Unexpected Gifts: Best Practices for Managing the Aftermath

July 7, 2009 By Brian Nevins and Sevil Miyhandar

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Circumstances such as natural disasters, sudden public acclaim or an unexpected large bequest can thrust your organization into the spotlight, heightening public awareness and, perhaps, resulting in an extraordinary number of gifts from new donors. As terrific as that sounds, such unexpected volume can present a unique set of significant challenges and opportunities.

During economic times such as these, it can be difficult to imagine how an unexpected financial influx could be cause for concern; however, hurdles do surface, and how your organization overcomes them can determine future growth and sustainability. While studies indicate that people who go online to donate to a charity for the first time often do not return to the Web to make later gifts, major donors can be a very different story.

The most common challenge organizations have to overcome relates to development infrastructure and resources, including technology, staffing and customer service. When a crisis or increased visibility occurs, and people respond in record numbers, it’s not unusual for an organization to experience Web site crashes due to traffic overload; and practical, operational limitations related to processing and acknowledging gifts. Smaller fundraising shops often struggle the most with managing major gifts, especially if no existing program is in place or major-donor programs are under-resourced.

There also might be programmatic implications. When donors support one specific area of an organization’s efforts (restricted giving), it could cause a decrease in general operating support (unrestricted giving). Organizational leadership must be adept at quick decision making regarding how to grow programs, hire the necessary staff, and communicate how giving is being directed with new donor and prospect communities.

On the other side of the spectrum, significant opportunities abound, beginning with the most obvious and most coveted: new donors and increased prospects for the major-donor pool. Every fundraiser’s dream! Heightened media attention, especially from respected, syndicated outlets, can raise your profile significantly, increase brand recognition and lend credibility to your organization. Added credibility will open doors and also can lead to unsolicited major gifts. Keeping these new donors in the fold is always a challenge, but those organizations that do can benefit in both the short and long term.  

A flood of unanticipated large gifts also can allow your organization greater flexibility and the opportunity to explore new strategies and tactics to build your fundraising operation. Surplus funding can be an opportunity to invest in capacity building and diversifying your resources. Greater giving from new sources also can be a leveraging opportunity. Your long-time institutional donors may be encouraged to help fund some of the nuts-and-bolts of capacity building, allowing you to use new dollars for program-specific initiatives.
If your organization is fortunate enough to receive an influx of unexpected gifts, it’s important to know how to effectively manage and embrace the opportunity as a time to develop best practices, cultivate new donors and strengthen a major-gifts program for the future. Use the strategies and best practices listed below to learn how to maximize the opportunities and minimize the challenges.

Best practices for capitalizing on the influx
It’s not realistic to expect to make a personal connection to every new donor; however, you can choose how wide you cast your net. Pick a threshold ($1,000 and up, for example) and develop an action plan for those donors — how many personal touches will each new donor receive and by whom?

One major challenge for development professionals is finding the time to make calls and speak with donors. Dedicated calling periods, or “prime-time calling” (Thank you Thursdays, etc.), is an effective tool to carve out time and talk to donors. Use your board, staff and volunteers — who often are eager to do something helpful — to assist you with this. Provide names and numbers and five talking points. Any questions that cannot be answered can be redirected for follow-up.

Invite new donors to special quarterly or biannual conference calls with leadership, program staff and field staff. This takes a bit more prep work than prime-time calling; however, it is a great cultivation tool for donors that can be utilized for both your high-end donors and, in this case, new first-time donors.

Create cultivation and stewardship plans that can be staffed with existing resources. Your plan should include:

Acknowledgement

• Prime-time calling: Use staff, board members and volunteers to thank your new donors.

Communications

• Mail or e-mail stewardship reports, outlining the impact of donor generosity.
• Hold special quarterly or biannual conference calls.
• Script leadership, program staff and field staff messages.
• Create auto-replies to e-mails and special messaging on your Web site to address potential questions and avoid delays in response.

It’s important to remember that special-circumstance donors require special cultivation and retention efforts. This specific group of donors gives to a “need,” and therefore it is important to communicate how their gift is meeting that need and the importance of continued efforts, as well as their continued support.

Donors will renew their gifts if they feel:

• personally connected to the mission;
• appropriately thanked;
• like they’re giving back to their community;
• like their gift will have an impact.

Craft your appeals and renewals to address the:

• impact of their first gift;
• continuing demand for the work;
• potential for their giving and involvement to continue making an impact, and personally connect them with the mission

Special year-end and renewal appeals should have special messaging — acknowledge the extraordinary circumstances that motivated the gift, and explain how the organization addressed the challenge.

Create a special major-donor plan. Make sure to ask the following questions:

• How will first-time major donors be handled differently?
• What short-term prospect research tools and consultants can you add to uncover the major-donor prospects?
• Who will be responsible?

Then, assign donors and prospects to a portfolio; continuously add qualified individuals to the prospect “pipeline”; and determine how to use resources most judiciously.

Identify what motivates high net-worth households to give, and tailor your stewardship of the newest donors accordingly.

Keep in mind that challenges and strains resulting from an unexpected influx of gifts often indicate areas for improvement relating to internal systems. Prepare your organization for the unexpected by conducting regular infrastructure audits to identify potential roadblocks and take corrective action. Despite the challenges, it is important to remember that, as with all things worthwhile, short-term pain often leads to long-term gain.

Brian Nevins is a senior vice president and managing director with the development and management consulting firm CCS. Sevil Miyhandar currently serves as a regional vice president with the firm. Brian and Sevil presented on unexpected gifts at the 2009 AFP Conference in New Orleans in March.

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