Create an Effective Annual Giving Plan

Volume 46 No. 6 ● June 1, 2021 ● Silver Member Sneak Peek

Annual giving is the foundational program from which all other development efforts grow and flourish. Not only is annual giving a revenue source for enhancing your school’s programs, but it is also the starting place for many prospects as they begin and sustain their philanthropic relationship with your school.

As Development Director, you want your annual giving program to be highly productive and finely tuned. An effective plan keeps you and your volunteers on task and creates a predictable cycle for your donors and prospects. This predictability contributes to building habitual giving among your donors and long-term support for your Case for Giving.

Integrate a formal plan for your volunteers into your annual giving plan.

Use the Donor Cycle as a reliable donor-centered guide to determine your action steps for your annual giving plan.

• Identify: During the spring and summer before your annual campaign, create steps to evaluate and profile new donors coming into the annual giving prospect pool and eliminate those who will no longer be solicited or whose status has changed. Use prior giving and electronic and anecdotal research to identify those prospects to include in your Leadership Division (the group of prospects with the potential to give a Leadership gift, the size of which your school defines, e.g., gifts of $1,000 or more). 
• Engage: Before your first solicitation, create ways to inform and involve your prospects in your Case for Giving. Publish your printed or online annual report, create an annual giving video, produce online testimonials, update your website, meet with individual donors for feedback and advice, create a compelling brochure that tells the story of annual giving at your school, and hold special events that celebrate past success. Meet with the faculty, your Parent Association, Alumni Board, and other groups about annual giving. Following your first appeal, continue to publish donor stories and real-time examples of annual giving dollars at work.
• Evaluate: Set dollar targets for your donors and prospects based on their prior year giving and their capacity and inclination, as gleaned from your donor research. Determine which prospects should have leadership giving targets and who in this group to solicit in person. Decide if there are leadership donors who might be interested in a particular purpose within your annual giving campaign.
• Solicit: Solicit from your Board and the faculty first. It’s imperative to show the community that your Board and faculty are 100% behind your efforts. Begin individual leadership solicitations as soon as the Board and the faculty are complete. These individual solicitations will continue throughout the course of the campaign. Schedule your first mail and email parent appeals in September, following the publication of your annual report. If appropriate for your school, schedule parent phonathons for October. Send your first alumni and parent of alumni appeals in October. If you hold your Grandparents’ Day in the fall, schedule your grandparent appeal immediately following that event. Plan an end of the calendar year solicitation of all constituents to take advantage of the close of the tax year. During the spring semester, schedule follow-up general solicitations (some schools use printers proofs for that purpose) and LYBUNT (Last Year But Not This) calls.
• Recognize: Be diligent about acknowledging all gifts in a timely manner. Consider sending thank-you notes from faculty members if the donor gives to a particular program and ask Board members to call or write to your leadership donors. Recognize your annual giving donors in your annual report. 
• Stewardship: Create a plan, executed throughout the year, that not only demonstrates your school’s gratitude but demonstrates the ways the school uses gifts to improve and enhance your students’ educational experiences.

Other Considerations

Develop action steps for the identification, recruitment, and recognition of volunteers (e.g., members of your Annual Giving Cabinet, individual solicitors, and class reps) critical to your annual giving program’s success. Integrate a formal plan for your volunteers into your annual giving plan.

Consider the preparation needed to accomplish some of your action steps. For example, include a step for downloading and proofreading names for your annual report several weeks before sending the report to the designer and printer.

Deciding When

Your annual giving plan should contain important planning elements and provide a calendar of tasks for you to accomplish. The accompanying sample lists some tasks that might be on your schedule.

An effective, donor-centered annual giving plan contains elements that keep you and your volunteers on task and supports the cyclical nature of your annual giving program. Careful attention to What, Who, When, How Much, Where, and How to measure success, in the context of the elements of the Donor Cycle, will help you meet your goals and celebrate support for your students and your school.