting on as much lately to be very honest

52:48um but I am more regularly posting on LinkedIn and then most of my current

52:54blogs have been on the memory Fox website so you can check for those but

52:59after today’s session we’ll make sure to get you uh links to the different

53:04resources that I mentioned and there are a number of free resources on my website

53:10as well I’m here well I was trying to turn my

53:15video on and it froze for a second I was panicked okay but we’re gonna go off share and um take a look at a couple of

53:21the questions that have just come in it looks like have any ideas for giving Tuesday’s campaign best practices

53:29really it’s to think about how you want to take a bite-sized piece of what you

53:37must raise and get people excited about that uh Andrea I know you’re a pro at

53:43this I’m wondering if you want to chime in and come off mute on what you’ve done

53:49successfully Andrea satter um from giving Tuesdays in the past hello

53:55me again I’m sorry I was I was doing technical things uh giving Tuesday

54:01campaigns or like for us give to the max day best practices that you followed to

54:07make sure that that day is successful as you’re planning one one tip that I think

54:12has worked for me successfully in the past has been to um have some plans no I’m talking with

54:19our um donor some of my donors ahead of time so that I know when some of the gifts are going to be coming in so that I know

54:26that it’s not going to be you know I’m not just relying on what what response I’m going to get from the communications I’m sending out but having some donors

54:33that I know are going to make gifts throughout the day um that are set up ahead of time that way you know at least you know you’re

54:39going to get some action some activity throughout the day yeah and then also having a plan for you know so we took

54:46shifts amongst our team for who was going to be making thank you calls as gifts were coming in so that we knew

54:52that every donor who was making gifts throughout the day was getting um immediate response good

54:59anyone else type in if you’ve got ideas that have worked well thank you Andrew that was great

55:05the main thing is uh have a plan don’t go into it willy-nilly so a dollar

55:11amount plan identify and and drive some of your donors to give during that 24

55:17hours so uh it it does get exciting and

55:22fun uh post things online be live if you can at some point and it doesn’t have to

55:29take a lot of time it just has to be organized all right anyone else with a question

55:36otherwise I would like to just thank Carly and the team at memory Fox for

55:42the fun we’ve had together this year and I’d love to have you see what memoryfox

55:48is because I frankly think it’s one of the most fun cool tools that you could add to your

55:54tool built well thanks we love that yeah this has

56:00been so informative um yeah it’s so fun to start thinking about giving Tuesday in August because I

56:07feel like a lot of times people wait too long to get started and they wait too long to um really make a plan and make

56:13it um well known which can be stressful I like the idea of really planning ahead and stay out in front of it

56:20so thank you Lori thank you for everything today I’m going to share my screen and

56:26like I mentioned I’m just going to tell you all a little bit about memory Fox

56:31let’s just take one second to get this in present mode here um and while I do

56:37um as you probably know I am the marketing manager here at memory Fox you probably have all received an email or

56:43two or three from me at this point and um I just wanted to quickly introduce myself I come from a bunch of non-profit

56:51gigs that came from the breast cancer Coalition most recently I’ve worked at the non-prof I’ve worked at Coda support

56:56foundation and I’ve done a lot of volunteer work for a bunch of different missions um and I wanted to just mention that I

57:04loved watching the registrations come in and seeing all the different word names and all of the different missions that

57:10you all put in the chat earlier to see what would be successful for you all and it really got me thinking like even just

57:16in this room today it’s pretty heartwarming to think about the impact that is here even just today watching

57:23Lori speak so thank you all for coming um yeah

57:29um almost like to start off with this question um if somebody asks you what is your mission

57:34can you show them

57:42I don’t want you to think about that and I want you to think about my next question here which is if if you’re having trouble answering that question

57:49um what is stopping you find that when we work with a lot of non-profit professionals like yourselves

57:54they really are about three different reasons why they find non-profit story

58:00talent non-profit storytelling Foods challenging number one would be that collecting content from your community

58:06is like pulling teeth number two is that organizing content it’s frustrating and can be very time

58:13consuming and then third a lot of people are just looking for a more efficient and modern

58:18way to share the great stories they already have

58:24oh we created memory box and it’s really specific to non-profits in particular we

58:30have our own collect organize and share method to address all of those pain points that you’re all feeling

58:40I’ll just do a quick overview on the three steps first we have step one which is collect and the way the memory box

58:46works is you create a branded campaign and you distribute it directly to your

58:51community whoever you’re trying to collect that story from they receive that link or that QR code and they can

58:57open it up on their own device where they feel most comfortable telling their story and if you want to see how it

59:03works for yourself you can go ahead and scan that QR code right there and just go through the process you’ll see how

59:09easy that is and one of the big things that you’ll notice right off the bat is that there’s

59:14no download or login required you don’t have to download another app I know I personally never have any storage on my

59:20phone so I’ve downloaded an app I’m not doing it another great thing about our collect

59:27um step is that we capture contact info and manage the consent up front just as

59:32Lori was just alluding to like making sure that you have access to even use stories after you collect them is so

59:38important and then finally after your Community member is submitting their photo video

59:43or written testimonial it’ll redirect right back to wherever you’d like it to go a lot of times you could invite them

59:51to become a volunteer at your next event or you could even ask them for a donation

59:59and then in terms of organizing um we have um once the Community member submits

1:00:05their photo video or written testimonial it’s actually going to automatically populate on the top of your memory box

1:00:10Story Bank this photo here is this kind of shows what your memory fog Story Bank looks like from your

1:00:15perspective as the organization and yeah it’s going to automatically sort based

1:00:21on time and by campaign but we also have a lot of organization tools to keep you extra organized so you can tag by

1:00:29program event department or use we like to recommend that people for example tag

1:00:34their photos by annual reports so when you find a story and from February that

1:00:39you want to remember to use in your annual report next year put a tag on that then you won’t forget

1:00:45another great thing about our story bank is that you have a bulk upload option so if you already have a bunch of content

1:00:50that’s okay let’s get it all into the story Bank you can now stop trying to

1:00:55find a story in your email your downloads folder or your Google Drive your Dropbox and they can all just be in

1:01:01one place instead and another thing to note about that is that we have unlimited storage so you

1:01:08don’t have to be worried about any hidden fees about getting um upgraded to a new [Music] um

1:01:13like have to pay more if you end up having more stories

1:01:20and then finally we have a ton of options for you all to make sharing super easy

1:01:25um with your audience you can turn your most compelling content into collateral social posts or reports so our brand new

1:01:32our newest feature that we have is our video editor and now people can combine edit trim rotate videos right within

1:01:40memory box without ever leaving the platform this is a huge game changer and we are so excited to offer that to you

1:01:46now we also have a story Builder so how this works is it’s a great way to share

1:01:52several stories about one Topic in one web page that you can then share out to people so very common we’ll have people

1:02:00who give out scholarships they’ll collect a bunch of thank you notes from all of the scholarships or from all of

1:02:06the scholarship um grantees and they will put that into one webpage and send it out to everybody

1:02:11who donated that fund really great way for people to be able to just quickly look at all of the youth impacts they’re

1:02:17having another great thing about our share option is that we have high quality

1:02:23original downloads that you can go ahead and download at any time to use any way that makes more sense for you and then

1:02:29finally you’ll see here we are integrated with canvas so when somebody does

1:02:34upload a photo video or written testimonial to your memoryfox account it’s gonna actually just automatically

1:02:40go to your canva account as well which is super easy because then you can just drag and drop right into any design or

1:02:46template that’s your favorite

1:02:53and yeah here at memory Fox we just know that every nonprofit really has great stories to tell and that’s why we offer

1:02:58our product with Equitable pricing and that’s based on your 990 so it’s all unique and I just wanted to say thank

1:03:05you for sticking around I invite you to connect with one of our expert storytellers today to talk about your

1:03:10unique storytelling goals as well as how we can help you really bring your

1:03:16mission to life that’s all I have for you all today so

1:03:22thank you all for coming thank you again Lori thank you Carly and everybody at memory facts it’s been fun

1:03:29and I wish everyone a hugely successful year-end fundraising effort yeah

1:03:39yeah fundraising good I’d love to hear about it bye-bye