Well well, well, you lucky people you! DSC have finally decided to do a second edition of the definitive book on using marketing effectively to enhance your fundraising. Trouble is I put the proposal in last September and in the meantime they've sold out. Fortunately, I've a few author's copies that might last until the reprint.
Very interesting to look afresh at the copy and how in the five years since publication my prognostications about the future of fundraising to 2020 looks horrendously out of date, shape and everything else. Note to self, any predictations (save for the Cheltenham Gold Cup - Long Run was my selection) are over 50 years not ten. 'Cause, of course, in the long run we're all dead.
Enjoy the legacy development opportunities whilst ye may.
Showing posts with label e-fundraising. Show all posts
Showing posts with label e-fundraising. Show all posts
Thursday, 31 March 2011
Thursday, 24 March 2011
Marketing or Fundraising? The Big Debate
A most interesting debate at LSBU today as to whether we must integrate fundraising into all our charity communications and fundraising or whether the skills needed for "the ask" are actually separate, complementary but different to those needed for marketing communications.
An initial vote showed 70% supporting the motion.
Patrick Boggon of Tarnside proposed that everything that fundraisers attempt in trying to change the world is driven by marketing principles. In fact unless Maple's five Ps (price, place promotion, product and positioning)are considered carefully and honestly the fundraising proposition is likely to fail.
Peter Maple countered that fundraising unlike marketing is really very, very simple. Taking into account Tony Elisher's fundraising cycle and the ubiquitous case for support all the fundraiser needs is to listen and ask appropriately. Marketing, on the other hand is full of concepts, theories, paradigms, matrices and gurus. He conceeded that one must have an understanding of effective marketing in a not for profit but asserted that it doesn't have to come from the fundraisers.
The audience were largely unmoved agreeing that there are two skill sets but that fundraising like sales )in commerical organisations), needs to be fully understood and integrated into the marketing function.
You had to be there.
An initial vote showed 70% supporting the motion.
Patrick Boggon of Tarnside proposed that everything that fundraisers attempt in trying to change the world is driven by marketing principles. In fact unless Maple's five Ps (price, place promotion, product and positioning)are considered carefully and honestly the fundraising proposition is likely to fail.
Peter Maple countered that fundraising unlike marketing is really very, very simple. Taking into account Tony Elisher's fundraising cycle and the ubiquitous case for support all the fundraiser needs is to listen and ask appropriately. Marketing, on the other hand is full of concepts, theories, paradigms, matrices and gurus. He conceeded that one must have an understanding of effective marketing in a not for profit but asserted that it doesn't have to come from the fundraisers.
The audience were largely unmoved agreeing that there are two skill sets but that fundraising like sales )in commerical organisations), needs to be fully understood and integrated into the marketing function.
You had to be there.
Tuesday, 30 November 2010
Accessing little know trusts
We had a most interesting character, Robert Pike, give a session for the fundraising students last week about the "invisible grantmakers".
Many people assume that if a trust isn't in the DSC directory they're hardly worth bothering about. However Robert, who runs a small agency called "Social Partnership Marketing" has been researching those who remain below the radar but still make significant grants. He's been doing this for 12 years and, it seems to me, that his directory published each year deserves to be seen by others with the tenacity to look beyond the usual sources. Check it out you might just find it more valuable than Prospecting for Gold (sorry Andrew).
Meanwhile, like all good fundraising, it starts and ends with RESEARCH, RESEARCH and more RESEARCH.
Many people assume that if a trust isn't in the DSC directory they're hardly worth bothering about. However Robert, who runs a small agency called "Social Partnership Marketing" has been researching those who remain below the radar but still make significant grants. He's been doing this for 12 years and, it seems to me, that his directory published each year deserves to be seen by others with the tenacity to look beyond the usual sources. Check it out you might just find it more valuable than Prospecting for Gold (sorry Andrew).
Meanwhile, like all good fundraising, it starts and ends with RESEARCH, RESEARCH and more RESEARCH.
Monday, 11 October 2010
e-fundraising - a core strategy or a bolt-on gizmo?
Interesting isn't it? The consultants group at the Institue of Fundraising are holding what looks to be a really interesting meeting on 24th November with some really good speakers. We try to do the same at LSBU each year with guest speakers looking at the latest trends and what's working well. As do a number of other organisations. Problem is it all changes so quickly, doesn't it?
Well at the risk of being labelled a ludite I wonder if it does. It goes without saying, (well ought to) that one must consider the changing state of technology and our uptake of it and that must be built into our communications strategies to avoid redundancy and being unnecessarily overtaken. However first into the market rarely triumphs. Remember Betamax and later the video laser disc both technologies that were superior to those that followed and cleaned up. I'm not sure if its the hare and the tortoise or simply following the first entrants and making a better job of it. Either way you have to be well informed but an element of risk aversion and pragmatism makes a compelling argument.
As Ralph Waldo Emerson famously said, "The world will beat a path to the door whoever makes a better mousetrap" but not necessarily the person who tries to eradicate mice altogether.
Well at the risk of being labelled a ludite I wonder if it does. It goes without saying, (well ought to) that one must consider the changing state of technology and our uptake of it and that must be built into our communications strategies to avoid redundancy and being unnecessarily overtaken. However first into the market rarely triumphs. Remember Betamax and later the video laser disc both technologies that were superior to those that followed and cleaned up. I'm not sure if its the hare and the tortoise or simply following the first entrants and making a better job of it. Either way you have to be well informed but an element of risk aversion and pragmatism makes a compelling argument.
As Ralph Waldo Emerson famously said, "The world will beat a path to the door whoever makes a better mousetrap" but not necessarily the person who tries to eradicate mice altogether.
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