The SYNOPSIS project concerns Storytelling and Fundraising for Cultural Heritage professionals. Cultural heritage covers a variety of activities, and a system of values, traditions, knowledge, and lifestyles that characterise society. The heritage sector has to deal with new challenges and it is therefore necessary to develop new professionalism, able to promote and support cultural heritage as it improves not only the overall economic growth and employment, but also social cohesion and environmental sustainability. Storytelling and fundraising skills assume a fundamental role in connecting the past to the future. Cultural Heritage storytelling is concerned with “communicating through stories”, creating narratives through which a cultural heritage enters into an emphatic relationship with people, managing to arouse public emotion. The purpose is to engage people to protect, exploit cultural heritage, and support it financially. This presentation presents a step-by-step guide to planning fundraising as part of the training programme

1. Fundraisers Guide
Storytelling and Fundraising for Cultural Organisations

2. Fundraising
Planning: Steps
and Competences
Fundraising for Cultural Organisations

3. Description of the activity
According to the European Fundraising Association (EFA), planning
is an indispensable element for the fundraiser. It is important to
define the objectives and find out their categories and
benchmarks, the strategy, the proper mix of fundraising
techniques, the budget, the schedule, and the evaluation. In this
way, the fundraiser should become familiar with different
fundraising approaches, alternatives and structures, addressing the
key components of a plan, namely: “where are we now? Where do
we want to be? How we will get there?” (Paper 6).

4. Fundraising Planning
A well structured plan is crucial to
reach our objectives, clearly set
according to our needs:
“where are we now?”;
“where do we want to be?”;
“how we will get there?”.
Once needs and objectives are
clearly set, it is possible to start
developing the right strategy to
reach them.
This is a four step process with clear
related competences.
1.Conducting a
Fundraising Audit
Managing Fundraising
2. Developing a
Fundraising Plan
• Managing Resources
for Fundraising
3. Establish a case of
support
Communicating a Case
for Support
4. Fundraising
Evaluation and Control
Managing People

5. Step 1: Conducting a
Fundraising Audit
Conducting a fundraising audit should include some specific activities:
 an assessment of the wider environment in which the organisation is
operating
 a competitor analysis
 an analysis of potential contributors (where appropriate)
 an assessment of each of the key supporter markets in which the
organisation is operating
 an assessment of the past performance of the organisation's fundraising
activity, the approach and tactics pursued and the impact on supporter
experience and response.

6. Underpinning knowledge
 the purpose of a fundraising audit and its structure and content.
 key external sources of fundraising audit data and how to interpret them
 external fundraising audit: STEEPLE Analysis; competitor analysis;
collaborative analysis; market analysis
 Internal fundraising audit: product/service lifecycle; non-profit portfolio
analysis; calculation and interpretation of simple fundraising metrics;
supporter care processes
 SWOT analysis: strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats analysis;
interpretation of findings

7. Practically, the fundraiser
should be able to:
 Utilize systems to gather and manage information effectively, efficiently and ethically
 Identify and evaluate relevant trends and developments, including those covering political,
economic, social, cultural, regulatory and technological developments
 Review the fundraising activity of competitor organizations to identify possible learning
 Review the potential to collaborate with other organizations for the purposes of fundraising.
 Conduct an analysis of the critical issues, trends and giving patterns in each of the supporter
markets the organization is presently operating
 Conduct a review of relevant past fundraising performance and assess the suitability of the
organization's present portfolio of activities and supporter care processes
 Conduct a SWOT analysis of audit data
 Write a clear and comprehensive fundraising audit report.

8. Step 2: Developing a
Fundraising Plan
A competent fundraiser should be able to develop a plan for their area of
responsibility. It is then crucial being able to develop SMART fundraising
objectives and to supply strategy and tactics capable of achieving those
objectives.
A detailed step-by-step
example on how to
elaborate a Fundraising
plan is well explained
HERE

9. The
Strategy:
general direction;
segmentation a priori
approaches (demographic,
geodemographic and lifestyle
segmentation) and post hoc
approaches (behavioural
segmentation, benefit
segmentation, RFM, RFV and
FRAC);
positioning value proposition
and sources of distinction;
case of support;
case for expressions.
The
Fundraising
mix:
overview of direct response
fundraising (including
digital);
major gift fundraising;
community and legacy
fundraising;
corporate fundraising and
fundraising from
trusts/foundations;
simple best practices in
relation to each form of
fundraising;
typical returns and
timescales associated with
each
The
budget:
methods of budget
setting;
categories of costs;
accounting for risk.
Monitoring/Evaluation:
importance of
fundraising metrics;
calculation and
interpretation of simple
metrics (e.g. average gift
level, return on
investment, lifetime
return on investment).

10. Step 3: Establish a case for
support
The Case for Support is a key document for any fundraising development activity. It presents
the reasons for supporting a campaign or project and is based on the organization’s mission,
vision and values. The Case for Support allows fundraisers to figure out the most useful
communication strategy (the right positioning and a proper technique) in order to identify
and reach the appropriate audience.
This tool “must persuade” potential donors to commit to the support and to do this, it is
important that it is persuasive, dynamic and creates enthusiasm towards the final goal.
It is crucial that it answers the initial questions of potential supporters:
• What is the need?
• Why are we raising funds?
• What is the best and simplest solution?
• How to bring about change?

11. To establish a Case of Support it is needed
to identify firstly the fundraising requirements of an organization,
The fundraiser should have knowledge of:
• Sources of information to identify an
organization’s fundraising needs
• Importance of maintaining the organization’s
identity
• Analysis tools
The fundraiser should be able to:
• Describe the organization’s purpose and mission
• Demonstrate how the organization’s legal and
constitutional powers affect its fundraising
potential
• Identify the costs of organizational needs and
service programs
• Describe the organisation's branding strategy
• Identify objectives

12. Then establish a Case for Support, and finally communicate the Case
The fundraiser should have knowledge of:
 Relations with contributors, their motivations
and roles, approaches to soliciting money
 Materials and time
 Tested methods of fundraising
 Case making for support
 Themes, policies, legislation and regulations in
the fundraising sector
 The principles of ethical fundraising
The fundraiser should be able to:
 Identify relevant stakeholders and their needs
 Prepare a case for support that emphasizes the
facts and benefits of the proposal
 Recognize the benefits/limitations of the
fundraising campaign proposed

13. Step 4: Fundraising Evaluation
and Control
The Evaluating and Control phase is crucial to monitor fundraising
activities related to the objectives identified in the fundraising plan
and that the performance of all the selected channels / media /
products or segments are within acceptable bounds.
Fundraisers should therefore be able to construct appropriate control
mechanisms and to calculate and interpret the relevant procedures.

14. Step 4: Fundraising Evaluation and
Control
Creating appropriate control mechanisms and knowing how to analyze results is crucial to
demonstrate that fundraising activities are in line with objectives and expectations.
Underpinning Knowledge:
 Performance metrics: metrics applicable to each focal form of fundraising
and metrics associated with money, donors/participants, time and activity.
 Simple financial analyses applicable to fundraising to calculate average gift
size; response rates; net income; average cost per gift/donor; cost of
fundraising; return on investment; payback period; lifetime return on
investment

15. Step 4: Fundraising Evaluation and
Control
Creating appropriate control mechanisms and knowing how to analyze results is crucial to
demonstrate that fundraising activities are in line with objectives and expectations.
Practically, the fundraiser should be able to:
 Understand the range of possible metrics that could be used to assess the performance of focal forms of
fundraising
 Work with others to select appropriate performance measures against which the fundraising
strategy/tactics can be assessed
 Monitor and evaluate performance against the agreed indicators and measures
 Establish which aspects of fundraising are performing according to expectations and which aspects may
benefit from review and possible amendment
 Monitor and evaluate the impact of internal and external environmental factors on the performance of the
organisations’ fundraising strategy
 Use indicators and measures to inform future fundraising activity
 Identify and utilise a range of sector benchmarks to critically evaluate fundraising performance.

16. Storytelling for Cultural Organisations