What is a donor engagement tool?
It’s a large (minimum recommended size is 11×17) sheet of paper divided into 3 sections:
- 30,000’: Why? Purpose simply stated plus 3 compelling core stories.
- 14,000’: What? 1000-day priorities. Three interlocking circles, each with a 1-2 word priority. Additional information focused on impact and success around each circle—any combination of text, graphs, pictures.
- How? Funding Plan: Champion, Invite, Support Today, Tomorrow, Forever.
Why it is effective?
- You have to distill why you are doing what you do (purpose) and what your priorities are for the next 3 years (1,000-day priorities).
- You get to have 3 priorities, which keeps it simple for the donor.
- You are encouraged to include stories—and stories create emotion.
- The format invites having a conversation vs. making a presentation.
- It quickly reveals the initiative(s) of greatest interest to the donor.
- It promotes the use of a permission-based approach to discussing the funding opportunities. This means you may end up talking about a gift on the first visit–with the donor’s permsission.
- If the donor is hesitating along the journey, you go back up a level and find the point of commitment.
- The Today, Tomorrow, Forever format leads you right into legacy gifts without talking about death and dying.
- Today, Tomorrow, Forever also make it easy to make a double or triple ask.
- And finally, the tool captures some of the excitement of drawing on the back of a napkin with enough elements to structure the discussion, allow the donor to quickly enter your world, and support less experienced volunteers making donor visits.
Thank you, For Impact | Suddes Group. To learn more, visit: www.forimpact.org.