This guest post was contributed by Sarah Tedesco of DonorSearch.
Previously on this blog, I discussed prospect research’s role in improving donor communications.
This time around, I’m back and ready to talk about another fundraising avenue that prospect research can assist you with: locating planned giving prospects.
Traditionally, when we think of the ideal trajectory of a donor’s relationship with your organization (i.e., the donor’s story), we imagine some variation on a donor learning about your work, getting involved, giving a first donation, being stewarded by your staff, and returning to donate more gifts over time and engage in other ways such as volunteering.
All too often, nonprofits overlook allocating a planned gift as a further chapter in a donor’s story.
Planned gifts are donations that are allocated in the present and given in the future, most commonly in wills or trusts. They are quite rare and tend to be rather large as well. Many nonprofits struggle in acquiring planned gifts simply because they do not know what to look for in prospects and wrongfully assume that there are not identifiable characteristics of planned giving donors.
Just like with major gift donors, there are plenty of ways to determine if a prospect is a strong candidate for planned giving.
Read on to see four factors that can help you identify planned giving prospects in your donor pool.
To learn more about planned giving before diving into a full discussion about ways of locating a planned giving prospect, check out DonorSearch’s Complete Guide to Planned Giving.
- The donor is a consistent contributor.
Donor loyalty is a major indicator of a planned giving prospect. What’s a better indicator of donor loyalty than frequent donations?
You will be analyzing two questions about a donor’s past giving patterns:
- How often has the donor given to your organization?
- How long has the donor been giving at that frequency?
Practically speaking, your nonprofit should be testing the donor’s RFM (recency, frequency, monetary value) score to see how strong a planned giving candidate the person is. As far as monetary value goes, wealth should be considered even though it is not as big of a limiting factor in planned giving as it is in major giving.
- Your organization has had a positive impact on the donor.
Your nonprofit has a mission and likely accomplishes some service. Whether you work in animal welfare or environmental protection, if your nonprofit’s efforts have a positive impact on a prospect, that prospect is more likely to leave a planned gift with your organization.
The good news with these prospects is that you’re already doing the heavy lifting. Your organization’s service has the potential to inspire them to contribute, so keep up the good work and make sure that donors know about the available giving possibilities.
For instance, a grateful patient might be curious about learning more about your planned giving program.
There’s no better giving candidate than a supporter who has directly experienced the power of your work.
- The donor is deeply connected to your organization.
The first factor this article covered is essentially evidence that a donor is a staunch supporter of your nonprofit and its mission, while the second factor gives one possible reason why a donor might be so loyal to your cause.
This factor speaks to not only the general concept of being connected to your organization, but the ways in which that tie can be demonstrated beyond financial contributions.
When someone has strong ties to your organization they are more likely to give. The method of giving can vary, but planned giving is an option.
A planned giving prospect can show a vested interest in your organization by:
- Frequently making donations.
- Taking advantage of various volunteering opportunities.
- Attending and participating in numerous events throughout the years.
The key takeaway here is to look for supporters with clear histories of involvement. The best step your organization can take to ensure that you have a deep pool of long-term supporters is to work diligently to retain donors and, more generally, retain supporters. If you want to succeed in your retention aims, make sure your team focuses on quality, exemplary stewardship practices that help you keep the donors you already have and attract even more.
- The donor wants to give more than is feasibly possible at the moment.
Not all who are interested are able to give a major gift. You might have a donor who is as loyal and dedicated as they come, but who does not have the financial freedom to donate such a large gift. If a donor is in that situation, they can be a great candidate for planned giving.
Yes, planned gifts can be massive donations left by wealthy donors, but that fact should not discount the notion that there are many other donors who would be open to leaving a donation themselves.
When a donor has a less-than-flexible expendable income, he or she can work around those limitations by putting a plan in place for a planned gift. That way, the donor can leave a larger gift than otherwise possible without sacrificing the financial implications of donating such a gift during his or her lifetime.
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All four of these factors should help you take a magnifying glass to your donor pool to uncover planned giving prospects. If you have an established donor pool, you have donors ready to make planned giving part of their stories. Ensure that your donors don’t miss out on the experience and your organization doesn’t miss out on the gift by actively seeking those donors and educating them about the opportunities.
Planned giving provides donors with both a positive emotional experience and beneficial tax incentives. Bring all the planned giving rewards to the table when you make your case, and you’ll have no problem securing these generous gifts.
This guest post was contributed by Sarah Tedesco of DonorSearch.
Sarah Tedesco is the Executive Vice President of DonorSearch, a prospect research and wealth screening company that focuses on proven philanthropy. Sarah is responsible for managing the production and customer support department concerning client contract fulfillment, increasing retention rate and customer satisfaction. She collaborates with other team members on a variety of issues including sales, marketing and product development ideas.
Vanessa, this post is very informative but it’s not really a good idea to try to zero-in on planned gift prospects in this manner. This is a bit “old-school”.
This strategy applies to organizations seeking to market planned gifts mostly via direct mail and/or one-to-one communications… the expensive route. For instance, they might have 3 million donors and only want to focus their expensive marketing towards a smaller segment. But this misses TONS of good prospects since anyone can make a planned gift.
A better strategy is to first ask all board members (past and present). That should be a no-brainer but most nonprofits fail to do it.
Second, a nonprofit should cast a very wide net to generate leads for planned gifts. Although consistent donors are slightly more likely to make a planned gift, great leads can come from non-donors too. We have one client (a very well-known environmental org. I’m sure you know) gets almost 80% of their planned gifts from non-donors.
The best way to cast this wide net is by making valuable offers ubiquitous online, on social media, at events, in print publications, and via direct mail, etc. Those offers can include opportunities to take a donor survey, volunteer, download information, etc. The trick is to ask where supporters are in their consideration of a planned gift and collect that information in a dashboard that scores, prioritizes and ranks them. Full disclosure: That’s why my technology does.
I explain all of this and a lot more in my recorded webinar titled “How to Generate More Planned Gifts with Less Money and Reduced Resources: An Introduction to Engagement Fundraising Principles and Tactics That Really Work” available for free here:
https://imarketsmart.com/resources/webinars/how-to-generate-more-planned-gifts/
Times have changed. Prospect research for planned giving might be somewhat useful for some nonprofits. But the strategies and tactics I outline in my webinar are much more effective and save nonprofits tons of dollars while generating real results.
The best duo combines prospect research with engagement fundraising (a phrase I coined in 2012) strategies and tactics.