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Nonprofit Lowdown

Rhea Wong

This is Nonprofit Lowdown where I review and recommend the best ideas, resources, tools, tricks and tips to run your nonprofit like a pro!

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#412
Monday · 44 min
#412 - The Year-End Question Nobody’s Asking Donors
You know the fantasy. You get one meeting with a philanthropic advisor, she sees how good your work is, she walks you into her top five clients, and your year is made. Dr. Vandana Arcot is that advisor. Nonprofits ask her for exactly this all the time. Her answer is “absolutely not.” Dr. Vandana Arcot is a physician who trained in India and then spent two decades with international global health agencies, mostly in reproductive health. She also holds a public health degree and an MBA, and she calls herself a translator between field work and the boards writing the checks. Today she advises high-net-worth donors and family foundations through KOMSELJ, with programs running in 17 countries. We start with her five donor types: the reactive giver, the giver tied to the place that helped them, the “reseeder” who spreads small gifts and comes back to whoever performed, the high-net-worth donor branching into philanthropy full time, and the legacy donor. Each one needs a different approach. Her story about the auditorium shows why. A donor wanted to sponsor one at her mother’s old school. On the field visit, Vandana’s team found the school needed toilets so girls could attend during their periods, plus streetlights so kids could get home safely. Attendance went up 25 to 30%. The donor still got her auditorium. Then we get into what her clients check before they give. Her answer: they give where they trust, and that trust comes from social proof now, not from your email list. The organizations getting surprise checks are “building a room, not a list.” That means small working sessions all year, where existing donors talk about the work and bring their friends along. Her verification process goes past audited financials to field visits, where past donors came from, and the failures you’re willing to name. One finding stung: founder-led nonprofits doing great work in the field rarely come up as the most fundable, because nobody has time to build the proof. On year-end, she says Giving Tuesday is an anchor, not a deadline. Your gala should end with a public impact report, not a gift basket. That means your legal name, your EIN, and what $10,000 and $100,000 actually buy. Link your audited financials in every email you send. And her top tip: stop asking donors how much. Ask when they plan to give, show them what the program costs, and let them decide the amount. My favorite moment is when we both admit the hard part. Doing good work doesn’t mean anyone finds you. I call it shining a diamond in a cave. Nobody’s out there looking for you, so you have to be findable, and for Gen Z donors that means Instagram and TikTok. If your year-end plan is a gala and a prayer, this conversation is for you. Important Links: KOMSELJ : https://www.komselj.com/ Substack : https://substack.com/@drvandanaarcot My Big Ask Gifts Program : https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program My Book, Get That Money Honey : https://go.rheawong.com/get-that-money-honey My Newsletter : https://www.rheawong.com/
#411
October 26 · 26 min
#411- Plugging Donor Leaks Before Year-End
We’re in what I like to call the Super Bowl of fundraising, that mad sprint to December 31st. Before you pour all your time and energy into your year-end campaign, I want to make sure you’re not losing money through hidden leaks in your donor funnel. In this episode, I break down the four biggest leaks that cost nonprofits thousands every year, and how to fix them before the giving rush begins: 1️⃣ Acquisition : why prospects might not even be paying attention to you. 2️⃣ Conversion : how a confusing donation page can kill your momentum. 3️⃣ Upgrade : the missed opportunities right under your nose. 4️⃣ Retention : the biggest leak of them all. Plus, I’m sharing a free Holiday Giving Readiness Checklist to help you plug those leaks and set yourself up for a strong finish to the year. Important Links: Holiday Giving Readiness Checklist: ⁠https://go.rheawong.com/holidaygivingreadinesschecklist My Big Ask Gifts Program:⁠ ⁠https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program⁠⁠ My Book, Get That Money Honey:⁠ ⁠https://go.rheawong.com/get-that-money-honey⁠⁠ My Newsletter:⁠ ⁠https://www.rheawong.com/⁠⁠
#410
October 19 · 20 min
#410 - Why Your Board goes Quiet after Yes
A board member once read me the riot act because I never told her that a friend of hers had given to our year-end campaign. She was right. I hadn’t closed the loop, and her friend ended up asking her why nobody had thanked them. I still think about that call. I’ve now worked with dozens of boards across the country, and I haven’t met one that didn’t care about the work. What I’ve met are boards that were never told what fundraising is, what happens to the names they hand over, or what they’re supposed to do next. This episode walks through the six reasons I see most often, split into two groups. Three are why board members hesitate: the money feels loaded, they don’t know what to say, and they’re afraid of looking foolish in front of their friends. Three are why they stall: nobody gave them a specific role, nobody explained what happens after an introduction, and nobody closed the loop when a friend gave. The emotional reasons take longer to solve. The structural ones you can fix this month. Here’s where to start. Replace the vague request to “help” with a menu of specific commitments and let each board member choose. Walk them through the process before they’re asked to trust it, so they know their friends can opt out at any point. And when someone gives, tell the board member the same day, then tell the donor what their gift does. Then look at your three most engaged board members and build from them. You don’t have to win over the three who are sitting back. If your board nods along in meetings and then goes quiet, this conversation is for you. Important Links: Free Board Reset The BAG Program⁠⁠ ⁠ ⁠Get That Money, Honey⁠⁠ ⁠ ⁠My Newsletter⁠⁠ ⁠ ⁠Join Our Live Workshop Register for the 2026 Nonprofit Bootcamp (Free Conference) Join Rhea as a keynote speaker!
#409
October 12 · 37 min
#409 - The 5 Financial Red Flags Fundraisers Miss
I came into this conversation thinking I knew how to raise money. Turns out, I've been fundraising with a broken financial house and didn't notice until Susan DeMarco walked me through it. Susan DeMarco is the CEO of Brand K Partners, an accounting firm that works exclusively with small to mid-size nonprofits. She provides everything from basic bookkeeping to fractional CFO services. She's spent years watching nonprofits celebrate a major gift, then panic when they can't manage the financial complexity that comes with it. In this episode, Susan names the five financial red flags that tank nonprofits, and it's not what you think. Growth without financial infrastructure is the first. Then revenue recognition confusion, fundraisers celebrate the commitment, finance knows it's not recognizable yet. Cash flow is the killer nobody talks about: you can have a $500,000 grant and still run out of money in month three if only 20% arrives upfront. Weak financial controls mean one person is handling deposits and reconciliation, which is a risk nightmare. And the biggest one: finance and development working completely independently, speaking different languages about the same money. Susan's advice cuts straight through. If you're hiring a CFO or finance director, nonprofit experience matters. For-profit accountants don't understand restricted funding the way a nonprofit accountant does. Every grant letter is different, and if your finance person doesn't know that, you're in trouble. Before you celebrate a major gift, ask your finance team: Can we actually manage this? Do we have the infrastructure? If not, the money arrives and your books break. The real kicker is this: fundraising success doesn't automatically equal financial health. It can feel like a win and a crisis at the same time. Susan walks you through what to watch for and the exact moment it's time to bring in outside help instead of hoping your one overworked bookkeeper figures it out. If your ED and your finance person don't talk, or if you're not sure what "revenue recognition" means, this conversation is for you. Important Links: Brand K Partners Susan DeMarco The BAG Program Get That Money, Honey My Newsletter Join Our Live Workshop
#408
October 5 · 44 min
#408 - Email's Hidden Value: Why Donors Wait
I came into this thinking email was dead. Ben Smithee and Brad Duff-Hudkins from NextAfter walked me back from the ledge with 17 million email subscribers worth of actual data. Spoiler: email is fine. You're just bad at it. Ben Smithee is Chief Growth Officer at NextAfter. Brad Duff-Hudkins is VP of Data & Analytics. Together, they've run 8,000+ experiments on nonprofit email and published research that blows up everything we think we know about donor acquisition and retention. Downstream donors, the ones who take almost 900 days to give their first gift, return $10.29 for every dollar you spend. Instant donors return $2.38. On a list of 1,000 new subscribers, 800 never give. But 100+ become donors over time, many jumping straight to major gift levels. The real move: donors who make a second gift within six months of their first are 40% more likely to give again in year two. Most nonprofits don't have an email strategy. They have a blast. One email a month, then ramped-up asks at year-end. Ben and Brad tested adding a single cultivation email (no ask) on a Saturday to an organization sending one appeal a week. Result: 41% revenue lift, 13% conversion bump, 52% engagement increase. The hard truth: 80% of new donors don't come back. But if you get them to a second gift in the first six months, you've locked in behavior change. You've moved them from transaction to relationship. If you're managing email like a campaign instead of a relationship engine, this conversation is for you. Important Links: NextAfter Research Database : 8,000+ free experiments searchable by nonprofit challenge Email Lifetime Value Study : Full report with all the benchmarks My Big Ask Gifts Program My Book, Get That Money Honey My Newsletter Join the Free Webinar
#407
September 28 · 46 min
#407 - The Gen Z Donor Strategy Nobody's Building
I'll admit it. I came into this conversation ready to talk about "those damn kids." They give me the blank stare. They call me bro. My friend in staffing says they show up for one day of work and never come back. Phil Putnam walked me back from the ledge. (Mostly. The bro thing still bugs me.) Phil Putnam is a workforce behavior strategist and keynote speaker who spent 20+ years as a team member and executive at Apple and Adobe. Now he helps associations and companies like PCMA, Bloomberg, Slack, and Salesforce understand how different generations work and give. He's a Gen Xer with two Gen Z mentors, ages 26 and 22, and he is unapologetically pro-Gen Z. In this episode, we get into why safety is the North Star for this generation. They've never known life without school shootings, and many of them believe the planet won't outlast them. Phil maps what each generation wants from work: loyalty for boomers, excellence for Gen X, value exchange for millennials, safety for Gen Z. Most fundraising strategies are written by boomers and Xers, through a boomer and Xer lens. For EDs managing Gen Z staff, Phil explains why "bring me a first draft" can feel terrifying to someone raised on teaching to the test. His advice: never lower the job requirements when a Gen Z fundraiser says they hate the phone. Pair the requirement with safety instead. Try it, and I won't punish you for the draft. And if they still won't do the job, find them another role or let them go. Replacing an employee costs roughly 150% of their salary. Then we tackle loyalty. Phil's take: Gen Z is loyal, just not to employment as we know it. The oldest Gen Zer has been working for six years. Layoffs, COVID, AI, more layoffs. Top performers get an average raise of 3.7%. The math doesn't math. On the donor side, Gen Z is 27% of the workforce today and will be 31% by 2035. Forbes 30 Under 30 is almost entirely Gen Z. Phil's approach starts with values alignment: ask what they care about and what they're afraid of, then take their answers at face value. For retention, keep the first gift easy, put your Gen Z donors in the room with your boomers, and connect them to each other. My favorite moment is Phil's welcome email test. You pay an association hundreds of dollars, and the first email asks you to join a committee. It's like ordering dinner and getting handed an apron. His point lands hard for fundraisers: your donors are your customer, not your resource. If your donor strategy only speaks boomer, this conversation is for you. Important Links: Phil Putnam Speaks Email Phil: booking@philputnam.com My Big Ask Gifts Program My Book, Get That Money Honey My Newsletter Join the Free Webinar
September 21 · 20 min
#406 - Who Told You It Was Supposed To Be Easy?
Most nonprofit leaders think the problem is the workload. I had a week that told me otherwise, and it took a coaching call to see it. I was venting about year eight feeling harder than year three when my coach said, "You're upset because life does not fit your model of reality." Somewhere around year two I quietly built a model where by now I'd be sipping mai tais while the business ran itself. Nobody promised me that. I wrote it myself, filed it where I couldn't see it, and have been paying rent on it ever since. The work was a Tuesday. The belief that I shouldn't have to do it was the surcharge, and the surcharge cost more than the work. So this episode is about the models running in the background of your job. The work is good, so the money should follow. I've been here six years, the board should get it by now. I shouldn't have to sell. If I explain the need clearly enough, people will give. We did everything right, so the numbers should be up. Not one of those was ever agreed to by a donor, a board, or the universe. You wrote them, usually at a moment when you needed something to hold onto. I also name the part nobody says out loud, which is that burnout is usually loneliness, not workload. You're the only one who sees the funders, the board, the staff, and the program at the same time, and that's a lonely seat. Then I get concrete, because I don't want you closing this feeling philosophical with nothing changed. Once you stop arguing with the obstacle about whether it should be there, you can read it. The donor who gave big and drifted is a missing stewardship stage. The board that won't fundraise was never given a menu. The ask that came back at half is a ballpark question you skipped nine months upstream. The revenue you can't predict is a pipeline you never built. Every wall is a syllabus item, and that's the difference between eight years of experience and one year repeated eight times. Plus the one practice I want you to run this week. The next time you catch yourself thinking this shouldn't be this hard, finish the sentence out loud: Compared to what? Name the version you're measuring against. It usually sounds ridiculous once it's out of your mouth, and that's the whole trick. Important Links: My Big Ask Gifts Program⁠ ⁠My Book, Get That Money Honey ⁠ ⁠My Newsletter
September 14 · 33 min
#405 - Yes! Your Nonprofit Is Allowed To Do This
Most nonprofit leaders think their biggest problem is raising money. Ny Whitaker says the real problem is influence, and money follows influence. Ny is the founder and chief strategist of Project NYNE, a former White House senior advisor and NYU professor of leadership who has spent 30 years building relationships with elected officials and teaching nonprofits to do the same. We cover why you build the relationship before the budget cut, not after. Ny walks through what a productive meeting with an elected actually looks like: lead with a problem in the district, name the three things your organization does that nobody else does, attach a dollar figure, and ask for the legislative director or budget director instead of the constituent services person who can't move money. She also clears up the thing that keeps a lot of organizations frozen. Your 501(c)(3) can do advocacy. What it cannot do is partisan political activity. That confusion is costing the sector power it already has. I pushed her on ROI too, because I was an ED with city council discretionary funding and the paperwork-to-dollars ratio felt brutal. Her answer is about what that money unlocks: matching funds, other agencies, introductions your elected can make, and being first in the queue the next time a pot of money opens. Plus the version of all this that fits a one-person shop. One thing a week. And the story of the organization that lost $100,000 in a city budget cut on a Thursday and had it restored by Monday. Important Links: Connect with Ny Project NYNE My Big Ask Gifts Program My Book, Get That Money Honey My Newsletter Join the Free Webinar
#404
September 7 · 41 min
#404 - The DAF Money You're Probably Missing
Donor-advised funds are everywhere. But for a lot of nonprofit fundraisers, they’re still a little mysterious. So I invited Liza Carballeira onto the podcast to break them down. She brings a pretty unique perspective. Liza spent more than 10 years as a frontline fundraiser, then seven years working on the other side with a major DAF institution, advising philanthropists and helping distribute charitable funds. Now, she’s the founder of Epic Philanthropy, where she helps nonprofits understand and activate this increasingly important giving vehicle. In this episode, we get into what a donor-advised fund actually is, where the money comes from, and why nonprofits need to stop thinking about DAFs like traditional foundations. We talk about everything from stock and appreciated assets to the surprising fact that even things like harvested corn can make their way into a DAF. But the really juicy stuff is what happens on the nonprofit side. How do you figure out who is giving through a DAF when the gift comes through an institution? How do you properly credit and steward those donors? And how do you find the clues hiding in your CRM? Liza shares practical ways to identify potential DAF donors and explains why truly anonymous DAF grants are much rarer than many fundraisers think. We also get into some DAF mistakes that could seriously come back to bite you: sending a tax receipt for a DAF gift, accidentally miscrediting the donor, using DAF funds to cover the tangible benefits of an event, and even trying to use a DAF to fulfill an enforceable pledge. There are some surprisingly strict rules here, and you’ll want your fundraising and admin teams to know them, And then Liza gives us her SPARK framework for DAF fundraising: show your legal information, pull DAF donors from your file, add a DAF page, reset your timing to the off-season, and keep talking about it. Simple steps that can help make DAF giving easier for donors and easier for your organization to receive. We also have a spirited conversation about DAF Day, donor fatigue, and why you probably don’t need to add another fundraising holiday to your already overflowing calendar, especially if you’re a small nonprofit without extra bandwidth. If you’ve ever wondered whether DAFs are something your nonprofit should actually be paying attention to, this conversation is for you. Important Links: Connect with Liza Email Liza: liza@epicphilanthropy.com Epic Philanthropy Liza’s DAF Program Use code RHEA for 10% off! My Big Ask Gifts Program My Book, Get That Money Honey My Newsletter⁠ Join the Free Webinar
#403
August 31 · 22 min
#403 - DAF Donor Targeting Playbook
Your year-end plan is actively insulting a segment of your donor file. It's September and that plan is nearly locked, so let's fix it before it goes out. When I was a baby ED, we'd get a $7,500 check from Schwab Charitable in December and I'd code it to Schwab. Not to Susan, who actually made the gift. In my file, Susan looked like she'd bought a gala ticket. She was a major donor and I never once treated her like one, because I didn't know what a DAF was and neither did the person doing my data entry. You probably have Susans right now, sitting in your database dressed up as corporations. Here's what most fundraisers miss: a DAF donor already took her tax deduction the day the money went into the fund. February and December are the same day to her. So every countdown clock and midnight-tonight email you send that segment is factually wrong, and she knows it. It makes you look like an amateur. In this episode I give you the CRM screen to run this week, the four behavioral signals that flag someone holding a DAF who's never given you one, and why I'd rather run this play in January. Everyone decided December was the Super Bowl. January is the empty field. Keep your annual fund calendar exactly as it is, your major gift calendar is a different animal. Important Links: My Big Ask Gifts Program My Book, Get That Money Honey My Newsletter Join the Free Webinar
#402
August 24 · 33 min
#402 - Your board isn't lazy. They're uninstructed.
I had a board member, let's call her Lena, who told me she'd rather stick hot needles in her eye than ask her friends for money. So I asked if we could count on her for the $35,000 check instead. She said yes, done, no problem. Then she spent the next several years opening her home and hosting people for us. Lena wasn't refusing to fundraise. She had no idea what fundraising was. In 20 years I have never met a board that refuses to fundraise. I've met a lot of boards nobody bothered to instruct. And in most board members' heads, fundraising has exactly one definition: standing in front of your college roommate with your hand out. So when you say "we need the board more engaged in fundraising," what lands in their body is "we need you to go be humiliating at a cocktail party." No wonder you get crickets. Underneath that there are two fears nobody says out loud. One is social capital, they don't want to be embarrassed by how you treat their friends. You're asking to borrow their reputation and you haven't told them what you're going to do with it. The other is reciprocity, if I ask Bob, Bob asks me. And the third thing we never talk about: even rich people have money baggage. Money is not neutral territory for anybody. So I show them the machine. Six stages of EFOS, and the board leads engagement, helps with prequalification, participates in qualification, cultivation and stewardship. Staff owns the proposal, and not because it's the scary part. It's the technical part. You physically cannot strong-arm someone inside a system where they're invited to opt out at six separate doors. Then the part nobody believes the first time they hear it: there is no ask. No pounding heart, no number said out loud into silence. We dissolved that moment nine months upstream in qualification. My client Amy ran this exact play last month, donor ballpark was $75,000, they came back with $120,000 unrestricted. Nobody asked anybody for anything. I'm also giving you the board action menu, why the menu itself is the training, the Jeffersonian dinner that changes the host more than the guests, why you recruit in twos and threes, and the one word I want deleted from your vocabulary entirely. Your board is not the obstacle to your major gifts system. They're the first stage of it. What You'll Learn: The three things actually going on when your board "won't fundraise" The two fears your board members will never say out loud Where the board belongs in each of the six EFOS stages Why there is no ask, and how it disappears in qualification The board action menu that teaches without a single training How to set a give/get as a floor, not a ceiling What to do about the board member who does too much of the wrong thing Important Links: My Big Ask Gifts Program My Book, Get That Money Honey My Newsletter Join the Free Webinar
#401
August 17 · 22 min
#401 - Why AI Cannot Replace Fundraising Strategy
Why AI Cannot Replace Fundraising Strategy I use Claude every day, he's literally my side piece. And I'm telling you to stop buying AI tools. Here's what I'm seeing across nonprofit shops right now: everyone's buying wealth screening software, AI donor tools, personalization platforms. They think the tool will fix it. It won't. AI amplifies what you already have. If your strategy is broken, AI just accelerates the crash. The real problem isn't AI. It's that most nonprofits don't have a strategy. They don't have criteria for what qualifies a major donor. They don't have a framework for moving donors through a process. So they purchase expensive tools and create content slop, technically personalized, completely forgettable. Here's the Ferrari metaphor: You need three things to actually get somewhere. One, the car (your AI tools). Two, to know how to drive (a clear strategy like EFOS). Three, to know where you're going (the skills to execute). Most nonprofits have one. Maybe two. Then they crash and blame the car. In this episode, I'm breaking down the five components of real qualification, timing, capacity, reason, engagement, permission and why wealth screening covers maybe one of them. Then I'm showing you what changes when you nail down EFOS first, then layer AI on top: suddenly AI becomes a qualification accelerator instead of just a donor organizer. What You'll Learn: Why wealth screening is not qualification (and what actually is) The five components of real donor qualification How AI synthesizes your data when you have a clear strategy The Ferrari framework: why most nonprofits crash How to stop chasing donors and start attracting them Why your donor communication tools are creating slop (and how to fix it) Important Links: My Big Ask Gifts Program My Book, Get That Money Honey My Newsletter Join the Free Webinar
August 10 · 30 min
#400 - 8 Years, 400 Episodes, and the One Thing I Got Wrong About Marketing
When I started this podcast in 2018, I had no strategy. No content calendar. Just a cheap microphone and a genuine desire to connect with busy nonprofit friends who never had time to grab coffee. I didn't think I was doing marketing. I thought I was just... connecting. Turns out, that's exactly what I was doing. But here's what I resisted for years: I didn't want to believe that visibility mattered. I wanted good work to be enough. I wanted to believe that if I just got excellent results for my clients, recognition would come. That the work would speak for itself. I was wrong. Dead wrong. And I'm not the only one. Most of you are probably under-marketing too. You're doing brilliant work. You're getting real impact. And nobody knows about it. Because you're operating on the same belief I was: that excellence gets recognized on its own. It doesn't. Here's the truth I learned in eight years: the best program nobody knows about loses every single time to the mediocre program with a megaphone. I wish that wasn't true. But it is. The math backs it up: 60% of your success comes from exposure. Who knows about you? That's the game. And the game changed. Your donors aren't coming to you anymore. They're researching you. They're Googling, YouTubing, scrolling LinkedIn. They want to self-qualify before they ever call. Which means your content is now your cultivation. Your visibility is your survival. In this episode, I walk through what I learned about visibility that actually works in 2026. Why relationships are necessary but not sufficient (you need a system, not just a lunch). Why the Bob story, the $50K gift I almost fumbled, taught me that you can't leave money on the table by hoping. Why personalization at scale isn't optional anymore. Why authenticity beats polish. And why, if you've ever said "we're the best kept secret," you need to pick up the megaphone. I also talk about the trends I'm watching: trust-based philanthropy. DAFs as the default, not the exception. A wealth transfer that's unprecedented. And a talent crisis that's bleeding your organization dry every time a fundraiser walks out the door. But the real lesson? Start before you're ready. Show up on one platform this week as a human being. Hit record and ship it before it's perfect. Done is better than perfect. Because consistency compounds. And visibility isn't vanity. It's survival. Important Links: My Big Ask Gifts Program:⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program⁠⁠⁠⁠ My Book, Get That Money Honey:⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://go.rheawong.com/get-that-money-honey⁠⁠⁠⁠ My Newsletter:⁠⁠⁠⁠ https://www.rheawong.com/⁠⁠⁠
#399
August 3 · 28 min
#399 -Stop Chasing Newly Liquid Founders
Here's what nobody tells you: when a founder gets $47M in liquidity, they don't call you. They call their advisor. And by the time you find out they exist, the giving decision's already locked in with someone else. Most nonprofits are still running the old playbook. Cold outreach to newly wealthy people (who get 100 asks a day). Hoping they land on your website. Betting on a gala where you can somehow figure out if they have capacity. It doesn't work. And the reason is simple: you're chasing donors when you should be positioning yourself with their advisors. Here's the blind spot nobody talks about: the window to be top-of-mind after a liquidity event is 6 to 12 months. After that, it closes. The advisory team, wealth advisors, tax attorneys, family office managers, they're the ones steering the giving strategy. Not the donor. The donor's overwhelmed. The advisor's asking, "Where should you give?" And if your nonprofit isn't the one they think of, you're invisible. I walk through four systematic levers for accessing this wealth before anyone else does. The Advisor Play (one board connection can generate $250K–$300K annually in referred gifts). The DealBook Scan (fifteen minutes every Monday on Crunchbase finds you one warm outreach opportunity per week). The Candid Play (your profile needs to be the obvious choice when newly liquid people search). And Founder Networks (if you have founder board members, you have direct access to people already thinking about impact). These aren't lottery tickets. They're repeatable revenue streams. The math: one systematic scan nets you roughly six to twelve donors per year at $25K–$100K each. One strong advisor relationship can generate $125K–$500K over five years. The best time to position your nonprofit for newly liquid wealth was three years ago. The second-best time is Monday morning. Important Links: My Big Ask Gifts Program:⁠⁠⁠ https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program⁠⁠⁠ My Book, Get That Money Honey:⁠⁠⁠ https://go.rheawong.com/get-that-money-honey⁠⁠⁠ My Newsletter:⁠⁠⁠ https://www.rheawong.com/⁠⁠ Join the Free Webinar: The Lapsed Donor Email That 10x'd a Gift
July 27 · 41 min
#398 - The Old Way Doesn't work
In this episode, I'm calling out the thing nobody says out loud: your major gift program isn't really a program. The gifts come in, but you can't predict them. Your board member lands a home run, then goes quiet. Your ED holds all the relationships in their head, and when they leave, the revenue leaves with them. I've lived this, and I know you have too. I start by naming what I call the invisible revenue gap: the difference between what your list should be raising and what it actually raises. It's costing mid-sized nonprofits hundreds of thousands a year while the financials look perfectly fine on the surface, and it's the thing that wakes EDs up at 4 AM in a cold sweat. Then I get into the diagnosis. You're not bad at fundraising. You're not lazy or unsophisticated. You're un-infrastructured. You know what to do, you just don't have a system to do it consistently, in the right order, every time. I break down why the old five-stage model we all inherited runs on fragile relationships and hope, and why it falls apart with today's busier, more skeptical donors. From there, I walk through what an actual system looks like: the six stages of the Engagement Fundraising Operating System, the real role of your board as door openers (12 board members, one intro each per quarter, that's 48 new prospects a year, the math maths), and the qualification conversation that stops you from chasing people who were never going to give. I also share results from a $6M client who went from 15 prospects to 47 and doubled her close rate. Not by finding richer donors. By building infrastructure. If every quarter feels like crossing your fingers, this one's for you. Important Links: My Big Ask Gifts Program:⁠⁠ https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program⁠⁠ My Book, Get That Money Honey:⁠⁠ https://go.rheawong.com/get-that-money-honey⁠⁠ My Newsletter:⁠⁠ https://www.rheawong.com/⁠⁠
July 20 · 37 min
#397 - Your Next Million-Dollar Donor Gives $10 a Year
The biggest gift your organization will ever receive might come from a donor who's been quietly giving you $10 a year for two decades. And most of you are ignoring them. Planned giving evangelist Tony Martignetti, retired attorney and author of the upcoming Planned Giving Accelerated, is back to bust the six nasty myths keeping small and mid-size nonprofits out of the game. It's not too complicated, it's not just for the big guys, and you're not having a "death conversation", you're talking about the life and longevity of your mission. The launch is simple: query your database for loyalty and longevity (gift size doesn't matter), pick your top 3-6 prospects, start conversations. Ten hours a month, no splashy website required. Plus: what to say when you make the ask, and the research showing 75% of donors who put you in their will increase their other giving. If planned giving has been on your someday list, this episode moves it to Monday. Important Links: Connect with Tony:⁠ https://www.linkedin.com/in/tonymartignetti/ Tony Martignetti Nonprofit Radio :⁠ https://tonymartignetti.com/ Join the Planned Giving Accelerated Waitlist: https://www.plannedgivingaccelerated.com/ My Big Ask Gifts Program:⁠ https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program⁠ My Book, Get That Money Honey:⁠ https://go.rheawong.com/get-that-money-honey⁠ My Newsletter:⁠ https://www.rheawong.com/⁠
#398
July 13 · 28 min
#396 - How a Teacher-Turned-CEO Landed Her First Six-Figure Gift
I love a good transformation story, and Lucy Madden's is one of my favorites. Lucy was a middle school science teacher who ran a snail mail pen pal program in her classroom, pairing her students with STEM professionals around the world. She watched her kids start imagining bigger futures for themselves, so she turned it into an organization: Letters to a Pre-Scientist. Now she's the CEO, and she's fundraising for it as a team of basically one. When we started working together, Lucy had 10 to 15 donors giving $1,000 or more, and those gifts felt random. In this episode, she walks through what changed: stepping away from grants, getting her board on board, and shedding the ick she felt about asking individuals for real money. The moment that stuck with me: Lucy called a donor just to say thank you for a $10,000 gift. On that call, the donor did the math on Lucy's growth plan herself and said, "You need $140,000. I think we can do that." It became a multi-year six-figure stock gift, the first stock gift her organization has ever received, on a budget of $500K. We also talk about why snail mail is her secret weapon (in programs and in fundraising), why she stopped throwing spaghetti at the wall, and what shifted internally that let her show up to donor conversations with actual confidence. If you've ever told yourself you're not a fundraiser, this conversation is for you. Important Links: Connect with Lucy: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lucy-madden/ Letters to a Pre-Scientist: https://prescientist.org/ My Big Ask Gifts Program: https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program My Book, Get That Money Honey: https://go.rheawong.com/get-that-money-honey My Newsletter: https://www.rheawong.com/
July 6 · 17 min
#395 - Why Your Major Gift Program Can't Wait
This episode is a little different. It's a bit of a public service announcement. I recently read new nonprofit sector data, and honestly, I haven't been able to stop thinking about it. The numbers tell a pretty clear story: organizations that rely heavily on grants and government funding are feeling more pressure than ever, while nonprofits with strong individual giving and major gift programs are weathering the storm much more successfully. If your organization has been putting off building a major gift strategy or if your current program just isn't producing the results you need. I hope this conversation gives you permission to rethink where you're investing your time. In this episode, I share why major gifts are becoming more important than ever, the biggest mistakes I see nonprofits make when trying to build a program, and a few practical steps you can take today to start creating more sustainable fundraising. If you're feeling overwhelmed by fundraising right now, know this: you don't have to keep doing things the way they've always been done. Sometimes the smallest shift in focus can make the biggest difference. Important Links: My Big Ask Gifts Program: ⁠https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program⁠ My Newsletter: ⁠https://www.rheawong.com/
June 22 · 37 min
#394- What Pricing Strategy Can Teach Us About Major Gifts with Claire Wang
One of my favorite takeaways from this conversation with Claire Wang is that fundraising and pricing have more in common than you might think. At their core, both are about understanding people their values, motivations, and the stories they tell themselves about who they are. Claire shares how great pricing isn't just about numbers; it's about listening deeply, understanding what someone truly values, and creating an experience that feels meaningful. We also explore how these same principles apply to major gifts, donor relationships, and building trust over time. If you've ever wondered how to better understand your donors, ask for larger gifts with confidence, or create a more thoughtful donor experience, this episode is full of insights you'll want to take with you. Important Links: Connect with Claire: https://www.claire-wang.com/ My Big Ask Gifts Program: ⁠https://go.rheawong.com/big-ask-gifts-program⁠ My Book, Get That Money Honey: ⁠https://go.rheawong.com/get-that-money-honey⁠ My Newsletter: ⁠https://www.rheawong.com/⁠
June 15 · 38 min
#393- Burnout, Budget Cuts, and the Future of Fundraising with Glennda Testone
I sat down with my friend Glennda Testone, CEO of the Nonprofit Leadership Lab, to talk about what we're both seeing across the sector right now: burnout, funding uncertainty, increasing demand for services, and nonprofit leaders trying to do more with less. It's easy to get caught up in the anxiety of the moment, but one thing became crystal clear in our conversation: the organizations that will weather this season best are the ones investing in relationships. We talked about why individual donors matter more than ever, the risks of relying too heavily on grants and government funding, and why fundraising is ultimately about human connection not transactions. We also got into some hot takes on galas, donor behavior, AI, and what nonprofit leaders should be focusing on when everything feels uncertain. If you've been wondering how to navigate the current fundraising landscape, I think you'll find this conversation both grounding and encouraging. Important Links: Nonprofit Leadership Lab: https://nonprofitleadershiplab.com/?wickedsource=google&wickedid=Cj0KCQjw0JnRBhDJARIsALobnXYMR6sg7UyNnriy98C0t1QkwFu8XqFOpgP5qXL4hJB-Ly5wREp22jYaAlXLEALw_wcB&w_adid=733701107251&w_campaignid=22263756844&utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=22263756844&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=22263756844&gclid=Cj0KCQjw0JnRBhDJARIsALobnXYMR6sg7UyNnriy98C0t1QkwFu8XqFOpgP5qXL4hJB-Ly5wREp22jYaAlXLEALw_wcB My Newsletter: ⁠https://www.rheawong.com/⁠ My Quiz: https://bit.ly/4vDEBjl

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