PlannedGiving.com - Planned Giving

From The Philanthropic Planning Companion, Brian Sagrestano/Robert Wahlers, Page 220.
Get it at: PlannedGiving.Com/brian22

• Inadequate Recognition.
• Inadequate involvement and information.
• Inadequate stewardship.
• Poor handling of complaint.
• Organizational changes.
• New leaders, programs, or policies.
• A similar organization is more attractive.
• Move to a different community.
• Life circumstances — aging, financial situation, death.

Think hard on this one.

A large corporation recently surveyed its employees and asked where their paycheck comes from. About 80% answered accounting, 10% answered the bank.

I asked my team at VirtualGiving.Com (my main company that delivers planned giving websites). I am happy to report that everyone answered “our clients.”

There is only one boss. Whether you shine shoes or run a multi-million dollar biz, the boss remains the same. It’s the client.

The client pays my salary, and decides whether my business is going to succeed or fail. The minute my business starts treating her badly or taking her for granted, she’ll put it out of business. She buys my clothes, my car, and everything I own.

This is why my signature line reads: If our service needs help, please tell us. If our service is worthy, please tell others.

I prefer to have clients and friends, and not customers. Customers just buy things. A client implies a close relationship. Same goes in fundraising. That’s why I say …

“Treat your prospects like donors, and your donors like friends.”

I want to thank each and every one of you for reading this blog, as well as being a friend of VirtualGiving.Com. Thank you for your business.

It sure looks it. Why? Many  are scared even to tip-toe into what they think is unfamiliar territory. To get to the bottom of this issue, we spoke to Chase Magnuson and Dennis Haber.

They agree the trouble is the incessant cacophony of “mythconceptions” that surround making and receiving gifts of real estate. Sure, the stories are bunk and noise, but repeated frequently and loudly enough by peers, these myths take on an aura of truth.

But don’t let it get in your way. Hogwash is hogwash. Here’s some wisdom you should listen to. Chase and Dennis share five common mythconceptions, plus five doses of fact that free you to succeed with gifts of real estate, and further your career.

Read more »

Eventually that “someone else” will steal your cash gifts, too, because planned gifts are gifts from the heart.

Below are more tidbits:

1. Cash-starved times are best times for planned giving.
2. Fundraisers who even dabble in planned giving earn 25% to 100% more than those who don’t.
3. A typical planned gift is 200 to 300 times the size of a donor’s largest annual gift.
4. Planned gifts do not affect prospects’ cash flow.
5. Prospects are eager to make a planned gift, but simply don’t know how.
6. Prospects making gifts through their wills typically double the amount of their annual support.
7. Anyone can make a planned gift.
8. Promoting planned gifts is easy.

We were recently asked:

Is there any “benchmark,” or industry standard regarding the mechanics of “handing off” a loyal direct mail donor to the Planned Giving Department?

Without airing too much “dirty laundry,” our in-house Direct Marketing Department refuses to give the Planned Giving Department access to the donor database out of fear that planned giving marketing activities with loyal donors will depress annual giving income from those donors. So basically the Planned Giving Department is being denied access to the best prospects, because of fear that planned giving will undermine annual giving.

How do other organizations handle this?

Read more »

If You Are Not Getting Any, You Have a Problem.

An average mailing of 10,000 should generate at least 25 complaints, if not 100. If you are not getting any, that means you’re being vanilla and just being ignored.

Complaints are unpleasant, but they start the conversation. They are normal. Everyone has a different opinion.

Read Tom Ahern on the cover of Planned Giving Tomorrow, Summer 2012 at pgtomorrow.com.

Myth:
Planned gifts compete with major gifts.
Fact:
Most planned giving donors are not prospects for large major gifts.

Read more »

Making the Money Come to You

You already know “sales” and “marketing” are different things. Sales, or stewardship, is direct contact, and the point is to make a sale. Marketing is more about building awareness of your brand, your mission and your vision.

Though it creates bonds in less personal ways than sales, marketing enables you to cast a wider net and create a sales funnel that directs revenue your way. Read more »

Even if you’re not in the higher ed sector, take a look at what this California college is doing. Its bold, outside-the-box approach to planned giving is attracting attention – and endowment funds.

Read more »

Tom Ligare and his colleagues at Planned Giving Marketing Solutions, LLC are promoting a gift type that helps build long-term endowment by making it easier for mid-level donors to engage in major giving.

We decided to find out more about it…

Read more »