Asia Half Way Through: Fundraising Observations

Sorry for the lack of posting recently.

This week is my half way point of my trip to Asia. I have now been based in the region for 4 and half months. It has been an exciting and exhilarating time full of learning and opportunities. Here is a short review of the progress:

Huge Potential

Asia has huge potential for well organized fundraising. There are the three critical things needed for fundraising – the need, the money and the philanthropic spirit. But it is not happening. Apart from the large notable INGOs, fundraising is short term, ad hoc and not delivering on its potential.

Challenges

As soon as I arrived, I noticed that no one knows what other charities are doing. There is hardly any sharing of information, ideas, techniques, resources. Each charity is working in their own silos, making mistakes and often concluding fundraising doesn’t work.

What have I been doing?

* Working with one NGO to test direct mail in this market. We sent our first pilot appeal to 10,000. Responses are low. Our next test will go out on Valentines day to 10,000. The next one will go out on 1st May to 15,000.
* Coordinating and contributing to Fundraisers In Thailand. If you are not a member sign up now – www.fundraisersinthailand.ning.com
* Researching and Writing a Market report on “Giving in Thailand” to help fundraisers know – where is the potential funding, how to access it and what results should we expect.
* Starting to work with new charities to test fundraising approaches. More details soon!

Ongoing barriers

Although, I have been working intensively to read, speak and write Thai, I am frustrated the knowledge that everything I produce is in the wrong language for the audience. Culturally, I am very aware of being the “pushy and noisy foreigner”. I am mostly engaging with Thais who have either worked overseas or work for international organizations. I think Thai people working in Thai organizations either don’t want to or can’t engage with me.

The next four and a half months I will be focusing on:

• Testing, Testing, Testing fundraising approaches and sharing those results with the sector. The two main areas are direct mail and grant fundraising.
• Developing an understanding of the challenges and barriers NGOs face to fundraising through free consulting sessions. Email me on Ruth.Mantle at gmail.com for more details.

Any suggestions or comments, let me know.

Fundraisers in Thailand – Presentation and Podcast

For anyone interested in recruiting donors in Thailand. Download my recent presentation and podcast from

http://fundraisersinthailand.ning.com/forum/topics/last-nights-meeting

The Importance of Donation Levels in Direct Mail

A classic discussion when writing a direct mail appeal is how to set donation levels in direct mail. Should it be $10? $100? $5,000?

Today I was reminded about how important it is to include an ask for a specific amount of money.

My Thai colleague presented me with a Thai fundraising letter for an orphanage in the North of Thailand. A cause I would be happy to support. As I don’t read Thai I asked her for the two critical things – how much do they need in total and how much do they want from me.

Her answer was – give what ever you want.

For my own purse I could give anything from 50 Baht to 1,000 Baht (between $1 and $30). How do I decide? Of course, I made a decision and given an amount. Rather than the glow of knowing that I have given the equivalent of the cost of a meal, days teaching or new clothes, I am left with a feeling of uncertainty. Did I give too little?

It’s a good reminder, even if the donations levels are a little high or a little low, they are an important part of the donor decision making process.

Eyewitness: The Funding Network Forum By Kaye Wiggins, Third Sector, 16 June 2009

Clive Stafford Smith at the Funding Network Forum
Philanthropists, campaigners and celebrities pitched up at the Dragon’s Den-style fundraising event. Kaye Wiggins joined them
It was like a celebrity version of Dragons’ Den. In London’s Canary Wharf, five celebrities pitched for donations from a wealthy but critical crowd, each of them arguing on behalf of their own charity of choice.
But fame didn’t sway the philanthropists gathered at the recent Funding Network event. They listened intently to all five cases, asked plenty of difficult questions and, after coffee and biscuits, pledged cash to the ones they deemed worthy.
The appearance of James Bond star Daniel Craig, asking for cash for a theatre and education charity in Kenya, created a flutter of excitement, but the crowd was left underwhelmed as the craggy actor read notes from a sheet of paper and left the room immediately after the pitch. His chosen charity came third out of five.
So if Bond wasn’t enough, what did sway the crowd to open their wallets?
Passion for the cause was the main criterion. The big winner, who raised more than £15,000, was human rights lawyer Clive Stafford Smith’s charity Reprieve. His charismatic pitch centred on a plea to help former Guantanamo Bay detainee Binyam Mohammed. There was a Bond flavour to his pitch, too, as he regaled the crowd with tales of tracking down CIA agents in his mission to help the imprisoned.
Other enthusiastic presentations that went down well with the audience included Irish actress Eva Birthistle’s impassioned cry for help for Ugandan children and a plea from Felicity Finch, the voice of Ruth Archer in long-running Radio 4 soap The Archers, for money to rebuild Rwanda in the wake of the genocide.
A good dose of business acumen also went down well. Second place went to social entrepreneur and author Jeremy Leggett’s pitch for SolarAid, a charity supplying solar lights in Africa. He presented the scheme as a cost-efficient social enterprise, talking about profits, markets and entrepreneurs. The Dragons would have been impressed; the donors definitely were, pledging £13,600.
Members of the audience said they wanted to be moved by a cause, to feel personally connected to charitable projects they funded and to believe they would work. They were swayed by a combination of passion and proof, rather than the glamour of celebrity backing.

Fundraisers In Thailand

I am so happy to have found a Fundraisers Network in Thailand. It seems to be an interesting mix of volunteer and employed fundraisers from a range of charities.

The next meeting is on Tuesday 8th September and will feature Sean Triner. A speaker I have wanted to see for a long time and kept missing in London.

The Father Ray Foundation has a significant database of donors and it appears to be well maintained. I am looking forward to learning a lot from Sean and then diving into data analysis.

For those based in Bangkok, come along!

http://fundraisersinthailand.ning.com/events/fit-monthly-meeting-special

Virtual Gift Campaign

At SolarAid, I am a successful Virtual Gift Fundraising Campaign. I have uploaded a presentation outlining the costs, results and structure here -

http://www.linkedin.com/osview/canvas?_ch_page_id=2&_ch_panel_id=3&_ch_app_id=25319760&_applicationId=1200&_ownerId=5098557&osUrlHash=S5tA&appParams=%7B%22from%22%3A%22owner_slideshows_profile%22%2C%22view%22%3A%22canvas%22%2C%22page%22%3A%22show_slideshow%22%2C%22slideshow_id%22%3A%221910116%22%7

Comments and Feedback very welcome.

The Fundraising Power of a Strong Brand

I have worked for organisations with strong, clear brands and those with weak and outdated ones. In my experience, the power of the brand has made a huge difference to how many resources I need to invest to get to a successful fundraising result. The main three ways:

Recognition
A key part of fundraising is getting someone to talk to you. It is a question I am asked by so many new fundraisers “How do I get x,y,z to talk to me?” Any small to medium charity will be experienced in not being able to get a response from the people they want to talk to. With a strong brand, the response from people has been – ah yes, I’ve heard of you, great work. Without, it’s just “who?” or no response.

Internalising the message
The old adage is true – a brand only really exists in people’s minds. The response from prospects to a strong brand is invaluable. They start using language like – I get it, it’s so simple, of course that’s what you do. They see the message and the cause not just a name or logo.

Credibility
A strong brand made people believe that the organisation was large, strong and more importantly a credible organisation. This was a good starting point for funding conversations. From then on, they appeared to filter the information I provided to support this view.

A strong brand has bought me so many benefits in my fundraising but mainly in the beginning conversations with a prospect. The next post will be about the critical elements of a strong brand from the perspective of a fundraiser.