Fundraising Talks
News and updates from the USM Office of
Advancement Research
Tell Me More...
Looking for funding opportunities? We've identified a few funds that might be useful to you. Visit the links below to learn more about the requirements and deadlines for these opportunities. 
 
Deadline: December 1, 2020

Deadline: December 31, 2020
 
Deadline: November 23, 2020 (LOI) and January 14 2021 (proposal deadline)
 
(No deadline)
Contact Us

Director of Advancement Research
301.445.2709

Prospect Researcher
301.445.1952

Office Clerk
301.445.1950
Letter from the Director
Dear Colleagues,

The month of November means we're getting closer to yet another holiday season. There is a lot going on in November, including the 2020 Presidential election and National Philanthropy Day. There's no better time to cultivate giving and gratitude and to strategize ways to celebrate our donors. This month, our team attended an APRA-MD virtual conference, where the keynote speaker, Mr. Frank Blake, the former CEO of Home Depot, spoke about the importance of celebrating donors. What ways can your team steward our donors during this Thanksgiving season?

On a different note, a recent report from Anthology, an education technology company, on Adjusting Alumni Engagement Strategies During COVID-19, should not be overlooked as we continue to deal with the effects of the pandemic. A national survey, which included more than 17,360 graduates of four-year colleges, indicated that a quarter of college alumni made a gift to their institution this year. Fundraising has faced many drastic changes during 2020 and there has been many adjustments made in alumni engagement at higher education institutions.

Below are some of the key takeaways from the report:

  • Email has become the dominant mode of communication. Alumni are interested in receiving updates about students and the evolving situations on campuses, networking opportunities, and alumni virtual events.
  • The majority (78 percent) of respondents indicated that they are unlikely to attend an event in-person during 2020, while virtual events are acceptable and preferred more now than in pre-pandemic days. 
  • Seven percent of alumni are interested in connecting with current students, especially to share career -related information.
  • One-quarter of respondents indicated that they had made a gift to their institution, while 29 percent never made a gift.
  • Almost one-quarter of respondents said they had been furloughed or laid off since March.

The results from the survey on alumni engagement are especially useful to us as we continue to adapt and find new ways to reach out to our alumni. It is quite impressive to see how higher education institutions have diverted to virtual engagement over the past months. The results of the survey are very likely to come into play even after this year. Meaningful engagement strategies with alumni provide positive yields as we continue to cultivate them for future involvement. I hope institutions can use these insights to adjust and improve alumni engagement strategies as needed. 

As always, please feel free to reach out us with questions, comments or any assistance with prospect research!

Best Regards,
Sapna and USM Advancement Research Team
Did you know?

The University System of Maryland Foundation has access to a library of recorded webinars from the Annual Giving Network (AGN) that you may watch at any time from your computer. While we cannot currently gather in person for professional development events, this work from home period provides a great opportunity for you to learn on your own time! Please click here to see what webinars are available from AGN.
 
If you are interested, please email Linda Bowman (lbowman@usmd.edu) and she will help you access these webinars for free. Please do not try to access these webinars on your own, as you will be charged a fee.

Please also note that the Foundation only has access to free AGN webinars, not workshops. Workshops are available at a marginally discounted rate.
According to Nonprofit Hub, in order to execute an effective fundraising campaign, you must:

  1. Remember the middle donor. 
  2. Seek corporate sponsorships.
  3. Maximize matching gift revenue.
  4. Ask for a professional opinion. 

Click here to learn more about each of these methods and how they can improve your next campaign.
EAB notes that oftentimes advancement offices fear that political giving will overshadow nonprofit giving. However, this is rarely the case. Those who give to political campaigns are more likely to make additional gifts to nonprofits compared to those who do not give to political campaigns. Post-election, EAB recommends paying extra attention to cultivating and retaining young donors, who demonstrated their affinity to give by donating to political campaigns at a historical rate. In the two years following an election, engage your wealthiest donors who have political affinity as there may be an opening for education-related philanthropy. Finally, track stock market trends when making cultivation plans for wealthy donors. Click here to read the full article and to see how donor behavior is affected by election cycles.
The ever-evolving world of information technology has made it incredibly easy to quickly sift through thousands of names at a time to perform prospect screening. The catch-22 is that technology is not as accurate as a trained professional and a trained professional is not as fast as technology. In this case, what should advancement offices do? Jennifer Filla, founder of Aspire Research Group LLC, says to embrace numbers and set up a campaign-style gift table so that researchers and front-line fundraisers can have meaningful conversations about the effort and cost it will take to reach goals. Filla also encourages advancement offices to work with researchers who care about your success when working with firms outside your organization. Click here to read more.
Understanding and empathizing with your target prospects is a fundamental effort. This GG+A blog post suggests making the year-end ask all about the donor and using language that conveys their importance. Next, reel them in with the best story your organization can tell - it could be about someone in need your organization supports, it could be misson-focused, or even inspirational. Lastly, be conscious of your ecological footprint as donors may be watching. GG+A encourages organizations to rethink how much paper makes it into the trash and how many donor resources are being used to produce hard-copy pages. Click here to read more.
Like most things this year, there is a need for #GivingTuesday to move online. NonProfitPRO suggests utilizing Facebook Live, which helped The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals raise $50,000 in 2017 on #GivingTuesday. First, make a plan well in advance for your live stream - what is your goal, who is in the audience, who will host? Next, make sure to market your event through social media posts, email newsletters, and Facebook ads. During your event, feature stories and interviews that introduce your cause and engage your audience. Make sure to add a donate button to your Facebook Live event and call out the donate button so that it doesn't go unnoticed. Lastly, repurpose the live stream after it's done by publishing short snippets of the video to social media. Pull quotes from the event and create social media posts featuring them. Overall, Facebook Live is a cost-effective way to promote your institution's #GivingTuesday efforts. Read more here.