Get Ready to Serve Up Spring Campaign Success

As the flowers bloom and the birds chirp, spring heralds a time of renewal and growth. For nonprofits, it's also a prime season for fundraising campaigns. With the right strategy, organizations can sow the seeds for a fruitful year ahead. But where do you begin? Let's roll up our sleeves and dive into the recipe for successful spring fundraising campaigns.

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The first question that often arises when discussing campaign planning is, "How much can I expect to raise?" It's a valid inquiry, but the answer lies not in crystal ball predictions but rather in past performance.

So, how much have you raised in the past? That's your starting point—a jumping-off point for your recipe planning.

Here's the scoop: if you've got a loyal base of 50 donors who typically give around $50 per year, a stellar campaign can certainly bump up those numbers. However, don't expect a sudden surge of 500 new donors overnight. Start with where you've been, and let's do a little measuring.

Take a moment to figure out how much you've raised in your last three campaigns. Don't worry if you're new to the baking... oops, fundraising; there's a method for you too.

If you’ve done fundraising before, here’s your assignment:

List out how much you’ve raised in your last three year-end campaigns. Or, if you’ve never done year-end before, your last three fundraising campaigns. (If you’ve never run a fundraising campaign before, go to the next page.)

Campaign 1 (C1) = _________
Campaign 2 (C2) = _________
Campaign 3 (C3) = _________

Now calculate the growth rate.

Take C2 and subtract C1. Then divide that by C1. Multiply by 100. That’s your growth rate from your first to your second campaign.

Next, take C3 and subtract C2. Then divide that by C2. Multiply by 100. That’s your growth rate from your second to third campaign.

Now average your growth rates together.

If you change nothing, that’s the growth you can expect. If you’re not planning to do anything different from last year, project just your average growth.

With a well-executed campaign, you can expect to increase that by 50% of the growth, but still you can guess up or down. If you have 10% average growth, project 15% growth.

So apply that growth rate to your third campaign, what number do you have? Let’s start with that as your target.

But let's not just rely on theory; it's time to ground-truth our goals. If you want to know what it will take in terms of donors to reach that goal, do the “not done much fundraising” assignment as well.

If you’ve not done much fundraising before, here’s your assignment:

1. Make a copy of this Campaign Gift Chart. It’s laid out to help someone raise $14,000. That’s a really respectable goal for a small nonprofit’s spring campaign, and I’ve put in traditional spreads I see in terms of numbers of donors to reach that level.

2. Look at the giving amounts and number of donors. Change the number of donors to what you think you can reasonably get to donate during your campaign. The chart will automatically calculate out how many prospects you need to reach that number.

3. Go through your current and prospective donors (or sources of donors, like your email list) and write the actual names (or sources) of people you think will give to this campaign in the “Prospect Names” category. These are your prospects.

4. Count them up.
   Do you have enough prospects per the gift range calculator? Great! Proceed with the campaign as planned because you’re going to do fine!
   Do you not have enough prospects? Two options. Option 1: Reduce your goal. Option 2: Talk with your board, volunteers, and network about who else might be interested in supporting your nonprofit until you have the right number of prospects.

Preview of the coming weeks

Over the next few weeks, we’re going to send you assignments to help you plan and launch your spring fundraising campaign. Here’s what you’re going to get:

April 12: How to write a donor persona based on your donor prospects.

April 19: Craft your recipe…I mean, campaign plan. (Don’t have one, then you’ll be able to steal mine!)

April 26: Get ready to roll it out.

May 3: Sweeten your recipe with matching gifts.

And there’s even more after that! Get ready to bake up a sweet spring fundraising campaign! Stay tuned for our next blog post, where we'll explore creative ways to slice and dice your donor audience to get the best results possible.

Now go bake the world a better place!