Appeals to the General Public
The reality is that for many nonprofits the most common source of funds comes from the hard work of asking large numbers of people for small donations or selling them products, the profits from which go to the organization. This category of fundraising contains the largest number of businesses and consultants set up to assist you (for a fee, of course).
The sites listed below will help you decide if these forms of fund raising are for you and how to use them effectively. They cover direct mail and face-to-face solicitation, product sales and the development of monthly pledges (Electronic Fund Transfers-- ETFs).
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This booklet from The Tamarack Institute for Community Engagement will give you lots of ideas for how to raise friends who can, in time, become donors.Tamarack - An Institute for Community Engagement -
This is Charity Village's home base for direct marketing. It contains a number of short articles that provide useful Canadian content about things like finding mailing lists.Charity Village -
This is an interesting article from The Grantsmanship Center's magazine on how details like typefaces and envelopes can affect responses to direct mail fundraising.The Grantsmanship Center -
This site, operated by a U.S. fundraising software business, contains quite detailed articles plus summaries of discussions from an on-line "course" it ran a few years ago. These notes from the on-line course on direct mail are still sound and thorough.Fund Raiser Software -
See also this piece that offers step-by-step directions on how to make direct mail appeals more personal.FundRaising Software -
Nonprofit Expert.com offers many tips on all aspects on nonprofit management including this one on how to write letters and approach people to ask for donations.(Click on "No Image")Nonprofitexpert.com -
If you are thinking of raising money through the sale of products (from chocolate bars to grapefruit) review what you need to think about by looking at this website of the U.S.-based Association of Fund Raising Distributors and Suppliers. It contains a useful checklist of questions to ask any company offering products for you to sell for fundraising purposes.The Association of Fund Raising Distributors and Suppliers -
Fundraising Central is a directory of fundraising products and services from independent fundraising companies that service Canadian schools and groups.Fund Raising Central -
"Converting your regular donors to EFT". This and the following items are all articles from The Canadian Fundraiser (Owned and operated by the same folks as run the Charity Village site). They deal with how to encourage donors to become sustaining supporters, especially through Electronic Fund Transfers from their bank accounts.Charilty Village -
"Obstacles to starting monthly giving programs and how to overcome them"Charity Village