Capital Campaign Stages and Stalls is a series of articles providing a simple overview of the stages a nonprofit will go through in its capital campaign journey, along with the most common times the process can stall. In Part 1, we explore Stages One and Two: Needs Assessment and Feasibility Study.
Campaign leaders should be committed to the success of the campaign and have knowledge of the mission of the organization and how that organization serves the community. Ideally, the campaign leader will also make a "leadership" gift.
After a nonprofit completes its pre-campaign audit and planning process, and the organization decides to begin its capital campaign, the next step is to begin preparing campaign materials. These are the education, cultivation and solicitation tools necessary to successfully implement the campaign. Following material preparation comes the time to identify leadership. These are key pieces to organizing a capital campaign.
This article is a primer course on capital campaign fundraising counsel. Included are the different types of fundraising counsel, benefits to fundraising counsel, why paying a fundraiser a percentage is viewed as unethical and may not be in the organization’s best interest, and costs associated with professionally directed capital campaigns.
Capital campaigns are built on vision, mission and dreams – all strong motivators for people to give. People like to give for what could be. Debt reduction campaigns are based on financial statements, interest rates, and business plans – all rather boring and are actually de-motivators. People do not like to give to pay for something that is already there.
All teams – capital campaign teams included – are best served when participants are focused on mutual goals that are larger than any one person can achieve on their own. Team building in capital campaigns is a vital process that can deeply impact a fundraising campaign’s success.
