Creating a fundraising plan A fundraising plan sets goals that promote growth and create ownership among the entire team. They enable the team to track progress, identify problems as they arise and avoid crisis fundraising. With a solid grip on the big picture, you will always know where you stand related to where you want to be. You will also be able to proactively set and balance your priorities and avoid competing timelines.

The process of creating a plan requires several steps. Following these steps will help your group plan initial efforts and gather and analyze information before the first ask is even made. STEP 1. Gather information on your past fundraising efforts

Based on last year’s fundraising and current year-to-date figures, determine the amount of money raised from all major categories of income. Ideally, analyze two years of fundraising history to get a better sense of fluctuations from year to year. A. What are your projected total expenses for the coming year?

B. How much income, in total, is already committed toward your expenses? C. Subtract “B” from “A” for total amount to be raised.

D. Fill out the following chart with your results from last year’s fundraising activities, your current year-to-date figures and projections for the coming year. There will likely be some parts of the chart that you’ll leave blank at this stage in your planning process until you’ve completed more of this worksheet and can come back to them.

SOURCE

Individual donors Total Events Sponsorships Auction Raffles Other Sales/earned income

Last Year’s Income

Last Year’s Expense

Current Year’s Income

Current Year’s Expense

Next Year’s Income

Next year’s Expenses

Other sources: USFAA Grant Totals STEP 2. Analyze past fundraising efforts As you look at your current fundraising strategies, consider these questions: • What has worked well and what hasn’t? • How can these activities be modified to become more effective? • Where is the greatest potential for growth? • Should you devote more time to certain strategies? • What are new opportunities coming up that you want to take advantage of, such as an anniversary, new organization leadership, etc.? STEP 3. Determine your available resources The more people helping you, the more donors you’ll be able to build closer relationships with and the more money you’ll raise. Decide how best to involve the leadership team, staff, volunteers (including former board), key donors, organizational allies, and others. Resources for fundraising include the people who will be involved in carrying out various fundraising tasks as well as money you’ll need to spend on staff time and materials. The expenses were included in Step 1. The following chart will help you brainstorm who you can recruit to your fundraising team.

Who? Leadership Team Members

How Many?

What Could They Do?

Staff

Volunteers

General Alumni Who else?

If your organization’s budget-setting process has identified how much you plan to spend on fundraising, put that amount here as another resource you have available. $ ___________________________

STEP 4. Strategies – What Will You Do? Be sure to include both the board and staff in the creation of the organization’s fundraising plan. When they participate in the process, they will be much more invested and more likely to commit to the plan that you have developed together. Involving everyone in the planning process is critical to building the ownership necessary for the plan’s success and for your organization to raise the money it needs. Now think about the fundraising strategies you’ll use to build support from individual donors — and in some cases, from small businesses or corporations - from the point of view of getting new donors, renewing current donors, and upgrading current donors.

Acquire new donors - List all the activities you will engage in to bring in new donors, such as e-mail outreach, events, and individual donor asks: 1. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 2. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________

3. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Renew current donors - List the activities you’ll engage in to ask your current supporters to give again. Typically, these include e-mail solicitations, follow-up phone calls and personal solicitation for larger gifts. Special events are also activities that donors often come to year after year. 1. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 2. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 3. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Upgrade current donors - Getting donors to consider larger gifts usually requires a more personal approach. The size of a major gift depends on your donor base. For a group with few or no donors, a major gift might be $100. For a group with several hundred donors or more who give varying amounts, $250, $500, or even $1,000 may be the threshold for a major gift. 1. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________

2. _________________________________________________________________________________________________________ 3. ________________________________________________________________________________________________________ STEP 5. Set your goals

Think about two kinds of goals for your fundraising plan – strategic goals and financial goals. Strategic goals are non-monetary goals related to your development program. These could include starting a newsletter, increasing board participation in fundraising, or becoming less dependent on University funding. Financial goals are more traditional fundraising goals. How much do you hope to raise and from what sources? List both strategic and financial goals for your group: Strategic:

_________________________________________________________________________________________________ _________________________________________________________________________________________________ Financial:

________________________________________________________________________________________________

________________________________________________________________________________________________ STEP 6. Hammer Out The Details For each strategy, think about the amount your team expects to raise as well as expenses associated with raising that money. How many staff and volunteers are needed to execute the plan? Who is responsible for which pieces of the plan? What are their deadlines?

For each fundraising strategy that you plan to use, fill out a separate page with the following information: Strategy: _________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Projected income (gross): Total cost (use worksheet below): Net income:

$ ______________________ $ ______________________ $ ______________________

Other goals that this strategy will meet (such as get new donors, generate publicity, involve board members in fundraising):

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________ Number of staff and volunteers needed to carry out this strategy: ______________________ Expense Space Rental

$ Amount

Notes

Food/Beverage Design

Printing Postage Other: Other: Activities / Steps to complete this strategy: Date

Task(S)

Who

STEP 7. Pull It All Together Finally, you can pull together all your fundraising planning in one chart that will show what fundraising activities you are doing, how much you intend to raise, from whom, when, who will do what, and how much it will cost. The following worksheet starts with a sample activity to give you an idea of how to fill it out.

Strategy Ex. Geology scholarship Banquet

Goals ($ and response) $5000 20 New donors

TOTAL INCOME:

Target Audience

Description

When

Who

Cost

Geology/geoscience alumni, past award winners, companies that hire USF geoscience grads

Plated dinner at ALC with awards presentation

Annually in February

Board and Volunteers: invites, rsvps, catering, awards AA Staff: venue logistics Dept/College Staff: finances

$10,000

TOTAL EXPENSES: