Hi everybody,
Thank you very much for everything you’re sharing and all the great questions you’re asking.
A few thoughts on some of them:
Appealing to major donors in your drives —
Major gifts are solicited one on one, but drives can help you identify prospects within your community of listeners and viewers. You can identify some prospective major donors based on how much they give and comments they share during your drives. Asking for bigger gifts – $100 a month, $500, $1,000 – is the same as asking for smaller amounts. The common thread is you’re asking people to give what they can. It’s important to remember that while many people can give $100 a month or a one time gift of $1,000, this is beyond what most listeners will give. So, ask for bigger amounts routinely but sparingly relative to smaller amounts that work for more donors.
Shorter drives —
Everyone loves them but they’re not the best choice for every station. There’s a correlation between how much fundraising stations do and whether they achieve and maintain their full potential of donors. Uf your station has a way to go to reach its potential of donors, shorter drives will make it harder if not impossible to get all the donors you could have.
Your station’s potential for donors and revenue —
Greater Public’s Benchmarks for Public Radio Fundraising measure stations’ fundraising relative to their listening. Listening defines a station’s fundraising potential. Over time, as listening goes up or down, fundraising potential goes up or down. These Benchmarks show you your station’s fundraising potential and how well your station’s fundraising is performing relative to its gull potential. When you know your station’s potential and how your fundraising is performing in relation to your potential you can make more informed fundraising decisions. Benchmarks is offered to all Greater Public member stations with no additional cost beyond your membership dues. Please reach out to me directly if you’re interested in participating or if you already participate and you’d like to review your reports to get a better sense of your station’s potential and how you can achieve and sustain it. We will collect data for FY22 benchmarks this fall. The deadline to provide your data is Monday, October 31st.
We can talk more about any of these topics and other questions you have when we get together on August 18th. Please reach out to me directly if you have questions between now and then.
Thank you!
Jay