Latest / Earn Your Leisure / Cliff Notes: Master No nprofit Fundraising and Overcoming Challenges

Transcript

Cliff Notes: Master No nprofit Fundraising and Overcoming Challenges · Earn Your Leisure

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Earners.
• 0:01
  Speaker 2: What's up.
• 0:02
  Speaker 3: You ever walk into a small business and everything just
• 0:04
  Speaker 3: works like The checkout is fast, the receipts are digital,
• 0:08
  Speaker 3: tipping is a breeze, and you're out the door before
• 0:11
  Speaker 3: the line even builds. Odds are they're using Square. We
• 0:15
  Speaker 3: love supporting businesses that run on Square because it just
• 0:18
  Speaker 3: feels seamless. Whether it's a local coffee shop, a vendor
• 0:21
  Speaker 3: at a pop up market, or even one of our
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: merch partners, Square makes it easy for them to take payments,
• 0:27
  Speaker 3: manage inventory, and run their business with confidence, all from
• 0:31
  Speaker 3: one simple system. If you're a business owner or even
• 0:35
  Speaker 3: just thinking about launching something soon, Square is hands down
• 0:38
  Speaker 3: one of the best tools out there to help you start, run,
• 0:41
  Speaker 3: and grow. It's not just about payments, it's about giving
• 0:45
  Speaker 3: you time back so you can focus on what matters
• 0:47
  Speaker 3: most Ready. To see how Square can transform your business,
• 0:51
  Speaker 3: visit Square dot com backslash go backslash eyl to learn
• 0:56
  Speaker 3: more that Square dot com backslash, go backslash eyl. Don't wait,
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: don't hesitate. Let's Square handle the back end so you
• 1:04
  Speaker 3: can keep pushing your vision forward. This episode is brought
• 1:10
  Speaker 3: to you by P and C Bank, a lot of
• 1:12
  Speaker 3: people think podcasts about work are boring, and sure they
• 1:16
  Speaker 3: definitely can be, but understanding of professionals routine shows us
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: how they achieve their success little by little, day after day.
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: It's like banking with P and C Bank. It might
• 1:27
  Speaker 3: seem boring to save, plan and make calculated decisions with
• 1:30
  Speaker 3: your bank, but keeping your money boring is what helps
• 1:33
  Speaker 3: you live or more happily fulfilled life. P and C
• 1:36
  Speaker 3: Bank Brilliantly Boring since eighteen sixty five. Brilliantly Boring since
• 1:41
  Speaker 3: eighteen sixty five is a service mark of the PNC
• 1:44
  Speaker 3: Financial Service Group, Inc. P and C Bank National Association
• 1:48
  Speaker 3: Member FDIC.
• 1:51
  Speaker 4: Like nonprofit, the lifeline is fundraising. Right, you have to
• 1:54
  Speaker 4: be able to get money, and you said government is
• 1:56
  Speaker 4: not the best sauce to get money, so it's private donors.
• 2:00
  Speaker 4: It's also very challenging right to kind of like always,
• 2:03
  Speaker 4: it's not not guaranteed either that you're gonna get extream.
• 2:05
  Speaker 4: So how has it been for you as far as fundraising?
• 2:08
  Speaker 4: What are some challenges and what are some best practices
• 2:11
  Speaker 4: that you.
• 2:12
  Speaker 5: Learn for sure? For sure? So right now we have
• 2:15
  Speaker 5: a strategy.
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: So I started implementing strategic planning right The strategic plan,
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: like I said earlier, is based on your needs assessment, right,
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: so we look at what do we need in the
• 2:24
  Speaker 1: organization and then okay, we need this and how we're
• 2:26
  Speaker 1: going to get it right. So what we did was
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: this year we have three approaches. So we have a
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: grant writer that we contract. So this grant writer spends
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: time in the library because they have a source called
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: Foundational Directory and it's a free database that tells you
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: all the grants are that companies pay for that, but
• 2:45
  Speaker 1: at the library is for free, right, So he'll spend
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: hours there and research and finding grants that align with
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: our mission. He'll present it to me and say, yo,
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: this is a good grant to go after. We'll have
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: several meetings on it talking about budgets, how'sing aligned with
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: my current mission and budget, and then he's going after them.
• 3:00
  Speaker 5: Right. So that's one approach.
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: The other approach is more like a traditional model corporate outreach.
• 3:05
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: So I was fortunately through one of my donors, so
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: we have some secure donuts from last year that gave
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: us a lot of money.
• 3:12
  Speaker 5: He gave me a list.
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: Of like over five hundred companies throughout the US worth
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: up to seven billion dollars.
• 3:17
  Speaker 5: Right. His company is based on cold calling. That's what
• 3:21
  Speaker 5: we're doing. Right. We have a team.
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: My team is dedicated some of their hours a week
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: to co calling those companies to introduce us, share our
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: mission and hopefully build relationships. So when it comes to
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: money and outreach, it's about relationship building, as y'all know. Right,
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: So that's what that's one approach that we want to
• 3:36
  Speaker 1: measure too to see if it's even effective.
• 3:38
  Speaker 5: Is the waste of time? Is it working?
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: So we're doing that to raise money. And then crowdfunding,
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: right is another thing through online campaigns, social media right,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: go fundme and things like that for specific things.
• 3:49
  Speaker 5: And then on what.
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: We did last year, which was really really interesting. It
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: was our first one, which was our first fundraiser gala,
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: right the goal with fifty thousand, We walked away with
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: sixty eight thousand dollars. First night, you know, shout out
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: to styles ped came as a guest speaker. We had
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: four hundred and thirty two people in the building. First fundraiser, right.
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: And that's how you raise money. You sell tickets, you
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: get you get a venue space, right, you market the tickets,
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: you use the money for non profit, but to invest
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: back into the company the money that we raised for
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: that fundraiser.
• 4:19
  Speaker 5: The goal was our first office.
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: And we just you know, signed the commercial lease in
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: February and we finally moved in and up and running.
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: So those are the ways in which now you have
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: to think about getting money for the nonprofit.
• 4:30
  Speaker 5: Because if you the.
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: Goal for every nonprofit is to try to secure consistent donors.
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: Even if one person give me five hundred a week,
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: I mean a year, one puss giving fifty thousand a years,
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: you got to count all of that money, right, while
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: still going after grants, you still need government funding, right,
• 4:46
  Speaker 1: and then what kind of put me in position? Was
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: a unique opportunity. So Executive Order two eleven by Governor Hoku.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: You know it was announced in twenty twenty two as
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: a result of gun violence, so a lot of money.
• 4:58
  Speaker 5: GVP is a buzzword.
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: Right now, gun violence prevention, right, you know a lot
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: of people going after it. That money was a lot
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: of money. About twenty million dollars was pulled into an
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: initiative called Project RIDS. So Project RIDSE was a new
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: approach to funding nonprofits from the state. It was never
• 5:15
  Speaker 1: done this way, right where they was giving you the
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: money up front, right, So we applied, we got accepted.
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: We were like one of like five nonprofits in Yonkers
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: that got it, and we got a nice chunk, which
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: played a major role in Meague going full time. Right,
• 5:28
  Speaker 1: so now we got part time staff members. I got
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: I'm a full time staff member. I got volunteers, and
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: I got paid per DM. So that's as I need them. Right,
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: you go into a per contract. So we've diversified our
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: money by using the state money, the contract money, the crowdfunding,
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: the fundraiser to now paid all the stuff that we need.
• 5:47
  Speaker 5: For the company.
• 5:47
  Speaker 4: Let me ask your question. So it's like, is there
• 5:49
  Speaker 4: like a test or like a limit, Like is it
• 5:51
  Speaker 4: a rule, because let's say everythink they have a nonprofit.
• 5:53
  Speaker 4: I raised five million dollars, right, I have to use
• 5:57
  Speaker 4: because like somebody could just depositive in their bank account.
• 6:01
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 6:01
  Speaker 4: So it's like, is there a rule to be like, Okay,
• 6:03
  Speaker 4: if eighty percent of the money that you raise, you
• 6:06
  Speaker 4: have to deploy in the course of eighteen months, Like
• 6:10
  Speaker 4: how did they track that?
• 6:12
  Speaker 1: Yeah? No, So when you do your own fundraiser, you
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: determine that, right unless a donor that's given you x
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: amount of money says this money's for this, So the
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: donor could determine like this is for your rent only
• 6:22
  Speaker 1: you can't spend this on program expenses, for example, you
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: can't spend it on.
• 6:25
  Speaker 5: Food for the office. Right.
• 6:27
  Speaker 1: So that's how one stipulation comes in with the project.
• 6:31
  Speaker 1: Like when it comes to state funding, is reavery controlling, Right,
• 6:34
  Speaker 1: you have a budget, a proposed budget that you have
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: to actually adhere to, right, so that money is controlled
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: in the timeline that you said you're going to spend
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: this money. They monitoring, like whatever the case is. When
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: you do your own fundraiser, like, you know, you got
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: to be authentic to your you know, your supporters.
• 6:49
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: Our goal was an office space, right, so when we
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: got the money, right, we didn't have no stipulations like
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: you got to spend this money on the but we
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: like now y'all helped us raise money for the location,
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: and we're gonna get the location because we actually needed
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: the location.
• 7:02
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 7:03
  Speaker 1: So the stipulation varied depending on the grant that you're
• 7:06
  Speaker 1: going after. Right, Some grants are unrestricted. So shout out
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: to Jay Jeff Bezel's wife.
• 7:11
  Speaker 5: Hopefully she sees this man.
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: She's been running around dumping millions of dollars into nonprofits
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: unrestrictedly though, Like unrestricted is like, yo, do what you
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: need to do with it. There's no police reporting on it, right,
• 7:24
  Speaker 1: Like that's a nonprofits dream, you know.
• 7:27
  Speaker 5: So just announced that like six billion she's yeah, she's
• 7:31
  Speaker 5: putting on right now.
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: She's I think New York State was the first place
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: she looked first, and it was I think she's looking
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: for like some crazy number of nonprofits.
• 7:40
  Speaker 5: Yeah, no, and her process is hard to even find
• 7:42
  Speaker 5: she did.
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: They have to find you, so hopefully they find out
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: one for United but no for sure for sure. But
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: the unrestricted comes from you know, noble individuals with a
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: lot of money. That's like, y'all love what you're doing,
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: We trust your work. But this is something good for
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: all business owners. Right, Your finances have to be in order, right,
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: like part of what got us the location or thiss
• 8:00
  Speaker 1: what got us into these A lot of these deals.
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: Grant writers, I mean grant providers, they want to see
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: your finances sometimes.
• 8:06
  Speaker 5: Right, there's something called god Star.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: They have the IRS website that they go look at
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: and check how much went to program and how much
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: went to salaries. Right, Some of them care about those
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: like little details, but your books, your financial story is
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: your engine for the organization, specifically for a nonprofit because
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: people are giving you money. Right, So, like what we've
• 8:25
  Speaker 1: been working on, which is a financial project, is getting
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: audit ready. That's what we call it, right, getting audited ready,
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: making sure that when any funder, hopefully real wealthy fund
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: that wants to see our financial story, it aligns right,
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: there's no disconnect.
• 8:38
  Speaker 4: So that's what I'm getting at. So, all right, you
• 8:42
  Speaker 4: audit ready, So if somebody wants to pull your records,
• 8:45
  Speaker 4: they can see, okay, this amount of money when here
• 8:48
  Speaker 4: this amount of money exactly, So if you're doing due diligence,
• 8:52
  Speaker 4: even for the public to know, like if they want
• 8:54
  Speaker 4: to give money to a nonprofit but they're not sure
• 8:57
  Speaker 4: about if the money's actually going to go to help people,
• 9:03
  Speaker 4: like they can actually look to see financial records.
• 9:06
  Speaker 5: Yeah the irs, if not the irs.
• 9:09
  Speaker 1: There's something called god Star. So Godstar has like certain
• 9:12
  Speaker 1: seals like Platinum, gold, Bronze.
• 9:15
  Speaker 5: The more transparent you are on god Star, the higher
• 9:18
  Speaker 5: the seal you get.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: So if you show them like your breakdown of your board,
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: the ethnical breakdown, who you serve your team.
• 9:24
  Speaker 5: Your finances.
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: You gotta publish your tenety, I mean your nine nineties
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: every year. You have to publish that, right, so they
• 9:29
  Speaker 1: can see your finances, so that you know, and if
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: they don't, Like I had a funder who in the
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: shout out to Bronz with Rotary Club, you know, they
• 9:36
  Speaker 1: was on it like like it was your finance.
• 9:38
  Speaker 5: Let me see with this why you don't.
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: Have this on god Star It was some like steps
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: that we overlooked and he was like intentional and he's like, yo,
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: you guys are doing the right thing. So once you
• 9:46
  Speaker 1: build that trust with your finances, everything else is like
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: just you know.
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: What are some of the biggest challenges obviously the money
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: raising the money figuring out how to get it, But
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: what are some of those challenges that people who are
• 9:57
  Speaker 2: not familiar with the space. What are the things that
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: that you face, right, Like that is something that somebody
• 10:03
  Speaker 2: puts you on. What are some other challenges if we're
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: getting into the space.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: Put the politics right? The politics is tough, right, And
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: I just want to touch on something. You're action and
• 10:14
  Speaker 1: answers to the challenging part. Right, So me being a
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: full time CEO, right, just to talk about the executive
• 10:19
  Speaker 1: to eleven. They're talking about taking that off the table. Right,
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: So imagine a fund is like here for three years,
• 10:24
  Speaker 1: you good and your first shit, They're like, oh hold on,
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: some political things are going on.
• 10:28
  Speaker 5: Gotta take it off the table. Now.
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: I gotta think about HOWMA cover my salary. Now I
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: gotta like pivot and I gotta work over time because
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: you know, June come, I might not have a salary.
• 10:37
  Speaker 5: Right.
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: So those challenges are about having a strategy in place
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: to pivot the things that you don't see, and that's
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: always hard, right, But there's many challenges with this work.
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: When they come to fundraising, it's about how you build
• 10:48
  Speaker 1: relationships and with who. So that's the political part of it, right,
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: Like you know this campaign season, so even like some
• 10:56
  Speaker 1: partners of mine that I really job with, you know, politically,
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: I can't take open answers with you because the five
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: oh one C three guidelines is that if I endorse
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: a politician, we get dissolved.
• 11:07
  Speaker 5: Right, And what does endorsement look like?
• 11:08
  Speaker 1: It could be them taking your swag and posting on
• 11:11
  Speaker 1: their page that they was actually an event. It could
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: be you taking a picture with them and it's you know,
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: framed a certain.
• 11:17
  Speaker 5: Way, so you have to be real careful, right.
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: So and then it's like a lot of the challenge
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: you see is that you cannot separate community service from
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: the political fere they go.
• 11:26
  Speaker 5: Hand in hand.
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: So now you gotta deal with politicians who really don't
• 11:29
  Speaker 1: believe in what you believe in, right, And that's some
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: of the things I'm working on, like emotional intelligence, right,
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: like how to navigate these spaces, you know, because I
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: got that rebel in me, but I'm also going through refinement.
• 11:39
  Speaker 5: I ain't got a little figured out.
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: And it's times that I'm in a space and it's
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: like I really want to talk how I feel, but
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: I can't. And leadership is about your brand ambassadorship, right,
• 11:47
  Speaker 1: like what are you representing online and offline because people.
• 11:50
  Speaker 5: Are watching, you know, And so those challenges about.
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: Policing yourself, you know, being careful where you're hanging out at,
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: how you moving offline and online, but who you really
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: deal with because your brand can be separate from who
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: you are, you know what I'm saying. So if again
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: have to navigate those Even now I'm doing my grand
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: opening for the novel for Space and I'm.
• 12:10
  Speaker 5: Like, who do I invite? Right?
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: Like, it gets tricky because you don't want to feel
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: like your favorite time. You know you're showing favoritism to
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: one politician or another, you know, because that might just
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: be you got a closer relationship with this person, but
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: they don't understand that because they run against each other.
• 12:22
  Speaker 1: So now if he gets here, she gets a position,
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: they like, yeah, we ection you out of this money
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: that we you know you could have had had you
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: voted for us, or you show to support, So like
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: being intentional with who you support and how you support,
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: which leads to another problem and challenge is how do
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: you focus on internally and externally the internal part of
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: the organization learning finance, management, learning how to manage a
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: team as you grow, learning how to manage new systems
• 12:46
  Speaker 1: that you need, HR consultants, learning all of that, and
• 12:49
  Speaker 1: then the external pressures of yo, we have this event,
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: can you come support, Oh hey, can you do this?
• 12:54
  Speaker 1: Or we want to do a collaboration or can you
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: come to this, Like it's a lot of like just
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: being pulled tuggle wall from two different directions until you know,
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: and those challenges are ready exhausting. But I think if
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: you stay true to your needs, right and your mission.
• 13:08
  Speaker 1: Everything else is going to follow.
• 13:09
  Speaker 6: An illegal alien from Guatemala charged with raping a child
• 13:13
  Speaker 6: in Massachusetts. An MS thirteen gang member from Al Salvador
• 13:17
  Speaker 6: accused of murdering a Texas man of Venezuelan charged with
• 13:21
  Speaker 6: filming and selling child pornography in Michigan. These are just
• 13:25
  Speaker 6: some of the heinous migrant criminals caught because of President
• 13:29
  Speaker 6: Donald J. Trump's leadership. I'm Christy Noman, the United States
• 13:32
  Speaker 6: Secretary of Homeland Security. Under President Trump, attempted illegal border
• 13:37
  Speaker 6: crossings are at the lowest levels ever recorded, and over
• 13:41
  Speaker 6: one hundred thousand illegal aliens have been arrested. If you
• 13:44
  Speaker 6: are here illegally, your next you will be fined nearly
• 13:48
  Speaker 6: one thousand dollars a day, imprisoned, and deported. You will
• 13:52
  Speaker 6: never return. But if you register using our CBP home
• 13:56
  Speaker 6: app and leave now, you could be allowed to return legally.
• 13:59
  Speaker 6: Do what's right, leave now. Under President Trump, America's laws,
• 14:04
  Speaker 6: border and families will be protected.
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: Sponsored by the United States Department of Homeland Security,