How To Build Strong Relationships With Donors

Then, if you have strong relationships with your donors, they will stick by your side. They will be a part of your team. They will help you in crisis if you know them and they know you and you have a strong relationship. So we're gonna talk about ways that you could build relationships with your donors stories of how I help my clients do that so that you can have some examples of what this actually looks like. It's not theory. it's reality.

It's totally possible for you and these relationships result many times in major gifts and increase in giving increase commitment, stronger relationship makes sense. Right. So here we go. How to build strong relationships with your donors? Number one, get personal, share about your life. I do this over email. I do this over text message. I do it on the phone. I teach my clients to do this inside courage lab. Right?

So an example is I was working with someone inside courage lab, and we were trying to think of what. They could say to their donor, what would be an excuse for them to reach out and just connect and be top of mind and build the relationship. And she said, well, I'm staying on a farm right now and across the street, they're all of these goats. And they're really cute. What if I just like sent a note to this donor with pictures of goats? Hell. It maybe seems a little quirky, but I liked it.

I was like, yeah, you love the goats. Your enthusiasm will come through in the email. Just send the photo of the goats. Why not? So she did. And the donor replied and loved it and it was just a silly little thing. It's not like she ran an animal welfare, a nonprofit. the goats photo had absolutely nothing to do with her mission. It was just something that was cute. And she wanted to share it with people because it brightened her day. That's literally the reason that she shared it.

And that's reason enough. Some of you. You email your donors and you dump all of this information about your programs and your goals and what you're doing. And it's just lifeless. It's not like a human being is on the other side. If you send photos of goats and you're like, Hey, where I'm staying right now, there's all these really cute goats. And I wanted to share it with you. Here's a photo. Then it's very obvious. There's a human being on the other side of that email.

This will not only make you stand out, but your donors are gonna be much more likely to respond to you, to, really have your personality and your heart and your values shine through. And it, it, it has nothing to do with the mission, but you need to get personal. You need to share about your. I try to do this with every single interaction that I have with a donor, even if it's tiny, if even if it's small. So that's one way share about your life. Get personal number two, ask powerful questions.

So you really need to get to know your donors. And even if it's just asking why they give, I remember I had a donor. I asked them, you know, why do you do this? Why do you give, why are you a part of this organization? And he said, you know, I know what it's like to be homeless. I lost my job at this tech company. I got laid off and I was living in my car. Showering at the Y M C a and using the computer at the library until I got back on my feet and got another job.

And this person was an executive at a huge firm. And if you saw them, and if you just judge them from their appearance, most likely you would never guess that they were previously. Homeless. And so the mission to them was so personal because they understood intimately how fragile things are in our society and how one crisis, one medical emergency, one medical bill that you can't pay.

Any number of things that could happen to anyone and they do all the time could cause us to be homeless and that's what happened to them. And so for them, it was super personal and that bonded us in a way that talking about work or talking about the weekend just never could. And it was because I was willing to ask about them. I was willing to ask questions, like, why do you do. With a spirit of like, I'm not taking this for granted.

You aren't expected to give you certainly don't have to give, so why do you do it? Some of you are entitled to your donors, donations. You think that they should be giving and you judge them if they don't give or that they should be giving what they are giving and they should give more. And why don't they give more and Ugh. And that prevents you from building an authentic relationship.

That's really strong because it's hard to get close to people that we despise or Lu down upon, or we judge severely and harshly. So, Hey, like how about don't do that? Resist the urge to dump a bunch of information on your donors and instead ask them really powerful questions. Anytime you reach out to a donor, always have at least one powerful question that you are going to ask them.

And if you don't know what those are, you need to sign up for my program, courage lab, because when you sign up for courage lab, I give you a really juicy C. Of my powerful questions that I love to ask donors. They are kick ass questions that allow you to build such strong relationships with people really fast they're fabulous questions. And I have used them for many, many years, and my clients love them. You can take them into all of your donor meetings on all of your calls.

You can pick one that you think is the best for that scenario for that donor. And it's super helpful to you. It will be a checklist that will go with you everywhere you go. So ask powerful questions. The next is pick up the damn phone. I don't know what it is, but like we're so afraid of the phone. What is the deal with that? Like what is the deal? Two minutes on the. Can speed up the relationship and strengthen the relationship so quickly, two minutes, they're more likely to meet with you.

They're more likely to give you more for your organization. They're more likely to share with their network, what you're up to and fundraise for you. Being on the phone. It's so intimate. Your voice is so intimate. It's something that email and text message and DMing on, you know, Instagram or LinkedIn or Facebook or whatever you guys do. It just could never compare being on the phone is a quick way to build deep roots. Obviously being in person is there's. There's nothing better.

But picking up the phone is fantastic. And I'll give you an example. So the other day I had a donor who gave $1,800, and I looked them up and I noticed that they had capacity for way more. So I just decided, okay. They just gave this gift. So I'm gonna call them on the phone within 24 hours to say, thank you. Now I have a lot on my. I run a business. I run courage lab. I produce this podcast.

I work full time at news story as a strategist and philanthropy officer raising six and seven figure gifts. My goal this year is 7 million. So I have a lot on my plate. Okay. That's not even all of my life, but that's my professional life. So I could easily make an excuse as to why I don't have time to call this guy. Right. He only gave $1,800. I have all these projects on my plate. I have an event this month. I'm going to Mexico in two weeks.

I have so many things going on, but I just decided I'm gonna call him. So I call him and I say, Hey, we got your donation. Thanks so much. I just, I'm just calling to say, thank you. And he. Aw. Wow. That's so nice. Thank you for this really sweet call. I really appreciate it. You know what? I'm gonna 10 X my gift Now, if you remember what I just said, I said this person gave $1,800. I called them within 24 hours and I just looked them up and I knew they had the capacity to give way more.

So that's pretty much all the phone call was. I was like, wow, that's so amazing. You'll hear more from me in the future. We're gonna stay in touch. He said, that sounds great, Julie, thank you so much for this. I really appreciate you calling. I'm gonna 10 X my gift. So 10 times 1800. You do the math. When we hung up the phone, that was two minutes. That was probably less than two minutes. Honestly, pick up the phone, pick up the phone, pick up the phone, pick up the phone.

That just happened to me the other day. That's one measly little story. There's nothing magical about that. Right? You could say like, oh, Julie's just so good at fundraising. No, I'm not. This example is just me saying thank you. Within 48 hours and picking up the phone and calling someone. That's all I did. That's it. If he wasn't in a rush, I might have said. How did you find us? Like what made you decide to give, like, why are you doing this?

I think that's the question that I would've asked. I'll ask that next time, but now he'll definitely answer my emails. Now. He will definitely take a meeting with me and I've already got him in two minutes to 10 X, his gift. So are you gonna pick up the phone yet or what? This is how you build relationships with. And the last is following up. I was planning a trip with a donor who lives in, uh, Southeast Asia. And there were a lot of logistics back and forth.

And in one of the emails, he mentioned that his son was in the hospital. And so that's why he was late in replying to an. And I wrote back right away within 24 hours and I said, Hey, so sorry to hear that. I hope that he's okay. And then we continued in the chain of planning this logistics from this long distance trip. And I made a note of that and I think like two or three weeks had passed and I emailed him and I said, Hey, I was just thinking about. And I thought about your son.

How is he doing? I hope that he's well, I just said a prayer for your son. That was all I said in the email. wasn't about his gift. Stewarding his gift. It wasn't about the program. It wasn't about the mission. It wasn't about the nonprofit at all. It was just about him and his son because his son was in the hospital. And why would he tell me that? He didn't have to say that he could have said, oh, we have a family emergency. You see, but you gotta get curious about it.

Why would a donor tell me this? They want me to know about their life. So I just followed up and I said, Hey, how is your son? Because I care. I care about people and I know you do too. And he said, he's doing. he's not doing as well as we had hoped, but he's doing all right. It really means a lot that you're asking. I really appreciate it. That didn't take much time, but it took intention.

So some of you believe that you don't have time to build relationships with donors, I'm telling you it doesn't take a lot of time. It takes a lot of intention. You lack intention, and you talk yourself out of reaching out to people because you believe they don't wanna talk to you. They don't wanna hear from you. You don't wanna bother them. And that's bullshit people. Want to be connected to you. You are awesome.

And the work that you're doing is amazing, who doesn't wanna be connected to more people who are doing good in the world. Everyone wants that. So I hope that this encourages you and inspires you to take action and reach out to your donors today. If you are stuck in overthink. And you're not prioritizing taking action, then you need to get inside my program. Courage lab. Don't wait. You need to do that. This is what I teach in my program.

It's six weeks and I will help you raise a 10 K gift or your money back period. That is what all my clients do. And they actually enjoy getting to know their donors and building these strong relat. And it gives them sustainability for the long term because they know they're donors and they know why they give. And so the money is not at risk when the economy is in a downfall. And I want the same thing for you. So I hope this encourages you take action today. Don't talk yourself out of it.

Your donors want to hear from you. See you next time.