How many legacies can you inspire?
In my career as a fundraiser “planned giving” always had a backseat to raising the day-to-day cash needed to fulfill the mission. The number one reason it was not a priority is that the work, thoughtfulness and time required to have a dedicated planned giving program can be too much of an investment when you need to raise money for the annual fund.
However, I would argue that “planned giving” work is not that different than building your typical major gift program. All fundraising is about relationships and our goal is to be organized enough about our relationship building to move the mission forward with our donors and get them to invest. Here are my five simple tips on building a planned giving program.
Define your objectives and goals for setting up a planned giving program.
How many planned gifts do you want to secure in years 1, 2 and beyond?
Determine which staff will lead the program.
Depending on the size of your organization will this be your CEO or development team leads.
Connect with estate lawyers and other planned-giving experts
Consider adding someone with planned giving expertise to your board or create an advisory council to educate them on your organization’s needs and help spread the word about your nonprofit’s work.
Identify planned giving prospects in your database with a simple search
Review all donors who have given in the past ten years consecutively. These are the perfect prospects to start planned giving conversations.
Start the conversations
Many of your board members and current individual major donors may already have your nonprofit in their estate plans.
Share your nonprofit’s goals and express the value of their commitment in terms of helping you spread the word about your planned giving program goals.
Planned giving does not have to be a complex new system to add to your portfolio of raising money. Start small and simple. Create SMART goals, identify roles and collaborate with local stakeholders in the estate planning space. Do your internal research and start conversations. You don’t need to be a planned giving expert to get the dialogue started, but you must be passionate and committed to spending time sharing and asking people to get involved in your mission.