News and Resources
Emails That Don’t Ask – Online Fundraising Done Right
When producing an email for donors, the following are a couple tips for grabbing your supporters’ attention: Keep it short. Provide engaging content (like a video or an awesome picture). As often as possible, make it about the donor. Avoid making an ask in every email. As is often the case, the online team at … Continue reading »
Growing Pains in Community College Alumni Relations, and other Alumni Engagement News
CASE Study Reveals Growing Pains at Community College Alumni Relations Programs A recent CASE survey found that community colleges are likely to see an increase in giving when they track and engage their alumni. However, data indicate that two-year institutions have made minimal investments in staffing and resources to develop alumni relations programs. Other findings from the study […]
BWF Children's Healthcare Philanthropy E-Newsletter
Bentz Whaley Flessner is pleased to partner with many leading Children’s Hospitals. For more information on our work with Children’s Hospitals, please contact Healthcare Practice Leader Mark J. Marshall Best Children's Hospitals: Doctor Survey Ends The Best Children's...
The 3 Ps of Philanthropy
Judy Kirk, Senior Associate at Bentz Whaley Flessner, focuses on helping clients build stronger development programs and prepare for successful campaigns. She advises clients that a winning formula for success includes the Three Ps of Philanthropy: Passion, Planning,...
3 Quick Tips for Campaign Planning
Dennis Prescott, Senior Associate at Bentz Whaley Flessner, offers these 3 quick tips for clients planning a campaign: Prepare Well. Preparing well for a campaign starts with a sound feasibility study. Invest in Leadership. Create leadership structures with...
Why Investing in Social Media is Smart
Nowadays, when I’m asked “what’s the ROI on social media for fundraising?” I often respond with my own question – “that depends, what’s your investment?” Too often, organizations put a low-level employee or intern in charge of managing a Facebook page or Twitter account and claim that they’re active on social media. If that’s the … Continue reading »
Keep Calm
Some simple advice that has served the world well!
Smart, High-quality Content Leads to More Engaged Supporters
For years I’ve been preaching to audiences far and wide that “quality counts!” when producing online video. And for years, audiences have been pointing me toward videos that are grainy, hard to see, and even more difficult to comprehend …and those videos often earn tens of millions of YouTube views. Case in point, is the … Continue reading »
3 Tips for Producing Visual Facebook Content for Your Nonprofit’s Page
With the new Facebook News Feed, not having an image associated with your post means not being seen. Not being seen, means not being clicked on, and not being clicked on means EdgeRank will make it so few eyes other than your own ever experience the content you post to your organization’s Facebook page. So, … Continue reading »
Donors Augment University Hospitals' Profile
Health system has transformed itself into a fundraising behemoth that is almost on par with the Cleveland Clinic By TIMOTHY MAGAW Over the last decade, University Hospitals has built up not only its physical footprint but also its philanthropic muscle, morphing from a...
3 Tips to Boost Online Fundraising – WEBINAR
On Thursday, March 14 BWF conducted a webinar that offered expanded details and advice behind what we believe are three things your nonprofit organization can do to dramatically increase your online and social media fundraising. (Yes, you CAN raise money through social media …quite a bit, if you do it right) Below is the full-length … Continue reading »
Academic Medical Center Philanthropy E-Newsletter
Welcome to the Academic Medical Center Philanthropy Newsletter. This quarterly newsletter will serve to inform you about emerging trends in Academic Medical Center philanthropy. “Moneyball” in Healthcare Jonathan Cohn wrote a great cover story...
A new way to judge nonprofits: Dan Pallotta at TED2013
Reblogged from TED Blog: Dan Pallotta created two huge charity initiatives — AIDS Rides bicycle journeys and Breast Cancer 3-Day events. These initiatives raised $108 million for HIV/AIDS and $194 million for breast cancer. Both had their best years in 2002 … and then Pallotta’s nonprofit went out of business. In the final session of […]
Make Something Go Viral? No Problem
John Haydon is a fundraising consultant and blogger who, simply put, knows his stuff. His recent post – The Secret Behind Viral Content – is chock full of good tips for producing engaging content. Go read it, then come back and finish reading this post… Back? Cool. John suggests in his post, as many social … Continue reading »
Knowing Your Audience is (Still) the Key to Good Content
To produce online content that gets shared, commented on, liked, retweeted, pinned and what ever else requires knowing what your core audience likes to share, comment on, like, retweet, pin, and whatever else. This is nothing new. Producing content your audience enjoys has always required knowing a thing or two about your audience. The difference … Continue reading »