4+ keys to great year-round fundraising campaigns
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Setting fundraising goals helps ensure that everyone at your nonprofit organization is on the same page about your various campaigns’ objectives. Keeping track of how close you are to meeting your goal provides the insight you need to adjust your fundraising strategy and find success for both your current and future campaigns.
In this guide, we’ll discuss how to develop goals that will help your nonprofit maximize your fundraising initiatives.
Your organization should approach its fundraising campaigns with clear, concrete goals. With these defined goals, you’ll be able to know if your nonprofit is successfully fulfilling its purpose.
Use these tips to define the results your organization wants to achieve.
Choose a goal your entire team can work towards. This goal should yield a specific, measurable result by the end of your fundraiser. For example, your overall goal might be to gain new donors. In this case, you might define success as gaining 200 new supporters by the end of the campaign.
To determine your primary, overarching goal, ask yourself these questions:
Once you’ve decided on your fundraiser’s overarching objective, you can move on to choosing specific fundraising goals.
The SMART method is a popular system used to create goals. This system gives your organization a framework for setting goals that encourage growth while remaining realistic.
In the SMART method, you’ll develop goals that are:
As you set fundraising goals for your next campaign, use the qualities in the SMART method to shape them.
Your nonprofit’s donor base is likely made up of a diverse group of individual supporters. From your broader group of supporters, you can create subgroups, or segments, of donors based on shared characteristics. Then, target each segment with messages that will move them to take a certain action that will help you achieve your goal.
For example, let’s say your fundraising goal is to raise 10% more than you did the previous year. First, create a segment of your most loyal donors. These donors should be those who make large contributions, regularly donate, volunteer, attend events, and generally show a vested interest in your cause. Then, you can target this subgroup of donors with messaging about contributing more to your cause this year, making for an effective strategy that puts you well on your way to meeting your goal.
Setting fundraising goals is a key part of planning any fundraising campaign. By developing goals that push your nonprofit, you can make progress toward fulfilling your purpose. Be sure to measure your fundraising success year after year to continue achieving each goal you set.
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