1. Building Blocks for a
Successful Major Donor
Strategy
Fiona Duncan
4 November 2008

2. • Major donor fundraising is just as much about
the donor as it is the project
• You don’t need bricks and mortar
• People make this more complicated than it
needs to be!
• Knowing what to do; deciding what to do; being
disciplined = success!
• 7 Steps & Moves management are all you need.

3. • More professionals and fewer volunteers
• Increasingly volunteers cultivate &
professionals ‘close’
• Higher expectations
• Doing more with less
• Involved in higher solicitations

5. • Involvement
• Impact – making a difference
• Global and home country
• Added value
• Social enterprise
• Head and heart

6. Considerations
suspects  prospects  donors
100  15  5
Research requests
– levels
Portfolio management
Data control
Reporting

7. How many donors do I need??
Gift Size Number Value
Donors
£5m 1 £5m
£3m 2 £6m
£2m 4 £8m
£1m 6 £6m
£100k-
£1m 20 £5m
Total 33 £33m

8. How many donors do I need??
Assumptions
Prospect Conversion 8 to 1
External Conversion 25 to 1
Prospect Research
Wealth Band Matches Conversion Gift Level Total
£50m+ 2 0 500,000 125,000
£25-50m 6 1 250,000 187,500
£10-25m 10 1 100,000 125,000
£5-10m 112 14 50,000 700,000
£1-5m 768 96 10,000 960,000
Influential 355 44 10,000 443,750
Total 1253 157 2,541,250

9. Critical success factors
• Powerful Case for Support – just what do you
want the money for?
• Excellent research
• Excellent cultivation
• Making the ask
• Loving your donors
• Asking again

10. What is leadership?
• Wealthy donors influencing other wealthy
people to give
• Wealthy donors who will use their networks
• People will follow leaders – lead gifts are
critical
• Big donors will push average gifts
up – small donors will push
average gifts down

11. Secrets of a Leadership Forum
• Excellent Chair who has made a big gift
• Clarity of purpose
• Clarity of targets
• Time limited
• High-powered
• Exclusive

12. Eight Step Cycle
1. Discover 2. Research

13. Eight Step Cycle
1. Discover 2. Research
Stewardship

14. history
database
stakeholder mapping
circulate lists
Discover
ask geography
press
competitors
service users

15. Finding your prospects

16. Developing a Prospect Hypothesis
• Describe the sorts of people who:
• Have the right levels of wealth
• Have evidence of philanthropy
• Have some connection to the cause
• Are active in fields other than their work
• Have business interests whose brands fit
with you

17. propensity
criteria &
maintenance
capacity
Research
volume
database
in-house / commission?
pipeline
management

18. Researching your prospects
• Start with your database – they already love
you!
• Use research companies or employ a
researcher
• Use all published information
• As names come up, ask your
trustees and existing supporters
if they know them

22. benefit ability
matrix
fit
family
Quantify
age influence
affinity
wealth
social
philanthropy

23. Decide the:
• criteria
• importance
• and multiplier

25. when
who
Introduce where
why
what

26. planned
relationships
interest
involve Cultivate
stages
build loyalty
activities

27. Cultivation
• How to meet them?
• Go where they go
• Hold an event they would like
• Use celebrities
• Ask for a meeting
• Events
• Staff well
• Brief and debrief fully

28. Cultivation
• Assign a staff member to each MD
• Provide them with the information they ask
for
• Invite them to a project visit
• If they come, you’ve got them!

30. how much?
for what?
Ask
how?
who?

31. The ask
• Many volunteers hate this
• Best done by a professional
• Know the right level of ask
• If in doubt, ask them

32. who documentation
signing ceremony
gift agreement
Thank and deliver
tax
reports project management
recognition

33. Follow up
• Thank
• Inform
• Involve
• Report
• Surprise
• Celebrate