It’s starting to look a lot like Chr…. End of Year campaign Season! This can be the most exciting time of the year for nonprofits. Not only is this the season of giving, but it’s a great time for your nonprofit to amp up donor relationships, send solicitation letters, and raise money from your generous donors.

When many start-up nonprofits think about raising money, they often think “I’ll apply for a grant!” It makes sense since nationally, corporations and foundations disbursed $87.7 billion in grants in 2018 alone! Winning grant funding is far more complex, however, than simply submitting an application for a great idea. It’s a sophisticated and often challenging process that can require you to think about your organization, programming, and financials in a new way.

Welcome back to the Giant Squid Group Stewardship Survey, where I’m exploring how the organizations who solicit me for money build relationships with me after I’ve made a gift. What does it feel like to be a donor? What excites, motivates, and inspires me, and what leaves me wanting more?

This week Giant Squid Group is thrilled to feature a guest post from Naomi Milstein on how she used fundraising best practices to double the individual giving of her nonprofit in just one year!

Are you making your new donors feel special? A few months ago, I attended the holiday part of a local nonprofit as the guest of a good friend. The mission of the organization resonated with me, and I was excited to learn more about their work. Before I left, I made a modest donation, excited to be getting more involved.

Donor stewardship is my bread and butter. Nothing excites me more than a beautifully written thank you letter sent promptly after a gift is received, or a well-designed new donor packet welcoming a supporter to your organization. Seriously, it makes me feel all warm and fuzzy.

You’ve opened up a new calendar and are looking ahead at the next twelve months with (hopefully) enthusiasm and excitement. What will the next year bring for your organization and its growth?

Individual donations are the lifeblood of nonprofits, big and small. They’re particularly critical to start-up and small nonprofits relying on the grassroots efforts of their supporters to fund their programs and increase their impact.

It’s a chicken and egg problem. How do you start fundraising when you don’t have a donor base? This is the most-asked question I get from startup and small nonprofits who want to increase their funding.

There’s no way around it: relationships are at the heart of successful fundraising. Think about who you would rather give a donation: someone you know personally and whose hard work and passion you see first-hand, or someone who randomly sends you a GoFundMe link?

If you want to raise money this year, you need a fundraising plan. Don’t believe me? Would you take a road trip without your trusty Google Maps, or go grocery shopping without a list? (Maybe you do - you rebel, you).

Happy New Year! Whether it’s the start of your fiscal year, or simply the beginning of a new calendar year, this is a great time to revisit and refresh your fundraising goals. I like to take the first week of January and think about the Really Big Things I want to accomplish the rest of the year. These resolutions aren’t specific: they’re the larger, overarching goals that will drive my work for the rest of the year.

With 2017 coming to a close, we’ve rounded up five crowdfunding campaigns we found particularly compelling. While the campaigns themselves are very different, each illustrates how to put together a crowdfunding campaign that really works.

When Kickstarter launched in 2009, the fundraising landscape shifted. Today, crowdfunding is a way of life. How many campaigns have you been invited to on Facebook asking you to support a charitable cause, underwrite an athletic event, or donate to a friend in need?

When you think of getting money for your organization, where do you imagine the money coming from? Many startup organizations think of grant funding as the silver bullet for their budget. They jump from planning programs to hiring a grant writer. There’s no way to beat around the bush: this is a mistake.

It's almost the end of the fiscal year and I've had the luxury to dig into donor stewardship. Last week, I launched a campaign called "A Week of Gratitude": for a solid week I sent daily emails with quotes from constituents, held a "thank-a-thon" and send framed pictures to key donors.

When I learned about Moves Management early in my fundraising career it was one of those “ duh” moments. Even though I was new to fundraising, it just made so much sense. If there’s a fundraising magic bullet, this is it.

Annual funds and appeal letters go together like peanut butter and jelly. And like peanut butter and jelly, they are a staple in the fundraising world. In fact, solicitation letters make up about 7% of all fundraising revenue in the United States, and that doesn't include giving via email.