Finding people, companies and foundations who have the capacity to help you can take on several levels of complexity. First you can examine your own donor base to find anyone who has given you $1,000 or more in any given year in the past. If you are like most institutions, you will discover that 10-20% of your donors have contributed 80-90% of your philanthropic income. If someone has given at this level, you may assume that they have more than a passing interest in the work your organization undertakes. Once this subset of donors is identified, you can evaluate whether any of these individuals would contribute more if properly motivated. Secondly, you can develop a profile of the characteristics of these donors to find other members of your mailing list who could make similar contributions. Third you can ask this group whether they a) would consider a larger gift, and b) know anyone who might share their interest in this organization and consider a gift of $1,000.

To identify potential corporate and foundation support, you can review the annual reports of local organizations to learn whether they have made gifts to organizations similar to yours. You can discover whether any of your constituents serve on the boards of any eleemosynary institutions and can therefore introduce gift opportunities to your non-profit organization.

You can pass your database through a third party supplier to identify individuals on your list who have significant assets as determined by public Securities and Exchange Commission reports of stock transactions, real estate holdings, yacht ownership, private plane ownership, and others.

Identifying people, corporations and foundations with the financial capacity to make a contribution is one thing. Finding those people and organizations who believe in what you do, and trust your leadership is another. A charitable donation is tangible evidence of belief in the work you are doing. I know of no case where a gift was made to an organization whose mission was detested by the donor. Gifted Memory prompts you to ask your potential donor, “Do you believe in our mission and vision of the future?” If the answer to this question is no, then you had best move on to the next name on your list. Your organization is not likely to get a gift from this person. You are unable to be all things to all people. Your objective is to find people who believe in what you do and then engage them in your efforts to improve society.

Once Identified, you load this subset of your constituent database into Gifted Memory for further research and management.

Research involves understanding the motivations and interests of your prospects to determine whether you and they share an interest in the same objective. Some information may be found in the public record. They may support other philanthropic enterprises in your area. Their names may already be etched on the walls of buildings. Your work may include estimating your donor's net worth by reading the corporate annual report to discover the stock holdings, options, bonus and salary of an inside trader, or checking the real-estate transactions in the newspaper to discern the fair market value of someone's home.

However the best information will come from the prospective donor directly -- in a personal conversation. Conducting a conversation that elicits insight into a prospect's priorities, personal beliefs, and charitable objectives take skill, sensitivity, and patience. Before someone is motivated to give and is willing identify potential giving methods, they must get to know and trust you. You may not receive all the information in one sitting. It may take several interactions to get answers to each of the following questions:
• How did you first become aware of us?
• Why did you make your first gift?
• What has been your greatest accomplishment?
• What do you want your gift to accomplish?
• Do you agree with our mission?
• What do you think of our service?
• How do you want to get involved?
• Who in your family, and circle of advisors do you consult on giving?
• Do you want to pass income and assets along to your children or grandchildren?

Prospect researchers can do a marvelous job of finding information in the public domain that can give clues to each of these questions. Once assembled and reviewed, someone must talk with the prospect to ask questions that go from the general to the specific. The responses to these questions are obviously confidential and need to be treated as such. This is why we built Gifted Memory as a separate, secure, electronic filing cabinet. You can record this information in a place where few people have access to it, and where those who need it can retrieve it immediately.

No longer do you need to go the file, find the profile, read the profile, recognize that it is out of date, find the word processing file that contains the profile, conduct the research, update the file, print the report and refile the report. All the information that you gather over time is stored immediately in Gifted Memory.

Understand that philanthropic giving is tangible evidence of an emotional event. A gift is a voluntary action, it is not a payment for service, or an obligation. It is given freely by the donor to meet certain spiritual and personal objectives that you can help fulfil. Once given, your obligation is to render the charitable works for which the gift was solicited.

Strategic planning in a charitable gift setting involves conceiving the appropriate method of engaging your prospect in your organization. Since giving is something that comes from the heart, you must get in touch the emotions of your prospect and illustrate how their gift can have a meaningful impact on the lives of others. You must have a track record that demonstrates the quality of your work, and the economic efficiency of your work. The people involved in the service delivery must share your enthusiasm for the mission of the organization, and execute their tasks effectively. The donor must come to know and trust the leadership of the enterprise, and believe in the direction in which the organization is proceeding.

Once you have devised a plan to engage your prospect in your work, it then must be implemented. There is a dynamic tension between planning and execution. Sometimes, we can hide behind the planning process and wait for more information, to make our profile complete before we step out from behind the desk. I know of cases where directors have continually fine tuned the plan without carrying out any of the cultivation steps, and missed the opportunity for a gift. On the other end of the spectrum, officers have acted without considering the needs, interests or history a prospect has with an organization and asked for a gift without thinking. In this case, if a gift is made, it is usually below the capacity of the prospect, and does not make the prospect a lifetime investor in your enterprise. A hasty act or lack of action can both lead to the same outcome -- no gift.

One of the prime ingredients in a successful major gift solicitation is the creation of a cogent plan. Sit around the table with people who know the prospect, who may themselves be involved in the solicitation. Gather insight on the philanthropists motivations, and discover ways to involve and inform the prospect in your organization. Put the ideas on the calendar, and make someone accountable for insuring that the campus tour is scheduled, that the feasibility study interview letter was mailed, that the prospect was invited to the student recital, the lecture on biomedical research, or helped distribute food to the hungry.

Understand that the plan is dynamic, and after each interaction with the prospect, the plan may be changed, revised, or replaced with a new plan. Most importantly each plan will reflect the interests of your donor.

The final stage of cultivation occurs when the prospect understands that you and a common objective, and a common vision for the future, that your track record of service performance is exemplary, that you have the capacity to deliver on your vision, and that the only thing standing between you and the common objective is a lack of money, which the prospect has. The gift becomes a natural resolution to a mutually recognized problem.

If you have to convince someone to make a philanthropic gift, you have not completed your cultivation.

Cultivation is a two-way street. You need to know your prospects just as they need to know you. You may discover during the course of cultivation that although a prospect may have the resources to give, you are not in a position to do the charitable work in which they are interested. If the fit between donor interest and charitable activity does not exist, there will be no gift. You may have to remove the prospect from your list and move on to someone else.

During the cultivation process, the donor will want to examine your organization from several levels -- from peers who are currently involved as donors or volunteers. Your donor will want to meet both management and the people providing the service -- teachers, doctors, performers, researchers, counselors, architects. They may ask to see a copy of your annual report, list of trustees, and endowment performance. Give them an opportunity to meet each in a variety of settings -- one on one and while delivering your service.

Remember that your organization does not have needs. Rather your donor has needs and your organization provides opportunities for those needs to be met.

Remember that you are attempting to establish a life long relationship with this prospect. Remember and acknowledge their anniversaries, birthdays, children's weddings. Do not concentrate solely on their financial investment. People who have earned fortunes have done so through planning and implementing their own business objectives. Count on them for advice. Ask them to help with your efforts.

Once you ask a prospective donor for advice, particularly in a campaign feasibility study, or long range planning study, be willing to listen and accept the advice. Don't ask if you won't listen. Also, if someone gives you sound advice, and you act on it, it will be very difficult for them to say no, when you return and ask for a gift to support the initiative they recommended.

1. Make your gift first.
If you are not committed to the cause for which you are soliciting support, you will not earn the investment of others. Charity begins at home. If you have not yet made your gift to the campaign, do it today. Write out a check for an amount larger than you think you could give. If you don't, then think twice about the merits of what your organization is doing, and whether you can justifiably ask others to make sacrificial gifts.

2. State your case.
Tell the prospect why you are there to see them -- to ask for a meaningful gift in support of a project in which you both share a common interest. Tell them what the project will accomplish, when it will get done, how you intend to finance it, how you will monitor its success, and what you would like them to do.

3. Listen.
The best advice my boss at Roanoke College gave this young development officer was to take an active listening course. Learn to listen to the voice, interpret the facial expressions and body language of your prospect. Hear what they are telling you (and not telling you) about their interest, their capacity, and the timing of this request. Once you have stated your case, let the prospect respond. It is their donation you are after, don't fill the air with the sound of your own voice.

4. Ask for the gift.
As Kathleen Kavanagh, Senior Vice President Grenzebach Glier stated during the CASE Capital Campaign Conference she chaired, solicitation is the “Pleasant and persistent pursuit of the gift.” Your title -- Trustee, President, Executive Director, Headmaster, Vice President for Advancement, Director of Development, or Director of the Annual Fund gives a clue as to why you asked for an appointment. Practice stating, “Will you consider a gift of $100,000?” Then keep quiet. Don't say anything. Wait for a response.

5. Say thank you.
Once a reply is given, whatever the outcome, say thank you. This person gave you their time. Appreciate it. As Roger Kallock, Chair of Cleveland Consulting Associates states, “Time is the one non-renewable resource.” Use it wisely. Say thank you, and leave. Write a letter of appreciation when you return to the office. Say thank you often.

If the gift helped with the construction of a new building, give them an insider's hard-hat tour of the construction site. Hand them a brick, or piece of stone.

If the gift created an endowment for education, introduce the donor to the student receiving aid and support from the fund.

If the gift helped promote the art exhibit, invite them a preview of the display.

If the gift helped support the orchestra, invite the donor to a rehearsal. Give them a chance to meet the musicians.

Find innovative ways to continue to tie your philanthropist to your organization. Don't just move on to the next prospect. Learn something from the world of marketing -- After Purchase Affirmation. Once you buy a car, you are inclined to show it off, get responses from other people whose insight you trust. You are hoping they will tell you, “what a great car!”. You don't want to hear that it was just recalled by the manufacturer. Published research has shown that word of mouth advertising is more effective than purchased advertising. The last thing you want a donor to say to your latest prospect is: “The only thing those people care about is money, and once you give it, that is the last you will see of them.”

Stewardship involves the wise use of money and the proper delivery of service. Make certain that you have the accounting practices in place to assure donors that their money can not be siphoned off for use elsewhere, embezelled, or poorly managed. I have had donors offer to keep their asset and give us the annual interest because the interest rates generated by the organizationžs endowment were well below the median market performance. Let your donors know that you do everything well, including money management. If you don't manage your own funds find a reputable money manager that can. Hire an outside accounting firm to review your internal practices. Eliminate every obstacle to giving and insure that the resources entrusted to your care are managed appropriately.

To earn a donor's repeat generosity, you must first do an outstanding job of service delivery. If your charitable activity falters or deviates from your mission, a donor will question your capacity to do the work you have set out to do, and may consider contributing to a more effective organization, or one whose actions are consistent with their mission statement.

Secondly, you must continue to build your relationship with the donor. That is why Stewardship is so important. Do not receive a gift, say thank you, and never speak to this donor, or the donor's family again. Continue to involve them in the work of the organization. Once they have made a gift, they are stakeholders in your enterprise, they are committed to seeing your organization succeed. Provide opportunities for them to help.

Continue to meet your donors on common ground -- you share an objective. Ask them for their continued support. They have already illustrated their commitment by the financial sacrifices they have made on your behalf, if treated with continual respect, appreciation, and under the right circumstances, they will give again. Ask them if they can help you engage others in the enterprise. People who have make major gifts can help you solicit others. They may socialize with people who share similar beliefs, and have similar assets.

So stewardship leads to renewal that leads us back to identification of prospect donors, and the solicitation cycle can begin again.