Million Dollar Strategy

And I've been helping my clients raise 10 K 50 K six, figure seven figure gifts, their very first seven figure gifts ever since 2018. So I've been at this for a while and I've had a lot of reps and I know what the best do. and I know what people do who are really struggling. And for those of you who are really struggling, I see you. I know you're working super hard. It's not a, it's not a lack of work ethic. So we're gonna cover the three keys to having a million dollar strategy. You ready?

Because this is going to be good. So number. Impossible goals. You need impossible goals. You don't need goals that you're like, okay, that's what we need to do. Great. Done. Decided feel good? No, no, no, no, no, no. You need goals that scare you. Some of you, your goals. Suck your goals. Suck. You wanna know how I know. If you always achieve your goals, then they are not big enough. They inspire no one. Your goals are so tiny that they inspire tiny gifts.

And then you wonder why you don't raise more and people don't step up. Why are people not stepping up? Why aren't they generous your goals? Suck. No one is inspired by your goals. Not even. If you are always meeting your goals, it is time to level up. You need to build and create impossible goals that call out a higher level of thinking. And a higher level of being for yourself. Goals are not so that you can always achieve them. Sometimes we set goals so that we can become someone new.

I'm gonna say that again. We don't set goals just so that we can achieve them. That's dumb. It's like saying, oh, let me lift this five pound weight that I know I can lift. Where, where is the fun in that? What is the purpose in this it's time to level up and part of how you do that? You set impossible goals. What is something that you think is impossible for you?

Maybe that's a million dollars between September one, which is today and the end of the year, December 31, maybe your impossible goal is a million dollars. Maybe it's a hundred thousand dollars. Maybe that feels impossible. Maybe you've never done that before and you don't even know how you'd get there. Isn't that exciting. That's where you need to live impossible goals. Force us to think bigger. If you have a sucky crappy goal that you know, you can achieve, you don't gotta think bigger.

You, you don't have to summon any courage. You don't have to wonder, well, how am I going to do this? I don't. You don't have to get creative. You don't have to ask for much help because you've got this. That's why you don't have million dollars or 10 million or 20 million or whatever it is for you because you don't got impossible goals. Think about your goals in terms of who it is, helping you to become a more courageous, bolder, more generous. Powerful leader.

It's actually irrelevant whether or not you meet the goal. If I set a goal, that feels impossible to me. Oh, wait a minute. I don't need to imagine that I've already done that this year. My own goal in my role at news story is 7 million. Have I ever raised 7 million personally in one calendar year? No, I have not. Does that matter? No, it doesn't. Does it feel impossible? Absolutely. That's where the exciting part happens. I wanna know what I'm made of. I wanna know what's possible.

I wanna get creative. I wanna push the pavement. I wanna hustle. I wanna see if this is freaking possible. I wanna see what I've got inside. How about. I'm I'm through with these crappy piddly sucky little tiny ass goals. Who cares? Why are you getting outta the bed in the morning? Is it so that you can do what you've always done and do what you know you can do? Or are you trying to change the world let's F and go get yourself some impossible goals.

That's number one, number two is meaningful activities. What do I mean by. When I say activities, what I'm talking about are the fundraising activities that you prioritize, that you put in your plans and you execute on. Sometimes that's a gala. Sometimes that's one on one meetings. It could be a golf tournament. It could be, uh, doing a silent auction. It could be doing any kind of event, big or small. It could be doing a campaign.

These are the activities that I'm talking about and they need to be meaningful. And this is where I lose some of you. Some of you prioritize activities that you see other nonprofits doing really well and you think, oh, we should do that. That's successful for them over there. And so we should have a golf tournament because I heard that this organization did this golf tournament and they raised 2.1 million. And so we should do a golf tournament.

That is not the definition of a meaningful activity. If your donors and your community and your team do not give a shit about golf, why are you doing a golf tournament? Just because someone else had a successful golf tournament, it needs to be meaningful. It needs to bring people closer. So what is an activity that is fun, meaningful, and will bring your donors closer to the mission closer to you and closer to your team that will ultimately result in more major gifts. Right?

So. I don't want you to necessarily focus on the major gift. I want you to focus on creating a meaningful experience that is fun, and that will bring your donors closer, because if you focus on creating that it will result in more major gifts. Some of you do silent auctions, you hustle, you get a bunch of stuff and you sell a few things.

and you're so bummed and let down, because you put a lot of effort into a silent auction and you got these great items that nobody cared about wrong activity, not meaningful. Some of you tried to sell t-shirts and no one cared. Stop doing the stuff that nobody cares about. One of the number one rules in business is you create things and you sell things that people want. You guys need to actually get in touch with the people that are your audience, right? You cannot create something meaningful.

If you don't know your donors, you gotta do something that's meaningful to you. And to. So stop doing stuff just because other organizations do it and they're successful at it. I E a golf tournament I E is silent auction. I'm not a huge fan of golf tournaments and silent auctions. Anyway, I think there are distraction, oftentimes not in every case. Okay. I'm not saying all the time. Stop comparing and despairing. You compare yourself to somebody else and the activities they have going on.

And the gala that they have, that's so successful and you despair and you think, oh no, they have this. We'll never have that. How do we get that? We should replicate exactly what they do. That is not a meaningful activity. And what's likely is you don't have a million dollar strategy because you're doing too many activities. And to be really, really, really honest with you, you're doing too many. And so therefore you're not great at any of them.

You're mediocre at best, because you're doing too many. So likely you need to cut back on all the fundraising activities you're trying to do. Stop selling. T-shirts stop doing giveaways, stop doing planning, this stupid golf tournament that nobody's gonna come to because they don't want to because they don't play golf and you don't play golf and your staff doesn't play golf. I'm really coming down on the golf. I recently actually, uh, started learning to play golf myself.

I think it's fun, but anyways, stop that. Stop trying to do what others are doing, just because they're successful at it. You need a customized strategy that is based on your culture and your strengths, what your team is good at, what you enjoy, because the strategy that's best is the one you're actually gonna. So to recap, number one, you need impossible goals. You need to be scared. They will create a elevated way of thinking. Number two, you need meaningful activities.

They need to be meaningful and create connections and bring people closer to you and to your mission, they need to be meaningful for both you and your donors, your community at large, not just one, not just the. It needs to be a win, win, meaningful activities. The third component of a million dollar strategy is ownership culture. And I will talk about this until the day that I'm dead. And then I will talk about it in heaven in eternity. this is what I mean by ownership culture. No one says.

Ugh, I gotta fundraise. I gotta go meet with this donor. I don't have time for fundraising. I have to do this and I have to do, I have to plan this event and it's this person's birthday. And I have to make sure that the volunteers have the blah, blah, and gotta do this and gotta do that. And you just get caught in all of this stuff. You just don't have time because you're just so. No, no, no, no, no. That is not a million dollar strategy. That is not a winning attitude.

An ownership culture owns it. Just own it. You it's not that you don't have time. It's that you hate this. How about that for ownership? Own it just own up to it. You are scared. Own it that you don't want to talk to that donor because you think they don't like you. And so you're getting out in front of it and you don't like them. And, and of course we don't wanna make time to talk with and meet with people and talk to them about money and giving money.

If we think they don't like us own that you have a bad attitude, own it. Stop pretending like you don't have time. Stop pretending my friend get real own. The fact that you are afraid to sit across from someone who is wealthy and ask them to give exponentially more than they're already giving own. The fact that you just won't do it own it. And when you own it, that's when you can change. You can change your attitude.

You can change the results that you're getting or not getting, and only you can stop blaming your problems and your lack of revenue on people not giving a shit on the economy. On the problems that you inherited on your predecessor and how they didn't prepare you and set you up for success. And there's no CRM and there's no data and blah, blah, blah.

Stop blaming it on the fact that there's a leader who doesn't like to fundraise on your team, maybe it's your boss or your CEO or the founder or the co-founder or the president or the board chair or the blah, blah. You don't have control over that. My friend control the controllables. There's a Polish proverb that I absolutely adore. And I say it all the time, not my circus, not my monkeys. There is some shit that is just not your responsibility.

Stop complaining about it and own you and your responsibility. You know, what's your responsibility is you, your attitude, you are in control of you. Ain't nobody else's control of you, but you. Ownership culture says I own my leadership role as a fundraiser. I own it. I own that. I'm afraid. And I am going to go anyway. Stop waiting around for times to get better for donors to spontaneously. Give to you. Stop waiting for courage lab to get more affordable. it's not afford.

Life transformation is not affordable. Becoming courageous will cost you your comfort zone, your ego, your old habits, your experience, what you think that you're good at, it will cost you all of that. It is a very expensive, it is a high cost and the reward is a completely new and courageous you. That is the ROI. There is a greater cost to delay owning the current reality of your organization and your fundraising results own it right now.

I want you to say it out loud with me, if this is true for you, just say I'm afraid to fundraise. Say it, say it out loud right now. I'm afraid to fund. I am afraid to ask for more. This is an opportunity for you to get honest with yourself. I'm afraid and starting today. I commit. To ask for more. I commit to ask for 10 K, you wanna know how you create an ownership culture. You start making some commitments and you start proclaiming who you will be moving forward. The past does not define you.

My. Friend, you need to make some bold commitments today. You need to get some impossible goals and write 'em down. You need to say, I commit to asking for 10 K I commit to facing my fears every single day. I commit to taking ownership of the results of this organization. I commit to stepping up and leading no more excuses, not on my watch. No more. Starting today. I commit to doing this, make a commitment, make a decision and watch how opportu. Will open up to you and your attitude will shift.

Now is the time it's not going to get easier later. It's gonna get harder the best time would've been months or years ago. The second best time is right now. So I'm gonna leave you with this. What commitments are you going to make today? What impossible goals are you going to set? What meaningful activities are you going to dream up and put into action and execute on? And how can you take greater ownership of the results that you have, or you don't have today is the day. It is a new day.

And the moment that you own it is the moment you can change it and move forward until next time.