Ep. 203: Summer Is the Most Underrated Fundraising Season: Your 90-Day Game Plan
EPISODE 203
Summer Is the Most Underrated Fundraising Season: Your 90-Day Game Plan
About the Episode:
Americans gave $592 billion to charity last year. That was a record year, in the same economy, in the same tumultuous climate, with the same donors everyone says are pulling back. So why does it feel so hard?
In this special session recorded live, I break down the summer fundraising forecast and make the case for why right now (not September, not year-end) is the most wide-open fundraising opportunity of the year. I cover what's actually keeping organizations stuck (it's not donor fatigue, it's messaging), why 60% of nonprofits are fighting over 0.4% of grant money, and how to run a focused sprint campaign this summer that seeds your strongest year-end ever. Plus real client results, live Q&A, and details on how to work with me inside The SPRINT Method™ and The Purpose & Profit Club®.
Here’s what you’ll learn:
Why there is no generosity crisis, only a messaging and strategy crisis
The summer fundraising opportunity most organizations completely miss
Why 60% of nonprofits are fighting over 0.4% of grant money, and what to do instead
Email as the foundational backbone of online fundraising, and why "it doesn't work" usually means the recipe was wrong
Monthly giving as the most sustainable revenue stream, and why most organizations don't have enough monthly donors
Sprint campaigns vs. endless soft asks, and why short, focused bursts beat marathon fundraising every time
It’s not your stories—it’s how you’re telling them. If your amazing work isn’t getting the attention (and donations) it deserves, it’s time for a messaging shift. The Brave Fundraiser’s Guide guide gives you 10 done-for-you donor prompts to make your message impossible to ignore. Get it for free here!
Christina’s Favorite Takeaways:
“Americans gave 592 billion $ to charity last year.”
“I have clients who are seeing growth, not because the conditions are perfect or suddenly donors became more generous,but because they stopped waiting for the environment to improve and started building systems to create growth.”
“Email is foundational for digital fundraising. Email drove 16% of online nonprofit revenue last year.”
“Monthly giving now represents 31% of online revenue, and recurring donors are dream donors.”
“If you want more monthly donors, you have to not only ask for more monthly donors, but you have to create a campaign that brings them in.”
“You need to start activating the people in and around your organization to help spread the message.”
“Your donors don't want you to constantly be in a state of fundraising.”
“I don't want you to be in a marathon of constantly fundraising.”
“Fundraising shouldn't be something you fit into this work; fundraising is the thing that makes this work possible.”
“Eat the frog! Do the hard thing first thing in the morning.”
“Nothing moves without the fuel, and the fundraising is the gas.”
“Fundraising is the activity that creates every other possibility for your organization.”
“You're thinking summer is the wrong time to ask. There is no wrong time to ask.”
“60% of nonprofits get 0.4% of grant money.” source: candid.org
“Individual donors give 3X more to nonprofits than grants, and that money is unrestricted.”
“Fall fundraising is seeded now.”
“You need to get to know your audience better, and you need to get more reps under your belt.”
Episode Resources:
Stop Crying Wolf: How to Fundraise Without Burning Out Your Donors
From $2,500 to $10,825: How a Classical Music Nonprofit Won with a SPRINT Campaign
The $20K Pivot: Canceling a Gala and Raising More with Sharing Hope Africa
From $3K to $12K: The SPRINT Campaign That Changed Everything
Charity: Water Ambassador Kayla Houchin Raised $147K—And Proved a Movement Can Start with One Person
How Aftersight Raised $20K in 20 Days (and Fired Up Their Board + Donors)
FREE Resources from Splendid Consulting:
How to Work with Christina and Splendid Consulting:
JOIN THE WAITLIST: The Purpose & Profit Group Coaching Program
Easy Emails For Impact™ - Turn Your Inbox into an Income Stream
Double Your Donations - Raise More From Your Laptop Without Chasing Grants or Galas
Donations on Demand: Build a $5K Email Campaign System in 30 min/week
Connect with Christina and Splendid Consulting:
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*Links may be affiliate links which means I may earn a commission at no cost to you.
Christina Edwards 0:00I'm gonna be sharing the fundraising forecast for you. I think everyone needs to hear this. Let's see, I'm gonna take a look, solo founder, director, co-founder, founder, executive director, part of a team, executive director. Okay, yep, major gifts officer. Okay, typical. So we have a good mix, we have like a good mix of solo founders, solo operators, scaling teams. Everything you're going to learn today is going to apply to you no matter what, because that's usually what I call in as a good mix. Okay, so let's begin.
So, you're here for the summer fundraising forecast. Happy June. It is summer, you know. One thing about summer that I think is interesting is, for me, I'm in Atlanta, it's summer. It's not actually the official day of, like, summer hasn't even begun, but, like, it's hot. It's summer. School's out for us, so it's summer to me. For other people school still in session, so your summers in a few weeks, totally fine either way. Before we talk about summer fundraising, I want to talk about the story that many nonprofits are actually telling themselves right now. So, if you hear yourself in this story, you're not wrong or bad, but I want to know if you hear yourself in the story, or maybe you hear your staffers in the story. You can say either in the chat for me. One donors are pulling back, people aren't giving, it's harder than ever. The fatigue is real.
Christina Edwards 3:55
The economy is anyone feeling that, feeling that pressure, feeling that grip, feeling that tension, or hearing that sort of receiving that, whether it's board members, executive directors, other nonprofits saying that 100% yep, yeah, that is the message that we in the nonprofit sector are fed, we are fed that message all day, every day, and it's just like compounding, meanwhile Americans gave 592 point 5 billion with a B to charity last year, 592 billion, that was a record year, that wasn't five years ago, that wasn't like COVID, no, that was last year in the economy we were in last year in the tumultuous times we were in last year, in the non perfect moments that still happens, so we know that the money is moving. The question isn't whether or not generosity exists. The question for you and your organization is whether or not you have a strategy to capture more of it, that is your opportunity, and that is the. Opportunity that so many organizations are missing out on right now, and that's what we're going to dig into today.
So, I want to hear from y'all in the chat. Tell me, the number one fundraising focus for the rest of the year. What is your number one fundraising focus? So, this can be a financial goal, this could be a strategy, this could be a hope or a dream or a wish, this could be something that is an initiative that has been dropped down to you, a voluntold. I know we, we, yeah, we get those sometimes. Okay, 30 more monthly donors love it, recapturing one-time donors, so meaning like maybe re-engaging those lapsed donors. Diana Capital Campaign, 1 million more. How much have you raised so far, Susan? I have quite a few clients in capital campaigns right now. Beautiful. Okay, she's 800k in, which is amazing, but I'm sure you're like, but I gotta do another million, right? So that heaviness is there funds to cover organizational structure. What does that mean? Like operating costs? Say more, Sammy Libby says, for me, major gifts in the first year, it's me, it's building my caseload and engaging major donors one on one. Awesome, very smart, very smart. I like to think about a goal, whether it's $100,000 or a million dollars or $50,000 and it's like I want you to do both. I want you to take chunks of that goal out from major donor gifts, and then I want you also to get small and midsize gifts as well. Okay. All right. Samie says yes. Most grants want to cover projects. We need to cover insurance, legal fees, salary, etc. Can we just give, like, an amen or a yes in the chat, like overhead is programs. The program doesn't exist without the people to buy the printer toner to welcome the clients to the program to answer the emails, and yet that's the catch 22 with grants. So anytime you come to my calls, I don't teach anything about grants, because grants are restricted dollars. Grants are time that is not guaranteed, and that application time that you never get back, for which you may not get awarded. And I remember this is like such a micro version of this, but my child's preschool is a little co-op, many, many years ago. And I remember volunteering there, and I was like, "Oh my gosh, you guys have a Vitamix blender, like that's a nice blender, that's like a $500 blender, at least, right? And the person, the director there, said to me, yeah, we got it through a grant, but no one, no one's here to make the smoothies, no one's here to clean up the cups. It was, it was just collecting dust, and it's like metaphorical, like we got this $500 thing, we have a dishwasher that doesn't work. We have a table and chairs that need new legs, or whatever it is. We have playground equipment we need, but we have $500 blender instead. Yeah, okay, yeah, you're feeling it. Okay, perfect. All right, so a lot of nonprofit leaders are bracing for a tough year, and everyone on this call doesn't have to. You do not have to brace for a tough year. Do you do not have to brace for a plateau year, a break even year? I was pulling some client data yesterday. This is not a lie, this is the truth.
Christina Edwards 8:09
I was pulling it yesterday, and one of my clients has grown 56% in online revenue year over year. Their monthly donors are up 33% year over year, their email open rates are 45% They are on track to cross $1 million in operating revenue for the first time ever, and they are mostly like, well, I feel very comfortable saying over 90% funded by individual donations. This is not from grants, this is not from foundations, this is not.. this is the other one I see. Well, we have one one wealthy donor that donates $500,000 a year. No, this is from a mix of mid, small, mid, and major level donors, and this client is not a unicorn. I love them, and they're not a unicorn. They are not special in an outlier. Our clients are seeing growth year over year over year, so that's what we're going to dig into that that pattern today. I, Patty's like, I hear Patty, Patty, and my mind is like, yeah, but what do they do? I bet they do something that people want to fund. What do you think they do, Patty? What do you think that they do? What do you think that here's the, here's the question. You can just type it in the chat, because I want everyone to hear it. What cause area, and everybody can participate is easy to fund. What do you think is an easy to fund cause area? Type in the chat,
Christina Edwards 9:35
Okay, cancer, food insecurity. What do you guess they do? Patty, animals. I was waiting for the animals. Yep, it's always animals. Yep, the latest issue. Yeah, something like, like, yeah, children's program. Kids, okay. All right, Patty, if you come up with one, just put it in the chat. I'm going to keep going. Um, isn't that funny?
Christina Edwards 9:57
kids and animals. You ready for this? No, kids, no animals. It's not that. And here's the other thing, and I think will break everyone's brain a little bit. They are not even there. They're spread all over. They are not community based. There is no annual event. All of their donors are across the country. Many of their donors have never been for a program tour. Many of their donors have never stepped foot on, you know, the property and the communities for which they're serving. I'm going to leave it there, and we're going to keep going. Art, yeah, so we all have, like, our own, yeah, but it's easier over here, and I can give you.. I could just spend a time spent.. I'm looking at my, like, I have a wall here of my clients, and I could just pick out other ones that, no matter what cause area you choose, I could find one where our clients' numbers are up in animal welfare, not in animal welfare, in youth empowerment, not in youth empowerment. So it's not your cause area, it is your strategy. Okay. All right. So that being said, we have clients who are seeing growth, not because the conditions are perfect, not because sudden, suddenly donors became more generous, not because they bought some sort of acquisition list, we're all sold, right, because they stopped waiting for the environment to improve and started building systems to create growth, anyway, this is what we've got, sometimes it's like, well, this is what we got, this is what we got, now what, so they're building better campaigns, better emails, more recurring revenue, more donor momentum, more visibility with what we've got. We don't know what we've got next year, we don't know what we got the rest of the year, like literally, who knows? But we have to have a fundraising strategy that is nimble enough to navigate, whether it's political, whether it's economics, whether it's some sort of natural disaster, like I think about how long ago was the Hawaii fires, right? And suddenly people were donating to that. How long ago were the fires on the West Coast in California? People are donating to that. So we have to have a bulletproof strategy for fundraising, even when emergent needs pop up, and you can. So let's start with what is underneath that strategy. These, these are the areas that I want you to focus on. I love that Jen said in the chat, so anyone that was like kids, Jen's like kids in general is not easy, like for every pro, somebody's like, actually it's not right strategy.
All right, so number one, email still wins when organizations tell me email doesn't work. I always say, "Forward me your last three emails. Foundationally, this is the backbone to raising money on your laptop. Period. Full stop. Not grants, not galas, not auctions, not Mackenzie Scott. Email is foundational for digital fundraising, for online fundraising, for any fundraising, the channel works. The execution is usually the root problem, because 33% of donors say email is what inspires them to give the most. Email, email drove 16% of online nonprofit revenue last year. We know that personalized emails outperform generic ones, and yet organizations are still struggling with email. If you are struggling with email, give me a one in the chat. I would also love to know, how often are you sending emails? And then you could even say, we send emails once a month, and we fundraise actively fundraise an email, what? And then you tell me that frequency. Oh my god, Tracy, Tracy says yes. I started an easy email campaign June 1. I received $12,000 as of today. Tracy's in my use emails course. Hell yeah, Tracy, that's amazing. Tracy, we're not unicorns, right? We're just doing the work. We're just doing the work. Yeah. Okay. I want to give you this analogy. When you're saying email doesn't work for us, we've tried funding raising for email, my favorite. Our donors don't like email, that's always when I hear anything in that it doesn't work right. It is like saying this recipe just doesn't work, but then you look closer, you skipped half the ingredients, you were subbing out like banana instead of egg, and what are you doing? Just like I do when I bake, I open the oven like four different times.
Christina Edwards 14:22
I'm like, is it doing anything that is not following the recipe right? So, if you have an unlocked email as foundationally the backbone to your fundraising engine, huge opportunity, huge opportunity. You can buy your time back, right? That channel isn't broken, it's something you need to iterate, and I just gave a talk about this. It's gonna be a little uncomfortable, whatever homeostasis is right now for you, whether you send emails monthly, quarterly, weekly, bi-weekly, I don't care. You're going to do to do two things: you'll need to change how often you send email, and you need to change the content. Within the email, because no one here, including myself, including you, is excited about getting an email that says make a difference, we need your help, right? We all send those emails, we all read those emails, that's not the emails that are converting.
Okay. Monthly giving, I want to talk about monthly giving. Monthly giving, who I want to know if monthly giving is something you're like, yes, sustainable income. I want that, and I would also love to know how many recurring donors, monthly donors you have right now. And you can give me an approximate, you can say less than x, more than y, I want that. I only have two, we have 150, 15,15, yeah, yes, I want it. We have, yeah, so our clients are doing a lot with monthly giving. Monthly giving now represents 31% of online revenue, and recurring donors are dream donors. And I'll tell you why. The average one-time donor, so I make a gift to your nonprofit right now, it depends on you and your organization, but it tends to be that eight out of 10 donors give one time, so we're one and done donors. That's a huge, that is not a leaky bucket, that's a bucket with a lot of holes in it. That bucket is like dripping, and so you feel like you're in a constant state of fundraising because of that one-time gift retention issue. Whereas monthly donors are amazing, they stay on, they have a lifetime value or lifetime span, rather of eight years. So, instead of one and done, it's eight years. So, it's really, really a strong strategy that a lot of people are talking about. The average recurring donor gives significantly more over time as well, but most organizations are missing a few things when it comes to monthly donors. Monthly giving isn't growing because donors suddenly woke up and said, "I'm going to start giving monthly. It started becoming part of our vernacular, and it started becoming part of their vernacular, and their habit, and their actions, because nonprofits started asking and started using tech tools that have good strong recurring giving options, so it's not me mailing a paper check, right? It's me and my Spotify subscription, where I forget I have it, my Netflix subscription, right? It just exists in the background. So, if you want more monthly donors, you have to not only ask for more monthly donors, but you have to create a campaign that brings them in, and that's the third piece. We're going to talk about campaigns a lot today. That's the big one. If you're like Christina, I have the donation tool, it accepts monthly gifts, it's cool, and we still have three monthly donors. It's because you're not running what I have created, I call them sprint campaigns. You're not doing sprint campaigns for monthly giving, and you need to, I always picture a four burner stove. Right now, monthly giving, really, y'all have like eight burners on your stove, but monthly giving is in the back burner, and that certain times throughout the year, I want you to bring it to the front burner, you know, the big pot, right? And then we're going to get it to a boil, and we push it back. That's how I treat all fundraising, is campaign style. They have a start and a stop date. All right. Third point I want to make today: community-powered fundraising is growing, so the organizations that are seeing the fastest growth aren't fundraising alone anymore.
Christina Edwards 18:15
Most people come to me, and they are very much in solo fundraising mode, and what that looks like is either you are literally a one person show, right, or you are solely responsible for fundraising in your staff and your org, and there are people who say they'll help board members who don't really help. It's really kind of all on you, and regardless of where you are, if you're a solo operator or team, it doesn't matter. You need to start activating the people in and around your organization, so supporters, those volunteers, those board members, partners, and advocates. They help spread the message. That's a huge part of what I teach inside one of my programs, where I teach on the social street team method, where we actually partner with influencers and ambassadors. You can do this even without going to like giant influencers. You can go to people to be audience amplifiers who are already inside your organization, because one person fundraising alone always hits a ceiling. It's a ceiling in time, it's a ceiling in bandwidth, right? It's a ceiling. Community-powered fundraising skills differently.
Now let's get into short campaigns versus endless campaigns, and I'm kind of curious when I say the word campaign, do you know what I mean? Do you have a sense of what I mean? What does that look like for you? And also, let's do a quick check in on how often are you fundraising right now? Like, how many fundraisers do you have throughout the year? And to give you, like, a little bit of a hint, typically what I hear is, like, well, we do year-end, or we have our spring blah blah blah event, or we have our signature fall. Gala, okay. Christine says 10. Christine, in the chat, tell me more about your 10. Like, what are they? Okay, Netta, I hope I said that right. Said three to four. Matt says once a quarter. Great, two to three, okay. Oh, Christine, I was saying, tell me about your 10 in the chat. Like, tell me more about how what does eight to 10 look like. All right, let's see. We have two major events in a year-end push. Dawn, I would say that's really close to what I typically see, two, and then Jennifer says two in-person events, and then your end, and then two to three this year, one event. Yeah, very, very common. Okay, so when I say a campaign, what I do mean, and I saw somebody say a specific message. Yes, one of the things that that I think has gets lost in translation sometimes is this idea of fundraising, your donors don't want you to constantly be in a, in a state of fundraising, we don't want you to always be asking us, right, and we also know that you don't want you to always be in a constant state of fundraising, but when the need is always there, that ends up kind of being the output. It's in your monthly newsletter, it's in your check-ins, it's in this and that. It's very like kind of a soft make a gift, and then at certain points it's a little more 911 but it's not a true campaign strategy, where there are key points throughout the year where you are fundraising, you know your fundraising, and your audience, your subscribers of donors and non-donors know your fundraising, like I always tell my clients, I want, I should know, I should be like, oh, they're fundraising right now, right? Anyone who is on an email list for any brand that runs a sale, you're like, oh, the sale ends on Monday, they have made that clear, they have made that clear, it should be similar to that, and I want to offer that takes a lot of guts, because to make it clear to your audience that, oh, they're fundraising that right now, that means you have to increase your volume, that takes courage, that takes being willing to hear, you know, Dan on the board, being like, that's kind of a lot, you're like, yeah, we would like a different result this year, Dan, so we're taking different action, so short campaigns beat these endless time, these endless sort of fundraisers that are soft but in perpetuity. Do you know what I mean?
Christina Edwards 22:29
So, instead, sprint campaigns are short, they can be for a few days, they can be for a few weeks, but they are not months and months and months long. They are not a capital campaign, they have a clear goal, a clear ask, a clear why. Why should the donor donate now? Can I just wait? Can I just give on Giving Tuesday? You should be able to answer that question. If you don't, this is what we teach inside my programs. It should have a high converting donation page. This is key. This is why I built the sprint method. The sprint method, we go into this in great detail of what your donation page should look like, because your donation page can can either have higher conversions for people who are thinking about donating or completely kill it. The words, everything on the page, all the way down to the tool you're using, but the words, the images, everything that can either get you across the finish line to making the gift or not, that's the formula you need. These short bursts, we sprint. It is not a marathon. I don't want you to be in a marathon of constantly fundraising. Christine says, okay. So, Christine was the one that said she does like 10 fundraisers a year. The reason why I asked her for more details, because my mind said that's more than I normally hear. Tell me more about that. I'm interested. And then she said, now, now she's saying she's exhausted. No wonder. She says they run from three to four weeks, raffles, auctions, etc. Are we exhausted for Christine? I'm exhausted for her. Okay, everything I'm teaching you about Sprint and about these short bursts of campaigns, no one gets a prize at the end. Donors don't want a prize. we don't need a thing. We do not need a goodie bag for donating. We don't need a T-shirt. We don't need an auction item. We don't need a raffle prize. And also, for you, Christine, and all the other organizations doing this, it is such an upfront lift that all that time you're taking. Hey, would you want to donate something to our upcoming auction? Hey, have you bought a raffle ticket? You could be going to book major donor meetings, you could be going to cultivate those mid-level donors to upgrade, but you don't have time to do that, because you can only do so much when you have to solicit for all these auction items, yeah. I, she's, yeah, Jen says completely agree. I want them slash us to put the money towards the cause. I have too many tote bags. Yeah, I don't need a pen. I don't need a pen. I don't need a thing. I don't want a thing. I want you to help the cause. I care. Out, that's what I want you to do, and that's that's a really big shift when you're in a state of this grassroots auction raffle, whatever your version is, prize kind of thing. Yeah, to shift into, but I want to say, regardless of cause area, we have organizations who are local. Hang on, let me even look at my wall, so I can look at some. We have domestic violence shelters, we have youth empowerment, we have arts theaters, international NGOs. Let's see, health, wellness, animal rescues, environment policy. This works for all of them. None of them are giving out swag, you know what I mean. None of them are like, 'Here's a prize for donating, and they're raising 1020, $30,000 in these types of fundraisers, again, not over the course of months, in the course of a week, two weeks, something like that, from their laptop. You could do this from a Starbucks, that's these are the essential pieces.
Okay, let's talk about frequency, so the belief is fundraising is something we fit around the real work. Somebody said this to me, I don't know now, I can't. It's blending together, because I've had some conferences lately, and some webinars lately, and I'm like, Who said, where was I? Basically, like, I don't have time to be fundraising, like you want me to do that, like that's kind of a lot.
Christina Edwards 26:22
She was kind of pushing back, like you want me to, like once a quarters, kind of a lot. I don't remember what I was telling her on frequency, whatever she was doing. I was like, I want you to do more. If you're doing twice a year, double it. If you're doing four year, add two more. She was like, that's kind of a lot. And I'm like, fundraising shouldn't be something you fit into this work, fundraising is the thing that makes this work possible. You with me? So, like, you, it doesn't exist without the funding, and I am one of the most impatient people you'll meet. And so, a wait list is not something I want your organization to have. I don't want you to turn down a new litter of kittens, because your shelters maxed out. I don't want you to turn away a mom that has nowhere else to go and is leaving an abusive relationship, because you just don't have the funding to add that next, you know, space, right? That's the piece. So, fundraising is number one. Everything else comes after fundraising. What else? Like, why are you prioritizing anything else in front of that? Fundraising is also the thing that you had to hire support. I love hiring admin support. I love it when my clients hire a VA. I love it when they hire a programs lead. Funding is the thing that does that. Yeah, Barb says, 'Who is all who's going to do all the work? You're probably speaking, Barb, like I'm in programs too, and that's okay. That's okay. What I'm saying is, instead of saying to me, Christina, I don't have time to do all fundraising, I'm running the thing. You have to look at, I'm hitting a ceiling on how much I can fulfill programmatically, because I have a funding problem, so I have to stop going over here and putting out fires until I put out the big fire and actually bring in funding first. That's what I'm saying. And it's like anyone who's heard the saying, 'Eat the frog, we've got to start eating the frog. And when somebody says to me, 'I'm full time at my organization where we raise less than $100,000 a year and I don't have time to fundraise, I'm like, 'Let me see your schedule. We got to start eating frogs. We got to start eating frogs a lot more often, because there's some passiveness happening here. And I want you to develop the skill of fundraising more often, asking more often, and you will see. Eat the frog. Yes. Okay. Eat the frog is a saying. Somebody will know it. It's like, do the hard thing in the morning. Do the hard thing first. Do, and if for you, asking, calling a donor, following up with a donor, making, sending another email, following up with the person on your donor match, those are all the things that we tell ourselves. I don't have time to do. I know this because you know I work with everyone out like, like you on this call. This is what I hear. Those actually don't take a lot of time. A phone call can take 90 seconds. A phone call is usually a voicemail. An email can take less than five minutes to write. Is it true that people donate to what you do in the program? Yeah, you sit down with a donor and you say, donor, I see that you care about.. let's see.. I see that you care about this after-school tutoring program, right? You care about that, and donors like, 100% You're like, well, we have to pay our tutors, otherwise the program doesn't exist, right? Well, we'll close down the program if your donation only goes towards books and snacks for the teenagers and the lights for the well, not even the lights, hang on, we're going to take that's overhead, you know? Right, very quickly donors are like, well, no, I want like really strong tutors here that we tell ourselves this is more of just the lie, we tell ourselves donors don't want to pay for this, we want to pay for this, I want to pay for, you know, the shelter to have volunteers to make sure the kittens are bottle fed and the crates are clean. Means I don't just want to pay for the, you know, toys, right?
Christina Edwards 30:05
We have to stop separating it. Yeah. All right, I'm gonna keep going. I want to give you this gas tank analogy, so it doesn't matter how strong your programs are, how beautiful your mission is, how talented your team is, how awesome your board is, nothing moves without the fuel, the fundraising is the gas, so you can't focus. You can't say, 'Well, we focus on the vehicle this year, we'll worry about the gas later, right? We're focusing on the program, the service this year. But this is what nonprofits do, and I would argue you're doing this for a few reasons. You're doing that because that's where your heart is, especially my founders, especially my executive directors, right, makes sense, right? But we've got to gas up the tank, right. And also, I would argue the other reason is like this thing over here is harder in its stretching way. Fundraising is a muscle. No one works out twice a year and expects to get strong. Nobody sends two emails and expects to get engagement, yet this is what organizations are doing. We're running two campaigns, maybe three campaigns, and expecting revenue to increase magically, but it's not right. So, muscles respond to frequency, repetition, consistency, not perfection. Let's talk about these campaigns and what they can do, they build pipelines, and this is huge. This is a huge result of running more shorter fundraising campaigns, more sprint campaigns. You might think campaigns only raise money, that is like the thing we want. Yes, I want you to hit your financial goal, but campaigns also create the following new donors, reactivated donors, meaning lapsed donors, monthly donors, major gift prospects. We've all had the campaign, or most of us have. We were like, dang, they were a $25 donor, and they just gave $1,000 They like poke their head up, they surprise you with an amount. I see some nods. Yes. Future volunteers, future advocates, a campaign isn't just a revenue event, it's a pipeline building event. So, when you stop fundraising for long stretches, 3,4,6 months, you're not protecting your pipeline, because you, yes, we can squeeze more juice from the people inside your donor base, yes, that's one initiative, but we also need to be bringing more people in your funnel. You with me? We need to bring people in. I would love to know in the chat what your donor acquisition strategy is. You just put in, like, I get new donors this year through what. While you're doing that, I'm going to riff on this in the chat. Libby says, I think nonprofits are embarrassed about asking for overhead. The issue is we don't connect the fact that overhead keeps us and keeps us open in a positive and excited message for donors. I'm going to even say we need to stop calling it overhead. I just think your gift towards my after-school tutoring program serves, keeps everything going. It's all in one. Why are we separating it? Why are we doing this? I think Charity Water has done a lot of things right. If I could do, take one thing and retool it, and I would even say I - I've heard them kind of talk about this a little. It's the separation of overhead. I wish that they didn't have. We do not have to have that. None of my clients have that, and none of my clients who are, who are winning at this, we're having success at this, are having overhead problems with donors. Okay. All right, so as the aqueous donor acquisition strategy, here's what I'm hearing. Don't have one. Asking more increased our mailing list, but this year we increased our mailing list, but didn't work. Did you mean direct mail or email, Barb? I don't have one. Don't have one. Yeah, okay. Got it. Totally fine. Here's what I hear sometimes, too: board member intros, right? We are all like boards, give us a warm intro. Acquisition lists, right, which Barb touched on with direct mail. Let me buy a list, right? Social media, I hear this a lot. Well, we're on social media, and then I say, how much funding is coming in through social media? Well, none. Okay, what are we doing? I don't know, or I'll hear, like, we're all get our gala, our signature event, whatever that is, that kind of brings in people.