If you are considering hiring a capital campaign consultant, take the following quiz:
- Your organization decides to raise money for a new building. You understand development and help create a fundraising committee that agrees to meet once a week. You agree to co-chair the committee. At the fourth meeting only three people show up – including yourself and your co-chair. You:
- Drink coffee and wait 30 minutes for others to show up before calling it a day.
- Catch up on recent organizational events that could possibly affect your campaign before leaving.
- Hold the meeting, moving forward with assignments, ratings, and updates with whoever is present.
- The end of the calendar year/fiscal year is coming up and you are still in the quiet phase of your campaign. You realize that many of your donors have yet to give to the annual appeal. You:
- Hold off on any asks until after the year closes.
- Only talk to people who have already given to the campaign.
- Consider who can be asked for both gifts at the same time.
- You are trying to decide how much money your organization can raise. As with any group, a few people are skeptical about the chances of success. You prevent this negativity from spreading by:
- hoping that their personal gifts will provide them with enough satisfaction to change their attitude.
- talking to them about how to improve their attitudes.
- proving through statistics and probability how the money can be raised with their help.
If you have not answered “c” to every question, consider whether you should call Mersky, Jaffe & Associates to help your capital campaign move forward. Our combined experience, perspective, consistency, knowledge, and focus can dramatically improve an organization’s chances of success. It’s not that you can’t go at it alone, but it will take you longer, and in all likelihood, you will raise less money.
The choice is yours, but if you decide you would like to set up a meeting to explore the possibilities of a capital campaign consultant call David A. Mersky or Abigail Hamron at 1 (800) 361-8689.