BEYOND THE TRANSACTION | PART 2:
Finding the People Who May Have Both the Capacity and the Reason to Make a Transformational Gift
By Angie Thompson
When nonprofits begin thinking about major gifts, financial capacity is naturally part of the conversation. We want to understand who may have the resources to make a significant investment in the work. But capacity is only part of the equation.
Someone may have considerable wealth and little connection to the mission. Another person may have a personal experience, family history, philanthropic interest or long-standing relationship that gives them a very real reason to care about what the organization is trying to accomplish.
Throughout my development career, I have approached capacity as one piece of a much larger picture. Knowing that someone has financial resources tells me what that person might be able to give. It doesn't tell me why that person would want to make a significant gift to the organization.
That distinction was reinforced when I studied for my CFRE designation. Identifying someone with the financial capacity to make a major gift did not automatically make that person a qualified prospect. We also needed to understand the person's interest in the organization and whether there was a reason to continue developing the relationship. AFP's prospect-development resources consider capacity along with affinity and propensity, while Blackbaud describes three related factors: affinity or propensity, capacity and readiness.¹ ²
Before I think about an ask, I want to know something more important:
Is there a reason for this person to care?
Learning What Matters to the Donor
Early in my development career, I thought fundraising meant I needed to convince someone that they should invest in our organization. Thankfully, I worked with a mentor who taught me that listening was the key to identifying giving interests.
That lesson changed the way I approached major-gift development. I learned to start conversations that helped me understand why a donor participated in the mission. That understanding rarely came from a single conversation. It developed over time as I listened, observed and learned more about the person.
I also learned that what people do can tell us as much as what they say. Giving patterns, participation, the programs they respond to and the questions they ask can all provide useful information. Research adds another layer. Taken together, those indicators helped me understand a donor's interests and recognize when there might be an appropriate opportunity for a more significant conversation.
Listening is also central to major-gift discovery. AFP describes discovery conversations as opportunities to listen, ask good questions and determine whether a prospective donor belongs in the major-gift pipeline.³ Jerold Panas similarly emphasized learning enough about the donor to understand interests, motivation and philanthropic possibilities before arriving at the solicitation conversation.⁴
Different Donors Can Need Different Experiences
Acknowledging differences in giving capacity can make nonprofit leaders uncomfortable. There may be concern that developing a more personal experience for a major donor somehow diminishes the value of someone who gives $50 or purchases a ticket to a fundraiser. I don't believe those ideas are in conflict.
Every donor deserves gratitude, respect, responsible stewardship and accurate information about how gifts are used. But treating donors respectfully does not require treating every donor identically. The person making a $100 annual gift and the person considering a $100,000 investment are making different philanthropic decisions. The information they need, the questions they ask, the time required and the impact they hope to achieve may be different.
While working as a development officer, I intentionally planned three or four appeals each year specifically for major donors. Unlike a broad annual appeal tied to a mailing date, those conversations could move on my calendar. That gave me time to develop the relationship, learn what mattered to the donor and determine when an ask was appropriate.
The donor relationship helped determine the timing, rather than the calendar determining the relationship.
There is room for all of those donors, and good development recognizes what each relationship requires.
Story Can Help Us Discover Affinity
I use story to help people understand the mission in human terms. Their response can also help me understand what matters to them.
A statistic might tell a prospective donor that an education program serves 800 children. A story can help the donor understand what the opportunity meant for one child, what was missing before the program existed and what became possible because someone chose to fund it. Then I can listen to what happens next.
What does the donor ask about? What part of the story seems to matter? Is there a personal experience behind the response?
From there, the conversation can expand. What if the organization could reach twice as many children? What prevents that from happening? What would need to change? What could a significant philanthropic investment make possible?
Panas taught that major donors are often attracted to significant ideas and opportunities and emphasized helping donors understand how their resources could make something meaningful happen.⁵ A smaller annual appeal may appropriately say, “Your gift will help us continue this program.” A transformational conversation may explore a larger question: “What could become possible if we had the resources to change this?”
Neither message is inherently better because they serve different philanthropic decisions.
WHO, HOW and WHY
When I am considering someone for a transformational-gift pipeline, I find three questions useful.
WHO has both the capacity and affinity to make this kind of investment?
Research can help me understand financial capacity, but conversations and experiences help me understand affinity. Current donors, sponsors, former board members, volunteers and people introduced by trusted supporters may all be worth knowing better. But “worth knowing better” is not the same as “ready to ask.”
HOW will we help that person understand the mission more deeply?
This may require a personal visit, a conversation with leadership, a program experience or an introduction to someone directly connected with the work. I don't view those interactions as a series of boxes to check on the way to an ask. Each should have a purpose based on what we know about the donor and what we still need to learn. Sometimes the appropriate next step is simply another conversation.
WHY would a significant gift matter?
The answer cannot simply be that the organization needs $100,000. Before I ask someone to consider a transformational investment, I need to be able to explain what becomes possible because the investment is made. What changes? Who benefits? What problem can be addressed? What opportunity becomes available that otherwise would not?
Knowing When Someone Doesn't Belong in the Pipeline
Qualification also means being willing to discover that someone isn't a prospective major donor for your organization. A person may have substantial capacity but little affinity. Another may care about the work but have philanthropic priorities elsewhere. Someone else may simply prefer not to develop a closer relationship.
That information is useful because it allows us to respect the person's interests and stop trying to develop a relationship toward a destination that doesn't make sense. Major-gift qualification is intended to help determine whether continued cultivation is warranted, not simply to confirm someone's financial capacity.⁶
There is also no guarantee that good cultivation will result in a gift. I have spent time developing relationships that never produced the outcome I might have anticipated. That does not mean the work was wasted. We may learn more about a donor, strengthen someone's connection to the organization, discover an interest we did not know existed or determine that there is no appropriate next step.
Development is a process. We can do the work well without controlling the outcome.
I would rather have a smaller pipeline of people we have taken the time to know than a larger one built primarily around capacity.
Major-gift fundraising is not the practice of identifying people with money and persuading them to support our needs. Throughout my career, I have found it to be the disciplined work of identifying people with both capacity and potential affinity, learning what matters to them and discovering whether there is an opportunity where their philanthropic interests and the organization's mission genuinely meet.
Sources
[1] Association of Fundraising Professionals, prospect research and major-gift discovery resources on qualification, donor interest and financial capacity.
[2] Blackbaud, “Before the Big Ask: How to Use CRM Data to Find and Prioritize Major Gift Prospects.”
[3] Institute for Charitable Giving, “Major Gifts.”
[4] Jerold Panas, ASKING; Institute for Charitable Giving, “What Does Maybe Mean?”
[5] Blackbaud, “Donor Cultivation Cycle: Tips for Each Major Stage of Fundraising.”
[6] Jerold Panas, ASKING; Institute for Charitable Giving, “Donors Give to the Magic of an Idea.”
[7] Jerold Panas and William T. Sturtevant, The Moves Management Manual.
[8] Association of Fundraising Professionals, “Major Gift Solicitation: A Practical Guide for Fundraising.”