Planting Space » Fundraising

Are People Reading Your Fundraising Newsletter?

Bradley — Mon, 16 Aug 2010 17:13:06 +0000

The point of sending a regular email newsletter, whether for support raising or communication with your launch team/congregation, is to communicate important information and get people to do something about it. What good is sending the newsletters if no one reads them?

Let’s face it – we’re all busy, and in a crunch it’s easy to ‘file’ a newsletter and ‘get back to it later’. Here are some tips to help keep your newsletter from getting filed:

Don’t self-promote; cast vision – involvement and support follow vision
Watch your “voice” – it’s easy to slip into a formal, sterile writing voice
Tell stories – let people know about exciting things happening at your plant, especially stories of changed lives
Have a strong call to action – tell them what you want them to do as a result of reading your newsletter
Set a strict publication schedule – inconsistency can negate all of the above. Never start your newsletter with, “I’m sorry it’s been so long since the last newsletter.”

Adapted from 5 Reasons Why No One Is Reading Your Email Newsletter on CopyBlogger.

Year-End Giving

Bradley — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 23:18:21 +0000

At this time of year many people are considering where to send a year-end gift to get a tax credit. They have to have it receipted before January 1.

Have you sent out a newsletter or other request for donations this month? It could be the most productive workday you’ll spend before Christmas.

Oh, and you’ll want to it immediately because the closer you get to Christmas, the more likely your mailing will get lost in the ‘noise’.

Offer people the chance to join in God’s work through what you are doing. You never know who might be just waiting to contribute.

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A Church Plant Proposal

Bradley — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 13:00:13 +0000

So you’ve been called to plant a new church and now you’re elbow-deep in fundraising. You’re probably approaching organizations as well as high-worth individuals for financial support. Have you thought about putting together a proposal?

The church plant proposal is the vision and reason for the new church in written form. It should also include your goals and your plan to attain those goals. The proposal functions in many ways like a business plan or proposal that a new small business might put together to encourage investors to jump in. Putting one together will force you to think concretely about your vision and the case for planting.

As a side benefit, having this all written down will strengthen your ‘pitch’ and help keep your message consistent between meetings.

Organizations and businessmen used to dealing in business terms will be impressed that you have thought through everything and have a solid plan. This will build your credibility and should increase your success rate at raising support.

For some great ideas on what to include, we recommend reading
the Art of the Start by Guy Kawasaki

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Fundraising – Turn a No into a Yes

Doug — Wed, 16 Sep 2009 19:34:45 +0000

I hear this all the time working with church planters, “I talked to that church today and they said they didn’t have money to support us.” Well of course they said that. What church, especially in this economy, is going to say, “Oh, thank you for calling. We’ve been wondering what we were going to do with that extra $50,000.” Instead they look at their bank account and say no. Most church planters give up or that point or just wait until later and ask again and get told no again. That’s the definition of insanity by the way: doing the same thing and expecting different results. Instead church planters need to learn to turn a no into a yes. When they say no, ask them if they would be willing to donate a few man hours to the project. They’ll say yes. They’d sound kind of jerky if they said no, so even if they don’t mean it they’ll say yes. Then hit them with this. Can you help me organize a fund raising event in your community? Perhaps a golf tournament, maybe an eBay sale, the possibilities are endless. The money is there they just need to spend a few man hours to get it.

Ten Church Planting Money Saving Tips

Doug — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 14:33:30 +0000

Budgets for church planting are shrinking everywhere as church and planting organizations tighten the belt to ride out the economic downturn. But this isn’t slowing church planters down who are among the most innovative people on the planet. Here are a few money saving tips:

1. Website: Its important to have a well designed and functioning website. But you don’t have to spend thousands to do it. If you own a mac, consider using iWeb to design the site. Cost $68.49 Or consider using WordPress.org. You can purchase a ready to use theme for around $75 with hosting for $5 – $7 a month. Check out Press 75 and WooThemes.

2. Equipment is one of the biggest expenses you incur in a new church. If you take some extra time, you can seriously trim this budget. Consider asking several churches what equipment they have to donate. One planter got his whole setup this way. Develop an equipment needs list and start shopping places like eBay. Contact churches who are moving into new buildings. Chances are they are upgrading their AV equipment. Shop garage sales for kids equipment. Its a great way to meet people too.

3. Staffing is the biggest expense for most new churches. Consider delaying hiring your staff until a month before the church starts. Consider using part time staffers from the local community rather than hiring full-time staff from other places. Many church planters assume that they need full-time staff for positions like children’s minsitry and worship ministry. While nice, most comporable sized churches don’t have full time employees in these positions. Equip and empower volunteers and hire the best in part time roles. This will save you tens of thousands.

4. Marketing is another big expense. While marketing is necessary to get the word out, consider doing less traditional marketing and supplement your plan with inbound marketing strategies such as blogging, Twitter and Facebook. Sceptical? One church recently launched at 600 and the primary marketing was done through Facebook. The best thing is all these things are free and with a few hours of web research you can learn a lot. Try Hubspot and Church Marketing Online for starters.

5. Facilities. Churches aren’t the only ones with tightening budgets. When renting a facility, negotiate. Chances are the extra money you bring into a business through rent will be a big help. Use that as leverage to negotiate a better price. I’ve had two church planters recently who negotiated facilities for less than $300 a week in urban areas.

6. Outreach. Planning your own outreach events are expensive and time consuming. Consider partnering instead. Your community will naturally have built in events. The biggest problems organizers face is volunteers. You can help with that. Be a consistent blessing to your community by providing volunteers for events. One church planter who did that had the city trying to find a facility for them to ensure that the church would start in their community.

7. Get a job. Work 10-15 hours a week in the community. Pick a strategic location like the gym or a coffee shop where you will interact with lots of people daily. This help you build relationships and enable you to trim a little from your salary.

8. Be Generous. Yeah I know it sounds counter-intuitive. But by creating a culture of generosity in the church, those involved will be more generous as well. Look for ways to give away money sacrificially as a church. Bless the community with it. Don’t be stingy and say we can’t give because we are a new church.

9. Home offices. I recommend for almost all church planters to have a home office. In the early days, have a mobile office in the community. Adopt the motto: Office is where the wi-fi is.

10. Utilize your volunteers. Many things in the budget are there because of convenience. For example, its easier to pay the post office to deliver postcards about the new church than to deliver them yourself. Save yourself some money and release your volunteers. Don’t have enough, bring in a mission team to deliver the cards door to door. I once served on a mission team where in a week we delivered 50,000 doorhangers.

All of these tips require making a few sacrifices. We’d all love to have the fancy website, more staff and the best equipment, but I don’t know one planter who would let those things keep them from planting a church.

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a Newsletter Hook

Bradley — Fri, 20 Mar 2009 16:52:35 +0000

Many planters are using a mass email solution (e.g. Constant Contact) to send out prayer and fundraising newsletters to their supporters. Established churches should be doing something like that to communicate with congregants and acquaintances.

Here’s something we can learn from a company that uses advanced online and email marketing strategies: their newsletter contains some compelling headline and interesting image, but you have to click through to their site to see what the deal is:

There are several advantages to churches that I can see:

Time Savings: Now you don’t have to blog and write a newsletter. Just write the blog and then copy & paste the first two lines or so into your email newsletter with a link back to your site. Try cutting off one of the sentences with a ‘…’ so they’ll naturally want to finish the thought
Increased Search Engine Ranking: the more you blog, the higher your website will appear in the organic results when someone searches on the internet
Regular Site Traffic: your readers will become accustomed to frequenting your site and may even join the conversation in your blog comments
Tracking: most services that send out mass emails will be able to tell you how many email recipients clicked through back to your site. Even if they don’t, you can always set up a special landing page that the public can’t see and can only be accessed through the newsletter link. Either way, you’ll be able to refine what and when you write by learning from your results & reports
Increased Delivery: now follow me on this one… If someone sends you a lengthy email and you’re just trying to get through all the emails in your inbox, don’t you ‘file’ it and try to come back to it later? How many of those do we actually get back to? By keeping it short and sweet, you can deliver the main idea very quickly. And if you write a compelling hook, they may take a quick inbox time-out to click through to your site and read more. I don’t have any proof, just a hunch that this will be a side benefit

Here’s to increased communication!

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Mass Email: don’t get caught in a spam filter

Bradley — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 16:39:57 +0000

The Baltimore Sun has reposted a list of 100 words you should NOT use in an email subject line. Some are obvious, but here are a few that church planters might use:

‘Hello’
‘Information you requested’
‘only’
‘Open’
‘Promised you’
‘Teen’
‘valium’ (it’s on the list, but just kidding)
Anything that looks like you are YELLING

If you include any of these in your email subject line, your email might get trapped in a spam filter even if the recipient has white-listed you (added your email to their address book or ‘approved sender’ list) and opted in to your newsletter. It’s not an absolute, but why risk derailing your communication?

Keep those emails clean.

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Fundraising: How To Make Your Presentation

Doug — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 15:35:07 +0000

Before you make a pitch there are a few preliminaries.

Know who you are presenting to. Find out who the decision makers are and make sure they are in the room. Find out what is the largest contribution they have given and if they have given to church planting in the past. This will give you an idea of how much to ask for. Learn what’s important to the audience. Visit their website and do Google searches to gather core information such as their mission statement, staff, values, etc. Find connections within your own plan that will be meaningful.
Develop partner expectations. Determine how you are asking them to partner. Most planters ask partners to pray, financially contribute and send mission teams.
Determine your fundraising goal. This should be based on the vision of the church and how much money is needed to support that vision. Which means of course that you need a vision as well.

Here are some tips for making the presentation (many are summarized from Chapter 3 of “Art of the Start by Guy Kawasaki:

Explain yourself in the first minute. The first minute of your presentation is critical. Let them know what the new church is about and why you are there. Practice this over and over until you can say it without notes.
Keep the presentation short (@20 minutes). If you can’t communicate why you are starting a church in 20 minutes, you may want to brush up on the communication skills.
Don’t read your slides. Let the slides communicate additional detail and to leave an impression graphically. For example, don’t go into detail about the church name, contact information, etc. Put that on a slide and cast the vision of the church. Consider having a graphic artists design the slides.
Ensure that the tech side is flawless. Don’t let technology be a distraction. Bring your own computer and projector if possible. Have a copy of the presentation on a flash drive. Bring printouts just in case.
Practice Makes Perfect. It takes most people about 25 times to get comfortable. Whenever you can watch yourself without being embarrassed you are ready.
Take notes on what they say. This shows that you are intelligent, competent and care about what they say.
Follow up. Rarely is the decision to support made during the presentation. Find out what the process is for the church and follow up. If they requested additional information, provide it within 24 hours.

What tips do you have for making a presentation for support?

Fundraising: How To Make Your Letter Stand Out

Doug — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 15:10:18 +0000

Have you ever sent out a fundraising letter that was written to perfection but never received a response? If you have ever sent letter out the answer is probably yes. Churches gets lots of letters and appeal for support. Typically they go to the mailbox of the mission’s committee chairperson. He/she probably remembers to check said mailbox once every two months. It takes another two months for them to actually talk about in a meeting. Then you are dismissed without second thought because church planting is not “missions.”

So here’s the key to making your letters get noticed. Don’t send letters. Instead send a package and if possible a big package. Why? Packages aren’t a daily arrival. Packages elicit a different emotion. I guarantee a big package will get opened the day arrives whereas a letter will get put in a pile somewhere and maybe never opened. Now you can’t just use the box as a ridiculously large envelope (though that might be funny). Here’s a couple of ideas.

1. Include something that communicates something about the area you live in. For example, if you are planting in Manhatten it might be appropriate to mail out a big apple. If you are planting in Texas, consider a cowboy hat (unless you are planning on doing fundraising in the D.C. area). Package your letter and promotional material along with the item. It won’t get thrown away like a letter and everytime someone around the office sees it, they will be reminded of you. Imagine the pastor with a large red apple on his desk. Everytime someone sees they are going to ask and the pastor will be forced to talk about you planting a church.

2. Include something that communicates the vision. Go to the dollar store buy some candy jars and fill the full of like colored M&Ms. Add one M & M of a different color. Use this to illustrate the number of people in the community per church or the number of Christians vs. non-Christians. The great thing about this piece is that it will sit on a desk in the church office until they are eaten. Every time someone eats a M&M they will be reminded of your vision to start a church.

Do something different and it will stand out.

Fundraising: how to get them to open your email

Bradley — Mon, 22 Sep 2008 20:53:12 +0000

Hopefully you have such a magnetic and interesting personality that people would open an email from you just because it’s from you. But even then, everyone is inundated with so much email that you can’t be sure that your email will get serious attention just because it’s from you. You need to give them a reason to open your email. You need to capture their attention.

Here is a great article on how to write compelling email subject lines. DISCLAIMER: this article is written to sales-based corporations, not churches. Of course, churches are not sales organizations. But if you translate the content through the lens of church communication, there are several gold nuggets in there.

Write on!

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