On Friday the Hudson Institute’s Bradley Center for Philanthropy and Civic Renewal, in partnership with Illinois University’s Center on Philanthropy, hosted a discussion titled “Giving USA 2012: Who Gave, How Much, and to Whom in 2011?” The Curtis Group’s Vice President, Wendy McGrady, along with Indiana University’s Center on Philanthropy Executive Director, Patrick M. Rooney; Nonprofit Quarterly’s… Read more »
As one of 40 members of the Giving Institute, each June we anxiously await the early release of the Giving USA report–the longest running, most comprehensive report on philanthropy in America. This year marks Giving USA’s 57th consecutive annual report. In 2011, U.S. Charitable giving totaled $298.4 billion, a four percent increase, and the second… Read more »
Last week we participated in a webinar on donor databases titled “Data Data Everywhere. Mining for Gold in your Donor Database.” This hour-long discussion was conducted by Fundraising Success magazine and featured three presenters: Amanda Mallinger Reinartz, Manager Product Development, Metafile; Jodi Scheib, Vice President, Fundraising, DMW Direct; and Joe Hamilton, Director of Development, Franciscan Friars…. Read more »
This week we came across an interesting article in our Twitter feed by Charles Moldow, a partner at a Venture Capital firm. Although the blog post from the website Tech Crunch is written for entrepreneurs seeking start up investments, there are clear parallels to be drawn for small nonprofits soliciting gifts from individuals. At the end… Read more »
As a follow-up to last week’s post in which we offered some general advice from “real world” funders on how nonprofits should operate, this week we’d like to share with you some red flags that funders see when it comes to requests. The following are a list of no-no’s when it comes to putting together… Read more »
Today, for the fourth year in a row, Keith moderated VOLUNTEER Hampton Roads’ Annual Funders Forum. This event, which brings together funders from across Hampton Roads, always produces a variety of interesting takeaways. An underlying theme of the funders’ comments from this year’s forum was the importance of a nonprofit operating like a business. The… Read more »
Earlier this spring, The Giving Institute hosted an interesting webinar on “The Cost of Fundraising” presented by fellow Giving Institute member, Melissa Brown of Melissa Brown and Associates. Melissa began by pointing out the fact that there are a lot of gaps that exist in fundraising costs today. In fact, the majority of organizations only track… Read more »
I attended a luncheon today hosted by the Economics Club of Hampton Roads and Old Dominion University, which featured an interesting presentation by Jeffrey Lacker, president of the Richmond Federal Reserve Bank and voting member of the Federal Open Market Committee. Lacker addressed the “considerable progress of the U.S. economy in recovering from the great… Read more »
As a part of our daily work we spend a lot of time listening to donors share their candid impressions of our client’s organizations as a whole; everything from the effectiveness of the staff and board to the way they are cultivated. Through the planning study, development assessment and capacity building interview process we learn… Read more »
We recently tuned in to an informative webinar on “Converting Event Donors to Organizational Donors” presented by fellow Giving Institute member, Event 360. The webinar, part of Giving Institute’s monthly series, opened by defining the characteristics of these two distinctly different types of donors—the difference being the individual’s degree of knowledge, connection, motivation and investment…. Read more »
