Annual Conference A7: Collaborative philanthropy: How to grow your community support and funding | NCVO
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Presentation from Annual Conference, 20 April 2017 Karl Wilding Richard Turner Michael Chuter
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Annual Conference A7: Collaborative philanthropy: How to grow your community support and funding | NCVO
- 1. COLLABORATIVE PHILANTHROPY: HOW TO GROW YOUR COMMUNITY SUPPORT AND FUNDING Dinner sponsors: Media partner: Partner sponsor: CHAIR KARL WILDING DIRECTOR OF PUBLIC POLICY AND VOLUNTEERING, NCVO SPEAKERS RICHARD TURNER @IFUNDRAISER ENTHUSIAST, COMMISSION ON THE DONOR EXPERIENCE MICHAEL CHUTER TRUSTEE, THE FUNDING NETWORK
- 2. Supporters as Champions of your Mission
- 3. 5 year experiment 2010/11 2011/12 2012/13 2013/14 2014/15 2015/16 FUNDRAISED UNRESTRICTED INCOME 5fold growth
- 5. We are all now channels Your charity is now a channel You are a channel Your supporters are a channel
- 6. We filter from trusted sources • People we know • Other “customers” • Increasingly we distrust authority Money for Good Report – 2013 New Philanthropy Capital
- 7. Our social capital is now stronger Your story is better coming from others People are even better connected You don’t know who people know!
- 8. Telling SolarAid’s mission story
- 12. How can we get supporters to spread our story?
- 13. “Yesterday a card arrived with delightful personal messages to Harry from the SolarAid team thanking him for his efforts. Cue misty eyes from his parents”. Worth talking about
- 14. Make an impact
- 15. Inspire donors to ask
- 16. It’s a mindset
- 17. Its about the mission
- 18. LIVE CROWD FUNDING How it works How to get involved
- 19. OUR MISSION To empower individuals and communities to break the cycle of poverty and end aid dependency forever
- 20. OUR MISSION To empower individuals and communities to break the cycle of poverty and end aid dependency forever OUR MISSION To collaborate with innovative and effective social change organisations for a healthier, fairer, and more sustainable
- 21. Pump Aid seeks to reduce rural poverty by increasing access to water and sanitation Many of our projects are individually expensive A typical pre-school project will cost around £10,000 Most individual donors donate between £25 - £100 The Radio 4 conundrum - What can you get for £25? TFN allows donors to pool their donations
- 22. Developing our TFN pitch Most TFN donors give between £100 - £250 That’s still small in relation to the cost of a project and the donor still needs to make a connection The best TFN pitches are those for easily dissectible projects with individually fundable components What can you get for £100?
- 23. Pump Aid pre-school project Constituent parts £4,500 Water point £3,250 Child-friendly toilets £1,000 Handwashing station £ 750 Hygiene lessons for children + carers £ 500 Kitchen garden £10,000 TOTAL
- 24. Pump Aid pre-school project “Just 10 donations of £100 will provide a child-friendly handwashing station, which is proven to reduce the spread of killer diseases like diarrhoea”
- 25. Pump Aid pre-school project “In its first year of operation this project will transform the lives of at least 804 people. That’s less than £12.50 per life”
- 26. Pump Aid pre-school project “This project will give a pre-school clean water and safe sanitation for at least ten years, at less than the cost of a cappuccino per day”
- 27. Developing our TFN pitch What can you get for £100? Possible solutions Divide a project into its constituent parts Calculate the number of £100 donations needed to fund a particular component Divide the cost by the number of beneficiaries Calculate the cost over the life of the project
- 28. TFN’s mission statement “As one of the pioneers of live crowdfunding, TFN aims to provide an open-to-all public forum, engaging people in complex issues and innovative solutions, creating a platform for donors of all levels to join together in an enjoyable, relaxed environment and collaborate with innovative and effective social change organisations for a healthier, fairer, and more sustainable society.”
- 29. TFN’s mission statement “As one of the pioneers of live crowdfunding, TFN aims to provide an open-to-all public forum, engaging people in complex issues and innovative solutions, creating a platform for donors of all levels to join together in an enjoyable, relaxed environment and collaborate with innovative and effective social change organisations for a healthier, fairer, and more sustainable society.”
- 30. TFN’s award process 1. Sponsorship 2. Nomination 3. Selection Panel 4. 2 page written pitch 5. 6 minute live pitch 6. Crowd funding session 7. Cash (including gift aid)
- 31. TFN’s award process 1. Sponsorship Only by a TFN member A sponsor cannot be a paid employee A sponsor is expected to donate the first £250 at the event and must have donated at least £100 at a previous TFN event TFN will not fund religion, individuals, fundraising challenges or any charity whose income is in excess of £1.2 million
- 32. TFN’s selection criteria 1. Vision & Capacity Is the project innovative or unique? Is there a genuine need? Is it clear and convincing? Has it proved its concept? How strong is its theory of change/mission statement? Is the leadership convincing?
- 33. TFN’s selection criteria 2. Impact & Sustainability Is there evidence of its impact? How risky is it? What social change will it generate? Is it scalable or replicable? Is it sustainable or at least aims to be?
- 34. TFN’s selection criteria 3. Funding & Partnerships Does it collaborate/partner with others? How easily can it raise funds? Will TFN help it unlock further funding? What is the return on investment? 4. Personal Preference Do you like it? Would you donate to it yourself?
- 35. TFN’s award process 1. Sponsorship 2. Nomination 3. Selection Panel 4. 2 page written pitch 5. 6 minute live pitch 6. Crowd funding session 7. Cash (including gift aid)
- 36. How to get TFN funding 1. Find a TFN member TFN does not publish it membership list 2. Meet a TFN member Anyone can come to a TFN event for £25 3. Become a TFN member Annual associate membership £50 Annual full membership £150 4. Use your networks
- 37. Good Luck !
- 38. Back at the office How could you encourage supporters to share your organisation’s mission story? • How can you start finding your story? • What support might you need?
Editor's Notes
- I, along with many other fundraising practitioners, have volunteered our time to contribute papers as part of the Commission on the Donor Experience in response to the current spot light on fundraising and to providing practical advice that delivers delighted donors. The project I put forward and led on is entitled: Supporters as champions of your mission. It, along with all the other projects will be published a week today. You will find the case examples I mention in the project paper. It is, I believe, a completely different way to look at fundraising – but built on the principles of good fundraising practice.
- 6 years ago I could see that fundraising was already starting to creak. I was Director of Fundraising for ActionAid – I’d held that position for over 4 years. I woke up one morning and realized I no longer enjoyed my job as a fundraiser. So, I handed in my notice and went on a quest to rekindle my love of fundraising. And I have learnt another way – one that builds a sustainable base of income. At SolarAid where I worked for 5 years as the lead fundraiser, our unrestricted income grew 5 fold AND from a diverse range of funding sources. And that’s without a 5 fold investment in fundraising.
- Read up to understand why things were changing – and to understand the root cause. There are plenty of thought leaders out there. My favourites include David Meerman Scott author of The New Rules of Marketing & PR, and Grant Leboff author of Sticky Marketing. Whilst not written for the voluntary sector they help you figure out the paradigm shift that has taken place and why.
- There are three insights I've gained. The first insight or rule is this. For the first time in history - we are all now channels. This changes the rules of communication. The last time this really happened was when the printing press was invented. Then one to many means of communication became possible. TV changed the game – but not the rules – it was still one to many. Direct marketing is one to many. But the internet has changed the rules - many to many communication is now possible. The BBC is a channel. But the BBC doesn’t just update its website once a year and say, “what we do”. Yet that is the danger that many charities think and do. Your charity is a channel – you have a website, along with a facebook, youtube presence. But that doesn’t stop at organisations – and this is key – you are a channel – your supporters are a channel. A post by individual is more likely to be read than a post from an organisation. This has a huge impact. For starters information abounds!
- There is a consequence of this abundance of information. We are drowning in information. So, what do we do? We filter? So, this leads to the second principle when we are flooded with information we increasingly rely on sources we trust. If you were to buy a camera what would you do? Chances are you will a) ask a friend what camera would you buy or b) search the internet and look at Amazon reviews by customers. You don’t believe what Sony or Panasonic tell you about their camera. Does this apply to our world of charitable giving? Well several years ago New Philanthropy Capital published their report called Money for good in which they surveyed donors. The top two reasons cited by a someone to give to a charity, other than being an existing donor, was they had either been asked by a friend, family or colleague or they have had been recommended by a friend, family or colleague. And these were the top two reasons for high earners over £100k. So we all now channels and we rely on sources we trust.
- The third and final effect is on Social capital. Beth Kanter refers to social capital in her book the Network non-profit as the magic juice. I like to call it the FORCE! The social capital or FORCE someone has with their friends and contacts is stronger than the social capital your charity has with their friends and contacts. So, it’s better your story comes from them not you. And because we increasingly rely on sources we trust THE FORCE is even stronger within us! Not only that - we are better connected than ever before and you don’t know who people know.
- Let me give you an example of what happens when you apply this thinking. Firstly, the key way to think about it is no longer about getting money out of people – it’s about inspiring people about your story. So, the first summer I was at SolarAid we debated whether to attend a summer festival. The sort of thing that needs volunteers, and raises a few pounds in the bucket. However we realized it’s was a great place to tell our story. So we built a stand to engage people (a photo backdrop they could have their picture taken) and equipped the team to about our new mission goal of eradicating the kerosene lamp and to talk to people. It did just raise a few pounds in the bucket. Two weeks later though I had a call. It was from a woman called Pippa who had spoked to one of the SolarAid staff and was shocked to learn about the horrors of a kerosene lamp. She said I didn’t tell you this at the time but I know a foundation I could put you in touch with. Not only did she do that, she got so inspired she wrote the application for us and did the presentation to the trustees of the foundation 9 months later – and SolarAid received one of its largest ever foundation grants.
- The first is you need a story that people will spread for you. And it needs to be a consistent story. That way as it ripples out and other tell it the story reinforces. You know its like hearing for the 5th time about the same thing. And where will you find the most consistent story in your organization? It will be rooted in your WHY or mission. Maybe you have seen the Simon Sinek on the WHY and his flipchart of the golden circle? If not I recommend you do. Most organisations can talk about what they do (go to any website – what we do is often a heading) or they can talk how they do what they do. But few seem to understand or know their WHY. Bizarrely that seems to apply in our world as well as the commercial world. A lack of focus. Your WHY is the big picture and is nearly always emotional. It talks about the problem and your ambition. Sometimes it is an impossible dream. But that’s ok too. More so in our world than any other world. Its important to realise this is not about building your brand – which is about credibility – this is about doing the incredible! Actually the importance of this is nothing new – when Professor Adrian Sargeant did a study on what was behind Great Fundraising – all organisations that transformed their fundraising had an ambition or impossible dream. So, with SolarAid our ability to fundraise in this way was transformed when we set our mission to eradicate the kerosene lamp from Africa by the end of the decade. That was the problem we are trying to solve. We now had a story to tell rooted in our mission. And an ambition. Ask any of SolarAid’s staff what we were about and they would all have the same answer.
- Next you need to get people to spread your story. There are various ways you can do this. Charity:Water who are included in this study did it by asking people to donate their birthday. This became a means for people to tell their friends about Charity: Water. And for every person who did a birthday it led to 7 others doing the same as a result, so it rapidly grew with zero dollar advertising budget. Indeed their mantra is – ask people to raise and inspire others on your behalf.
- This wasn’t a conscious strategic decision – but it’s a great example of how delivering a great service can help spread your story. Simon McDermott, contacted the Alzheimer’s Society in desperation when his dad became extremely violent. He got such good advice from the helpline he decided to fundraise for the Alzheimer’s Society. I am raising money because of a women at the end of a phone – read his JustGiving page. He then told his story in a creative way through a video. The video was a film of him driving his Dad to the supermarket using dash cam. His Dad was a former Butlins redcoat and earned the name the songaminute man because he could sing a song a minute. So on the way to the supermarket, Simon plays a tune on the car stereo and his dad bursts into life and becomes himself once again singing Quando, Quando Quando! It has had over 2 million views on Youtube. His fundraising on Just giving has raised several hundred thousand pounds. Not only that but the Alzheimer’s Society has had trusts contact them asking to fund their phone helpline. My point is this - your story can be stronger coming from someone else than it can be from you. Watch the film Simon made with his dad here : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9UQ5mjFzHTA
- At SolarAid we fell upon an obvious solution. Obvious only when we had asked the question – how can we get supporters to spread our story. Actually, it was a supporter who gave us the idea – when I was asked at awards event if I would give my solar light away that I carried around for a donation. The donor gave me £50. The light cost £10. The next day the same thing happened with a visitor to our office. So, from that point on we offered donors who gave £50 or more the option of a solar light to spread our story (you can provide a gift upto 25% the value of a donation for donations upto £100 and still claim gift aid). We also provided them to people who fundraised for us and sold them at a premium price on our e-shop. And the magic happened … One boy of 14, Ethan, created his own video using the solar light – he soon passed his target of £100 on JustGiving and Raised £1,400, we had a first time donation of £5,000 from a donor, when I called him up it turns out his professor friend at Edinburgh University had one of our solar lights and recommended SolarAid, my favourite was when we had a run of new donors from a particular postcode. It turns out a supporter was knocking on the doors of all her neighbours in her street, solar light in hand telling them to give to SolarAid. Last year SolarAid got a £25,000 from a city firm when an employee took in a solar light. SolarAid got its first legacy last year – when I spoke to executor who was her best friend – she said “She loved you guys – and you know what she had a solar light in her kitchen that she showed everyone who came in for a cup of tea!” Link : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ql_W4Z9FBbc
- The third way is simply give people a great customer experience … so much so that people talk about you. The simplest way to do this is start with your Thankyous. Get prepared. At the very least produce a set of cards, using strong photos but with a blank inside – so handwrite a thank you. If you send a thank you letter keep them fresh and try not to be predictable – opening with Dear Richard, Thank you so much for your donation of £25 towards the work …is just dull.. Think of it like the opening to a film – make it a story. In fact use thankyous to tell your mission story. What we found is people shared the experience on social media – I feel special. One dad was so taken when we sent his son a handwritten thank you he did a blog about it – cue Misty eye parents!
- Take it a step further. When SolarAid did some work on the impact of solar lights we used this in our feedback to donors. Our research team found that one solar light benefits a household of 5-6 people, and over a 3 year period leads to 1000 hours extra study a night, savings of $200 a year and averts a tonne of Carbon. We knew that for every £3 we were able to sell a solar light at a fair market price. So we could equate donations to solar lights and solar lights to impact. Hence we could link donations to impact and created an impact calculator. We place this on our website and also used it in feedback communications. Once again it became a talking point.
- The final example is a prototype we developed at solarAid to go the whole way and give a great experience as part of the giving. We developed this thinking inspired by Charity: water and their work at showing donors the location of their water projects. Using sales data and determining GPS location we matched donations to the location of solar lights we distributed. But the bit I really liked was this – if I got my network to donate it credits me. So you see I have funded 10 lights – but my network has funded x10 that. It was a way of attracting new donors. We nicknamed it the Speed of Light. We developed it with individuals in mind but it was corporates who were also attracted to it. The platform was a way of showing their impact to their customers. It was key in securing a six figure corporate partnership over 3 years with 9BAR. One downside supporters liked this so much they want all of their support logged this way – fundraising, purchase of lights – and at the moment it doesn’t have that capability. So, if you go down this route – open your mind, take your time and be prepared to adapt as you go. You can join it here https://speedoflight.io/ Or this is my network https://speedoflight.io/r/zmkf1
- If you want people to be champions of your mission – find your why, get them to spread your story and deliver a great donor experience. As I mentioned at the outset you’ll find more detail in my project report for the Commission on the Donor Experience which is published in beta stage next week. If you sign up as an “enthusiast” on the Donor Experience website you’ll be notified of the projects, be able to download them and better still able to contribute and add to them. The key point with all of this is its about approaching a mindset. It’s not how can I get money out of donors – but how can I inspire supporters to spread our story. And the money will come. I believe old style response based fundraising doesn’t leverage this approach. And as a result it doesn’t benefit from the ripple effect that can happen when someone spreads your story – even if they don’t give. If you are interested in more about this thinking check out my blog ifundraiser.
- When SolarAid launched its mission in 2011 – at the initial dinner where we shared our ambition with a small group of people – Darren stepped forward. He worked for a Chinese company, Yingll, who had a vision for clean renewable energy for all – so he asked how he could help with our goal to eradicate the kerosene lamp. He became an advocate – got his company on board. Last year as a result of the partnership he developed, SolarAid produced the worlds most affordable solar light – designed in Manchester and manufactured in China –and sells in Africa, including the margin for local entrepreneurs for just $5. That could be a gamechanger for families who spend $6 a month on kerosene for light. But it wouldn't have happened with fundraising inspiring someone to be champion for our mission and advocate on our behalf. And that’s what its about – not the money – the mission.