Fundraising When Money Is Tight A Strategic and Practical Guide to Surviving Tough Times and Thriving In The Future by Mal Warwick.

Fundraising When Money Is Tight A Strategic and Practical Guide to Surviving Tough Times and Thriving In The Future by Mal Warwick.

This was a very quick read. I read it in the morning. Now I am writing about it. Mal Warwick describes how to focus nonprofit fundraising efforts in times of recession. There is both less money to raise funds and less money available.



He argues that it is necessary to be more focused in fundraising efforts, focusing your activities on things which have worked before. He suggests cutting out activities that don't raise much money and asking more from fundrasing staff.



A few of the suggestions I liked were that telephone, internet, and direct mail are not separate. For example it is often more effective if you first send a person a letter, then make a followup phone call. I also liked his idea of going back through your old donor lists for the last three years and contacting all the people who did not give this year.



Mal Warwick makes nine major points in this book, reassess your donation process, strengthen your case for giving, stick to what you have in hand, be selective in cost cutting, go to where the big donors are, stay close to your donors, understand your donors personally, step up your online efforts, and get cooperation throughout an organization for raising funds.



I found some of his ideas on raising funds online interesting. Google has a few charitable programs that are interesting. We recently added a donation button for our foundation to our website.
This is a very quick read with many constructive ideas on how to raise funds. Mal Warwick has written 18 previous books on raising money. http://www.malwarwick.com/