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Bristol developer Johnson donates $1M for United Way endowment fund

There was a loud eruption of cheers and applause at the United Way of Bristol Wednesday morning when Bristol developer Steve Johnson pulled a black sheet off an oversized check. Johnson donated $1 million to the organization’s newly created endowment fund. He proposed the endowment fund when he was campaign chairman nearly a decade ago and said the long-term goal is to fully fund the administrative side of the nonprofit so 100 percent of annual fundraising benefits more than 30 partner agencies. “The needs of this region are tremendous,” Johnson said. “The things we take for granted like food and shelter — some people don’t have that. We need to eradicate those problems and giving back to the community means a lot to me. I’m fortunate that I can do it and help the United Way.”

Spotlight

The Zoltner Consulting Group

The Zoltner Consulting Group (ZCG) is a Santiago-based social enterprise dedicated to the creation and implementation of innovative initiatives using information and communication technologies (ICTs) to promote social inclusion and human and economic development. John Zoltner and his multi-disciplinary six-person staff work with public, non-governmental and private entities to design strategies, projects and methodologies that take advantage of the power of ICTs to empower individuals, organizations and communities. They also design, raise funds for, and manage innovative development projects involving ICTs on the national and regional levels in the Americas.

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Nonprofit Management

What Are the Top Five Lessons for Your Non-Profit This Year?

Article | July 13, 2022

It is crucial to keep a keen eye on what the significant figures imply for NGO’s and how they affect their operations. Learn more in detail in the 5 key lessons! It's alluring to concentrate just on the significant figures that affect the non-profit industry as a whole. However, it's equally crucial to concentrate on what those significant figures imply for certain NGOs and how they may affect your day-to-day operations. The report can be used to learn the following five key lessons. Lesson One: Small-Dollar Donors Are Being Left Behind Around 84.1% of contributors give less than $500 yearly to the organisations they support, and just 19% of new donors are retained over time, according to the most recent Fundraising Effectiveness Project data. This indicates that the great majority of small-dollar donors are leaving non-profit organizations. Lesson Two: There are Winners and Losers by Mission Type Donors change the emphasis they give to certain missions every year. Donors' giving priorities clearly reflect the legacy of COVID-19 as well as the enduring influence of racial and social justice movements. The number of non-profits with missions in the arts, culture, or healthcare increased significantly in 2020. Non-profits with an emphasis on foreign affairs, human services, and education, on the other hand, had slow growth or reductions in 2021. Lesson Three: Corporate Giving is a Distraction It will become more crucial to engage with people instead of concentrating on corporate ties as businesses modify their philanthropic alliances and employees try to support their preferred causes outside of their workplace's giving program. Lesson Four: It’s Time to Modernize Bequest Giving A warning sign that NGOs are not investing in highlighting the opportunities available with legacy gifts is the decline in bequests during 2021. Although any donor can establish a contribution through their estate to a non-profit they are passionate about, there is a frequent misconception that bequests must be customized for significant donors. Lesson Five: Retention and Acquisition Benchmarks Are Critical For its key revenue figures, the Giving USA report heavily depends on IRS 990 information. When examining giving trends throughout the sector, that data is helpful, but it is less helpful when attempting to comprehend the behavior of all donors. It is reassuring to see that when discussing contributors' ongoing support of NGOs, the Fundraising Effectiveness Project's data on acquisition and retention of individual donors was recognised as the primary source. It's crucial to comprehend donor behaviour, and you can achieve this by comparing the donor behaviour of your own organization to benchmarks from the ‘Fundraising Effectiveness Project.’

Read More
Nonprofit Management

5 Videos That Show Creative Ways to Market Your Nonprofit

Article | July 20, 2022

Video marketing increases brand engagement, reflects your nonprofit brand personality, and informs the public about your impact. The key is to approach your video marketing strategy in a creative way so you can stand out from the crowd. The following five videos are creative examples from which you can draw inspiration, from capturing your audience’s attention to building strong storylines that deliver information in innovative ways. In each example, we’ll dissect some best practices and learnings you can take away in order to level up your own videos.

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Nonprofit Management

5 Ways Nonprofits can Access Corporate Philanthropy

Article | July 28, 2022

Most nonprofits know about corporate sponsorship, but have you tried matching gifts and volunteer grants? Has a business ever donated goods or services to your nonprofit? What about a business donating to a cause or capital campaign? If you haven’t explored corporate philanthropy options, chances are you’re leaving money on the table. Corporate philanthropy programs are a great way for nonprofits to raise crucial funds. Plus, there are often non-monetary benefits that add additional incentive to embrace a business’s social responsibility program.

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Nonprofit Technology

Utilize an Email Marketing Strategy to Drive More Donations

Article | June 13, 2022

When creating your nonprofit fundraising and donations strategy, email marketing should be on the top of the list of channels to use to support your efforts. However, 70% of nonprofits do not have an email marketing strategy, despite 26% of online donors saying email marketing is what inspires them to give. Email marketing can help nonprofits reach their fundraising goals by helping expand reach, develop a loyal donor base and drive more donations. Build an Email Marketing Strategy Implementing email marketing may seem intimidating to some, but once you have an effective strategy in place, it will act as a blueprint and support all your goals moving forward. When you start building your strategy, it’s important to spend time developing a unique strategy that aligns with your mission and goals. Consider these questions: Who is your target audience? How are you collecting email addresses? What types of emails will you send? What types of content do you want to share in those emails? What will your emails look like? What is the layout? What is the design based on? How often do you plan to send emails? What platform will you use? Does it integrate with your donor database and have all the features you need to implement your strategy? Email marketing is the most effective and successful when there's a strategic plan in place. Creating a detailed strategy that answers the questions above will provide your nonprofit with the stepping stones needed to set your email marketing efforts up for success and help meet your overall fundraising goals. Send Emails Once you have a strategy and execution plan in place, you’re ready to start sending your messages to your audience. Email subscribers want to hear from you, but you need to be sure you are sending engaging messages to the right audiences. When you start sending your emails, plan to send a mix of different messages to your audience. Email marketing is an effective channel to not only fundraise but to help subscribers stay engaged and keep donor retention high. A great example would be to include advocacy emails in your plans. Advocacy emails include newsletters and impact stories. These types of emails help your subscriber feel valued as a donor as they’re seeing the direct impact of their support. As you start and continue to send emails, always track each email's performance. This helps you determine what is working and what is not working. By tracking key metrics, like click-through rates, conversation rates and donations per email, you will be able to continuously improve your strategy and the emails you are sending. Follow Best Practices As you begin to execute your email strategy, there are a few key best practices I recommend following to help increase engagement, donations, and overall performance of your emails. Personalize the email for your subscribers. Personalized emails can generate donations up to six times more compared to a generalized email. Make sure your emails are well-designed with compelling imagery that helps the donor visualize your mission and the impact of their donations. Provide clear calls to action in each email you send and always include a “Donate” button in all your communications. Include social sharing buttons and links to your social channels in all your email communications. Emails with social sharing buttons increase click-through rates by as much as 158% and help expand your reach by allowing donors to recommend and share your nonprofit with their network. Create an email cadence so you are regularly communicating with your audience throughout the year. For every 1,000 fundraising emails delivered, nonprofits raised $78, so it is in your best interest to continuously send messages to your subscribers. Start by sending emails monthly and then experiment with increasing the frequency of emails per month and see what works best for your nonprofit. Utilizing email marketing is key to having a successful fundraising strategy for your nonprofit. By building a well-thought-out strategy and implementing it, you will be able to engage, retain and convert subscribers into a loyal donor base.

Read More
Nonprofit Management

4 Challenges that Large Non-profit Organizations Face

Article | July 13, 2022

It is crucial to keep a keen eye on what the significant figures imply for NGO’s and how they affect their operations. Learn more in detail in the 5 key lessons! It's alluring to concentrate just on the significant figures that affect the non-profit industry as a whole. However, it's equally crucial to concentrate on what those significant figures imply for certain NGOs and how they may affect your day-to-day operations. The report can be used to learn the following five key lessons. Lesson One: Small-Dollar Donors Are Being Left Behind Around 84.1% of contributors give less than $500 yearly to the organisations they support, and just 19% of new donors are retained over time, according to the most recent Fundraising Effectiveness Project data. This indicates that the great majority of small-dollar donors are leaving non-profit organizations. Lesson Two: There are Winners and Losers by Mission Type Donors change the emphasis they give to certain missions every year. Donors' giving priorities clearly reflect the legacy of COVID-19 as well as the enduring influence of racial and social justice movements. The number of non-profits with missions in the arts, culture, or healthcare increased significantly in 2020. Non-profits with an emphasis on foreign affairs, human services, and education, on the other hand, had slow growth or reductions in 2021. Lesson Three: Corporate Giving is a Distraction It will become more crucial to engage with people instead of concentrating on corporate ties as businesses modify their philanthropic alliances and employees try to support their preferred causes outside of their workplace's giving program. Lesson Four: It’s Time to Modernize Bequest Giving A warning sign that NGOs are not investing in highlighting the opportunities available with legacy gifts is the decline in bequests during 2021. Although any donor can establish a contribution through their estate to a non-profit they are passionate about, there is a frequent misconception that bequests must be customized for significant donors. Lesson Five: Retention and Acquisition Benchmarks Are Critical For its key revenue figures, the Giving USA report heavily depends on IRS 990 information. When examining giving trends throughout the sector, that data is helpful, but it is less helpful when attempting to comprehend the behavior of all donors. It is reassuring to see that when discussing contributors' ongoing support of NGOs, the Fundraising Effectiveness Project's data on acquisition and retention of individual donors was recognised as the primary source. It's crucial to comprehend donor behaviour, and you can achieve this by comparing the donor behaviour of your own organization to benchmarks from the ‘Fundraising Effectiveness Project.’

Read More
Nonprofit Management

What Your Non-profit Should Know About Accepting Cryptocurrency Donations?

Article | July 20, 2022

Video marketing increases brand engagement, reflects your nonprofit brand personality, and informs the public about your impact. The key is to approach your video marketing strategy in a creative way so you can stand out from the crowd. The following five videos are creative examples from which you can draw inspiration, from capturing your audience’s attention to building strong storylines that deliver information in innovative ways. In each example, we’ll dissect some best practices and learnings you can take away in order to level up your own videos.

Read More
Nonprofit Management

Non-Profits Cannot Afford to Ignore These Business Practices

Article | July 28, 2022

Most nonprofits know about corporate sponsorship, but have you tried matching gifts and volunteer grants? Has a business ever donated goods or services to your nonprofit? What about a business donating to a cause or capital campaign? If you haven’t explored corporate philanthropy options, chances are you’re leaving money on the table. Corporate philanthropy programs are a great way for nonprofits to raise crucial funds. Plus, there are often non-monetary benefits that add additional incentive to embrace a business’s social responsibility program.

Read More
Nonprofit Technology

Utilize an Email Marketing Strategy to Drive More Donations

Article | June 13, 2022

When creating your nonprofit fundraising and donations strategy, email marketing should be on the top of the list of channels to use to support your efforts. However, 70% of nonprofits do not have an email marketing strategy, despite 26% of online donors saying email marketing is what inspires them to give. Email marketing can help nonprofits reach their fundraising goals by helping expand reach, develop a loyal donor base and drive more donations. Build an Email Marketing Strategy Implementing email marketing may seem intimidating to some, but once you have an effective strategy in place, it will act as a blueprint and support all your goals moving forward. When you start building your strategy, it’s important to spend time developing a unique strategy that aligns with your mission and goals. Consider these questions: Who is your target audience? How are you collecting email addresses? What types of emails will you send? What types of content do you want to share in those emails? What will your emails look like? What is the layout? What is the design based on? How often do you plan to send emails? What platform will you use? Does it integrate with your donor database and have all the features you need to implement your strategy? Email marketing is the most effective and successful when there's a strategic plan in place. Creating a detailed strategy that answers the questions above will provide your nonprofit with the stepping stones needed to set your email marketing efforts up for success and help meet your overall fundraising goals. Send Emails Once you have a strategy and execution plan in place, you’re ready to start sending your messages to your audience. Email subscribers want to hear from you, but you need to be sure you are sending engaging messages to the right audiences. When you start sending your emails, plan to send a mix of different messages to your audience. Email marketing is an effective channel to not only fundraise but to help subscribers stay engaged and keep donor retention high. A great example would be to include advocacy emails in your plans. Advocacy emails include newsletters and impact stories. These types of emails help your subscriber feel valued as a donor as they’re seeing the direct impact of their support. As you start and continue to send emails, always track each email's performance. This helps you determine what is working and what is not working. By tracking key metrics, like click-through rates, conversation rates and donations per email, you will be able to continuously improve your strategy and the emails you are sending. Follow Best Practices As you begin to execute your email strategy, there are a few key best practices I recommend following to help increase engagement, donations, and overall performance of your emails. Personalize the email for your subscribers. Personalized emails can generate donations up to six times more compared to a generalized email. Make sure your emails are well-designed with compelling imagery that helps the donor visualize your mission and the impact of their donations. Provide clear calls to action in each email you send and always include a “Donate” button in all your communications. Include social sharing buttons and links to your social channels in all your email communications. Emails with social sharing buttons increase click-through rates by as much as 158% and help expand your reach by allowing donors to recommend and share your nonprofit with their network. Create an email cadence so you are regularly communicating with your audience throughout the year. For every 1,000 fundraising emails delivered, nonprofits raised $78, so it is in your best interest to continuously send messages to your subscribers. Start by sending emails monthly and then experiment with increasing the frequency of emails per month and see what works best for your nonprofit. Utilizing email marketing is key to having a successful fundraising strategy for your nonprofit. By building a well-thought-out strategy and implementing it, you will be able to engage, retain and convert subscribers into a loyal donor base.

Read More
MORE ARTICLES

Spotlight

The Zoltner Consulting Group

The Zoltner Consulting Group (ZCG) is a Santiago-based social enterprise dedicated to the creation and implementation of innovative initiatives using information and communication technologies (ICTs) to promote social inclusion and human and economic development. John Zoltner and his multi-disciplinary six-person staff work with public, non-governmental and private entities to design strategies, projects and methodologies that take advantage of the power of ICTs to empower individuals, organizations and communities. They also design, raise funds for, and manage innovative development projects involving ICTs on the national and regional levels in the Americas.

Related News

28 Hancock County nonprofits get $164,000 in Maine Community Foundation grants

Mainebiz | July 01, 2019

The Hancock County Committee of the Maine Community Foundation has awarded $164,133 in grants to 28 nonprofit organizations, it announced on Friday. Recipients include Island Connections, which will get $10,000 to expand services by transporting people to medical appointments and social outings with a new, donated minivan, and Annex Arts, which will get $7,350 to add a residency and other programs for writers. The Hancock County Fund is a permanent endowment that supports projects and nonprofits that strengthen communities in the county. Out of 60 applications received in the latest round, 47% received grants, and the average amount awarded was $5,862, according to data shared with Mainebiz.

Read More

Weston Award for Nonprofits to Increase to $50,000

YES! Weekly | February 12, 2019

The Joel and Claudette Weston Award has honored and recognized leadership and excellence in nonprofit management at local organizations for more than 30 years. Joel A. Weston, Jr. was a senior executive at the Hanes Companies and an active member of the Winston-Salem community. He served as president of the United Way of Forsyth County Board from 1980-1982. Joel believed strongly that nonprofit organizations should be well run and efficient and he introduced many innovative programs designed to strengthen charitable organizations and the community. He passed away unexpectedly in 1984. The Weston Award Endowment was founded in 1985 at The Winston-Salem Foundation by family and friends of Joel A. Weston as a way to honor his vision and dedication to the community. In 1985 the Weston Award for Nonprofit Excellence was established to recognize local human service agencies that are performing at peak efficiency. Today, Joel’s widow, Claudette Weston, continues the family tradition of community involvement and philanthropy through her efforts on numerous boards and organizations and as a member of the Weston Award Committee.

Read More

Coastal Baldwin forms endowment foundation to help nonprofits

Lagniappe Mobile | January 23, 2019

Leaders from three south Baldwin County cities are raising money to establish an endowment fund with the goal of awarding community grants to nonprofits.The Tri-City Community Foundation aims to serve Foley, Gulf Shores and Orange Beach and surrounding communities. It’s the latest of three established under the umbrella of the Community Foundation of South Alabama (CFSA) in Mobile, which serves Baldwin, Choctaw, Clarke, Conecuh, Escambia, Mobile, Monroe and Washington counties.“Civic leaders come together and say they want to be on an advisory committee to participate in a foundation for our community, basically to be able to give back to the community in perpetuity,” CFSA President and CEO Rebecca Byrne said. “To have some type of an endowed community fund for the benefit of that particular community. That gives those communities a chance to identify the issues they want to address.”Tri-City is still in the fundraising stage and will spend 2019 trying to raise seed money to generate interest. The fund got its start with a grant from the Coastal Resiliency Coalition (CFC), a local nonprofit created after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon Disaster and focused on helping local Gulf Coast businesses and individuals survive, sustain and succeed, Tri-City Chair Michelle Hodges said.

Read More

28 Hancock County nonprofits get $164,000 in Maine Community Foundation grants

Mainebiz | July 01, 2019

The Hancock County Committee of the Maine Community Foundation has awarded $164,133 in grants to 28 nonprofit organizations, it announced on Friday. Recipients include Island Connections, which will get $10,000 to expand services by transporting people to medical appointments and social outings with a new, donated minivan, and Annex Arts, which will get $7,350 to add a residency and other programs for writers. The Hancock County Fund is a permanent endowment that supports projects and nonprofits that strengthen communities in the county. Out of 60 applications received in the latest round, 47% received grants, and the average amount awarded was $5,862, according to data shared with Mainebiz.

Read More

Weston Award for Nonprofits to Increase to $50,000

YES! Weekly | February 12, 2019

The Joel and Claudette Weston Award has honored and recognized leadership and excellence in nonprofit management at local organizations for more than 30 years. Joel A. Weston, Jr. was a senior executive at the Hanes Companies and an active member of the Winston-Salem community. He served as president of the United Way of Forsyth County Board from 1980-1982. Joel believed strongly that nonprofit organizations should be well run and efficient and he introduced many innovative programs designed to strengthen charitable organizations and the community. He passed away unexpectedly in 1984. The Weston Award Endowment was founded in 1985 at The Winston-Salem Foundation by family and friends of Joel A. Weston as a way to honor his vision and dedication to the community. In 1985 the Weston Award for Nonprofit Excellence was established to recognize local human service agencies that are performing at peak efficiency. Today, Joel’s widow, Claudette Weston, continues the family tradition of community involvement and philanthropy through her efforts on numerous boards and organizations and as a member of the Weston Award Committee.

Read More

Coastal Baldwin forms endowment foundation to help nonprofits

Lagniappe Mobile | January 23, 2019

Leaders from three south Baldwin County cities are raising money to establish an endowment fund with the goal of awarding community grants to nonprofits.The Tri-City Community Foundation aims to serve Foley, Gulf Shores and Orange Beach and surrounding communities. It’s the latest of three established under the umbrella of the Community Foundation of South Alabama (CFSA) in Mobile, which serves Baldwin, Choctaw, Clarke, Conecuh, Escambia, Mobile, Monroe and Washington counties.“Civic leaders come together and say they want to be on an advisory committee to participate in a foundation for our community, basically to be able to give back to the community in perpetuity,” CFSA President and CEO Rebecca Byrne said. “To have some type of an endowed community fund for the benefit of that particular community. That gives those communities a chance to identify the issues they want to address.”Tri-City is still in the fundraising stage and will spend 2019 trying to raise seed money to generate interest. The fund got its start with a grant from the Coastal Resiliency Coalition (CFC), a local nonprofit created after the 2010 Deepwater Horizon Disaster and focused on helping local Gulf Coast businesses and individuals survive, sustain and succeed, Tri-City Chair Michelle Hodges said.

Read More

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