How do you find donors for your small nonprofit? Building a strong community of supporters is essential for successful fundraising, whether you're seeking annual gifts, major donations, corporate support, or organizing events. Your people are the driving force behind your fundraising success.

What is a case for support and why do we need one? The start-up phase for small non-profits can be an exciting time, when support comes in fast, and fundraising is often based on an urgent need. When organizations grow, transform or begin to mature, the urgency is replaced by the need to understand and align with the motivations of our supporters. In other words, we know WHAT we are doing, now we need to articulate WHY. Hello, Case for Support!

Full details about the Cedar Fundraising Campaigns service for small nonprofits.

Full details about the Root Systems Fractional Fundraiser service for small nonprofits by Cedar Fundraising.

Smaller organizations often don’t know where to start when it comes to major gifts. It’s more than simply flipping the “major gifts” switch on the fundraising plan. It’s also about intention, and organizational strategy, which needs to prioritize building external relationships and individual giving (at all levels). Board members and senior leaders also play an important part, so they must understand both how fundraising works and their role within the system.

Writing grants can be one of the most time-consuming tasks out there, and let's face it - it's ongoing. Grant writing is an essential but time-consuming task for any nonprofit, big or small. If there is a way to do it faster… I want to know!

I believe that small-shops have the stewardship advantage. And it would be a true shame to waste a super-power like this. Here are some examples of how (small but) Mighty non-profits can really rock it when it comes to the final stage in the donor journey.

Policy and planning are high-level. Strategies are the action plans that will get you to your goals.

In an ideal world we would have time to fuss around with the filing system all the livelong day, but in terms of time investment, your best bet is to have a solid system for collecting and organizing impact data that you will use on a ongoing basis.

Money, especially public funds (charitable gifts) should be managed with diligence, transparency and respect. However, fundraising is often very focused on the elements of relationship-building - connecting, conversations, soliciting and stewardship. All of this is vital, of course, but it is all too easy to let the financial systems slide

If we channel the self-help gurus for a moment, you can also think of your case as “your why” but on an organizational level. I think this is really helpful. Conceptualizing it this way speaks to core motivations, and understanding these can help you create sticky messages that resonate with supporters and future supporters.

Welcome to the first entry in my “Root Systems Series”! Join me, please, on this journey as we explore the unsexy world of fundraising operations and systems for nonprofit organizations (did I just come up with the title of my future book?).

I’m taking a course called Fundraising Operations at Toronto Metropolitan University.