TOUGHEST FUNDRAISING QUIZ EVER

Instructions: 

1) Your renewal / retention rates are falling, which of the following factors is most responsible.

1. Your renewal series should be rewritten.
2. There is a shift occurring in your membership database as to how members were initially acquired.
3. The economy is weak and your donors have fewer funds to contribute.
4. Other similar nonprofits renewal rates are climbing, increasing the competition for annual contributions.

1. Use examples from the past to give your donors confidence in the institution’s capabilities.
2. You should both simplify and strengthen the case statement of your organizations needs.
3. Seek to develop and to empower your institution’s professionals to develop dreams for new or improved service.
4. Phase out your current major donor newsletter and replace it with short personalized letters and notes.

1. Stop mailing renewals and search the database for all similar errors to those discovered.
2. Call your membership database software supplier and check to see if a new version of the software has been made available.
3. Audit your database to determine who entered the errors you’ve discovered.
4. Reboot your database server and see if the errors continue to appear.

1. To cultivate individuals and suggest they give more than they can afford.
2. To send lapsed members an additional gift solicitation designed for current members.
3. To solicit a gift that was smaller than the individual was capable or prepared to give.
4. Failure to encourage Board members to give themselves, solicit others, or resign from an institution’s Board of Directors.

1. Demonstrate the organization’s needs by budgeting in such a manner that expenses exceed revenues.
2. Recognize unrestricted bequest income only when it is received and use it to fund the organization’s highest current priority.
3. Meet with major donors.  Do not advocate; shut up and listen carefully.
4. Prepare a full proposal to be left with prospective donors following face-to-face meetings.

1. Review the organization’s strategic, five-year plan.

2. Examine the institution’s annual operating budget to determine where the greatest amounts of money are being generated and spent.

3. Look at the calendars of executives to determine where they are investing their personal time.
4. Read the organization’s annual report and press clippings to learn what services make the organization deserving of support.

1. In reviewing the daily call report from the evening before, you notice the lack of response in the $250 to $350 previous donation segment and recommend reducing the suggested amount solicited by callers.
2. Knowing that getting the most members reinstated is important, urge the telemarketing firm to continue calling until the campaign’s total revenue equals the total expense.
3. Insist that the call plan be to contact most recent lapsed first and to work backward toward the longest lapsed, stopping the calling when several night calling fails to generate revenue over and above the cost of calling for that same period of time.
4. Monitor live calls from time to time to insure the firm and the callers know you expect the highest quality calls.

1. Spend able income will be considerably less because of the cost associated with securing an on-air membership.
2. The most successful pledge programs will be those with the largest audiences.
3. Special programs produced for pledge drives will use “thank you gifts” increase the size of the average pledge with little attention to the expense associated with securing and shipping those gifts.
4. Deposited revenue will be less than anticipated because some members will not fulfill their pledges.

1. The average number of years that a member will make a minimum of one annual gift of a specific minimum amount to the organization.
2. The amount of special additional contributions made over and above the above annual “membership.”
3. Known or expected income from bequests.
4. The number of times each year the member makes a gift to the institution.

1. You listened carefully to the individual’s description of their needs and desires.
2. You ask the individual if your description accurately reflects what they said.
3. The individual, often pressed for time, asks you “What can they do for you?”
4. Having listened to the individual’s specific needs, you restate them in your own words.