Dying to give?

My wife died four weeks ago. Six months from diagnosis to death from Bile Duct Cancer. All too much, too soon. The pain doesn't go away but the process of dealing with everything keeps one occupied.

It is very interesting to see how different organisations deal with the notification of death and how different some of the responses are. The banks were both very professional, sympathetic and did what they promised. Two charities, of whom she was a member, promised a call back and failed to respond. Think they'll be on my giving list?

My research shows that the death of a loved one - parent, partner or child, is probably the single most powerful trigger for charitable gifts. It is the reason people form charities and make endowments. The Princess Alice Hospice, who had been great in the last few weeks of her life, benefited from more than £1,000 of donations in lieu of flowers and will probably, in the fullness of time benefit from a gift in my will. The two I've mentioned who with four other charities were in her will for a conditional bequest, are now rather unlikely to benefit from my new will.

Those regular readers amongst you will know that I do bang on about the boomers, but with good reason. We are dying in increasing numbers and are still writing charitable wills. I suspect however we are far quicker to write charities out of our wills when they upset us. So how do we keep those existing supporters happy enough to become legators?

More of that later.

First Thursday Club

Attended a meeting of the London Group's regular master class session in "The Red Herring" thanks to the good offices of Kevin Kibble and James Buchanan. Great evening though I say it myself. Lots more on the behaviour of major givers. Some really interesting questions about the value of using a conceptual model and the role of volunteer leadership both of which the meeting overwhelmingly agreed are worthwhile.

Lots more research needed into the baby boomers, I'm doing my bit, but even the Institute of Fundraising seems to prefer case studies over research for the convention. Rather sad really. Particularly, since there's a new book out by David Willetts called "The Pinch" about the adverse impact the boomers are having upon the prospects of our children - generation X and Y. Worth the read because it might begin to impact what we do about, amongst other things, our charitable giving.

Be curious and have a look. If nothing else have a look at the video James has posted on youtube at - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dP7hb6CFOCo

More fundraising research

Delighted that on Tuesday the Institute met with some 50 or so interested members, practitioners,academics, suppliers and the like to discuss what needs to be done in terms of making more research applicable to and usable by fundraisers. Of course I have a vested interest I hear you say, you're an academic now. Well that's true but I always have an eye to the usefulness of anything I'm undertaking as 20 years of practice has shown me that you simply can't have too much.

Anyway, as an aside, for a lecture about corporate social responsibility to some third year marketing undergraduates I was forced to do some desk research of my own. Sue Adkins always claims that the American Express link up with the Statue of Liberty restoration in 1983 is one of the first cases of Cause Related Marketing. However I found a Marriott Hotel and "March of the Dimes" link in 1976. Then I was reliably informed that Sunlight Soap had an on pack promotion supporting the RNLI in the 1930s. Can anyone beat that?

Fundraising Research takes centre stage

Well, take a bow Lindsay Boswell. Following his resignation from the CASS advisory group he's calling for a think tank to try and innovate, set an agenda, and stimulate some useful fundraising research. Don't like to say I told you so (actully I do), but I did. In 2003 I published research showing we dramatically underinvest in marketing research. Compared to the commercial sector who spend up to four times what charities do, we generally invest less than 0.5% of income on useful marketing research.

Anyone who's heard any of my lectures knows this is a pet hobby horse. If we want help we've got to start helping ourselves. I'm looking at major donors, regular givers, baby boomers, legacy developement and good practice. But, even I can't do it all. Going to the Institute's meeting in February so please, please me and tell me what you think we need to be looking at.

September Professional Fundraising

Isn't it interesting how you say one thing and people hear something else?

The new pf has a decent report about the research I summarised at the end of July about how UK charities generally don't practice what they preach in terms of looking after and developing relationships with major givers.

They've picked up on my comments about the lack of conceptual frameworks, models and examples to help understand those who support a particular charity - and that is certainly an important observation.

However, I thought, my piece de resistance was that fact that whilst everybody acknowledges the fact that peer to peer asking is the most effective, powerful way to ask for gifts, very few charities are actually doing it!!!

No grumps today (much)

Had a very successful evening last week presenting the first phase of my "donor motivation" research at LSBU where it was, it seems, very well received by an audience of around 70 third sector fundraisers, trustees and academics. In fact I've been asked to do a reprise, twice! Really interesting thing though, which is a sort of grump, is the lack of major donor/volunteer involvement there is in most major gift programmes. The ask is generally done by a fundraiser and whilst volunteer boards are aspired to; few charities do anything about it!

Considering that, and the gift pyramid, is at the heart of all successful capital appeals, why aren't we practicing what we preach?

Institute of Fundraising Convention

So, another year has come and gone. Some really interesting sessions on the changing face of legacy marketing and the possibility of change in how we talk to major donors but where was the research???

Yes Adrian Sargeant did his thing but nothing from Cass, the Institute itself, LSBU, Kent, Sheffield Hallam, or I think, anywhere else. Bloody pathetic.

Come on convention board. Your job is to sniff out the new stuff, the genuine research and trends analysis. That's what the convention could really lead the world on if it had the bottle.

More later!!!

29C in Valencia

Yes it´s too damn hot. Forced to stay in Valencia to present an update paper on "The Spectrum of Philanthropy" at the International Congress of Not for Profit Marketing in downtown Valencia. Poor old me but someone has to do it. More on this next week as it does involve the Institute of Fundraising losing out again. But there we are!