2006 Land Trust Staff Retreat & Board Leadership Workshop (May 4-6)
Gathering Waters is planning a combination of fun, celebration and learning during the 2006 Land Trust Staff Retreat and Board Leadership Workshop, which will be held at Eagle Harbor Inn in Ephraim. Door County Land Trust staff will lead us on tours of two of their newest conservation projects, at Anderson Pond in Ephraim and The Clearing in Ellison Bay. On Friday, we've invited representatives from government agencies and foundations which fund land conservation work for two panel discussions on land trust funding needs and the grant programs those representatives run. Kim Wright, the new manager of the non-profit section of the state Stewardship Fund, will be attending, as will Tom Nowakoski, with the DNR's Lakes and Rivers Protection program. Travis Olson from the Wisconsin Coastal Management Program will also be attending.
We have invited representatives from many foundations, including the Bock Foundation, the Brico Fund, the Mott Foundation and the McKnight Foundation.
And, perhaps most importantly, we will be holding the 2nd Annual Dessert Potluck on Thursday night!
Download a copy of the brochure and registration form or look for your registration brochure in the mail. We hope to see you there!
Registration forms due with payment in full by April 21!
Share your thoughts with Gathering Waters!
We want to make sure that our members' voices are heard! In the coming months, Gathering Waters will undergo a review of our communication strategies, and we want to know what you think.
Members of Gathering Waters Conservancy can fill out the survey throughout the month of April 2006. It takes approximately 10 minutes to complete. As an added enticement, when you complete the survey you can sign up for a drawing for a $75 gift certificate to the Wisconsin Restaurant Association, redeemable at over 7,000 restaurants around the state.
Fill out the survey online now! »
For questions about the survey, please contact Sara DeKok at 608-251-9131 or sara [at] gatheringwaters.org.
Fundraising
Tips
by
Sara DeKok, Membership Coordinator
If you're like me, you're always looking for ways to improve your fundraising letters and increase your response rate by a few percentage points. Here are a few easy (but slightly more time consuming) ways to improve your fundraising mailings. I think if you give them a try, you'll find that the extra work will pay off in the end!
1. Mail-merge your letters
Rather than sending “Dear Friend” letters, mail-merge them
so that each begins with the donor’s name, address, and salutation.
If you have a database and a word processing program, this is an easy
technique to learn.
2. Add hand-written notes
Scribbling a personal note in the margin of a letter is one of the best
ways to improve your response rate – especially if you know the
donor. A simple, “Thanks for your support” or “Hope
to see you at the party next week,” should do the trick.
3. Get the board involved
Like I said above, hand-written notes are most effective when they come
form someone the donor knows. So, next time you’re getting ready
to do a mailing, circulate the mailing list to your board members and
have them indicate their friends and acquaintances. When it comes time
to send the mailing, ask your board members to sign and add a personal
note to those letters.
4. Hand-address the
envelopes
This is the only guaranteed way to get your mail opened. Think about it
– have you ever thrown away a hand-addressed envelope without opening
it? If your list is simply too long to hand-address all of the envelopes,
pick out your best prospects and give them a little extra attention.
5. Use first-class
stamps
For those of you who have been using the bulk mail rate for you mailings,
you may think this is an unnecessary extra cost to add to already expensive
mailings. If so, just as with the hand-written envelopes, pick out your
best prospects and add a first-class stamp. I think you’ll find
that your returns will more than exceed the additional amount you pay
for postage.
6. Customize "the
ask" to the donor's giving history
In the opening of your letter, remind the donor of their last gift –
“Thank you so much for your dues payment of $50 last year!”
Then, ask them to consider increasing their gift – “We have
a challenging year ahead of us. Please consider increasing your gift to
$75 to help us reach our goals.” People may not remember what they
contributed in a previous year. By reminding them, they are likely to
give at least that and maybe more, if presented with a compelling appeal
for support.
7. Customize the reply
card
Similar to “the ask” in the letter, be sure that your reply
card is appropriate the donor’s giving history. If your reply card
has giving level options, be sure that you don’t send a $250 donor
a reply card that begins with a $25 check-off. The first available check-off
should be for the amount previously given and go up incrementally from
there, ending in a check-off for “other.” This sort of personalization
can easily be done with a mail-merge.
8. Include photos
or a photocopied newspaper clipping
There are all sorts of colorful, informative and effective enclosures
that can be included in your mailings to pique a donor’s interest.
The most effective enclosures are ones that come in an eye-catching format
and convey urgency, progress, or exciting news. Donors are usually more
inclined to read a newspaper article or study a colorful photo with a
descriptive caption than read the appeal letter itself.
9. Go electronic!
If you collect e-mail addresses of your donors – and you should
– email your appeal letter too. Try e-mailing your appeal a week
before you plan to mail it. In the email include a link to your website
where they can make an online donation or print off a donation form. If
you get a response, you can save the paper and postage of mailing the
letter – a point that you can make in the e-mail: “In an effort
to conserve resources and put your donation to best use, we are asking
you to renew your membership online. If you respond today, you can ensure
that your membership renewal is entirely paperless!”
10. Advertise challenge
gifts
Everyone’s interested in making their dollar go a little further
– even when it comes to their charitable contributions. If you have
a major donor that’s interested in helping you leverage funds for
an important initiative, ask them to make a challenge grant and advertise
it to your donors. Your donors will respond well to an appeal that announces,
“Double the impact of your gift! If you give today, Mr. Smith will
match your donation dollar for dollar.”
The bottom line for most of these techniques is the same: personalization. People respond better to appeals that are less mass-mail-feeling and more friendly and tailored to the individual. After all, the key to successful fundraising is building relationships with your donors. However, these personalization techniques do require extra effort. If it feels daunting to consider adding all of these techniques to your direct mail at once, just try one or two and test them for effectiveness. Then decide if the extra effort is worth it to you.
Ask
an Attorney
Our question this time around has been answered by Renay Leone of Stewart
National Title Services.
Q: Under what circumstances could a land trust pay more than fair market value for property? How would this not violate the IRS rule against private inurement?
A: The doctrine of private inurement in connection with a nonprofit organization is usually referred to in connection with transactions involving the organization and a related entity or individual. The way this would play out in the given question would be that a board member’s or other related party’s land (or an easement thereon) would be purchased by the land trust for more than its fair market value as determined by a valid appraisal. The extra value over and above the fair market value would be considered private inurement to that individual and a violation of this doctrine as applied to the land trust involved. Private inurement can also be found if the land trust, in theory violating its public benefit purpose, pays more than the fair value for anything it purchases.
As a rule, I believe it is a bad idea to go down this ‘slippery slope’ of paying more than fair market value for land or easements. In hot real estate markets it can be extremely frustrating to always lose out to speculators when the nonprofit organization’s appraised value seems never to be quite enough to be the winner in a bidding situation. Stop and consider the long term effects of public knowledge that your organization is known for bidding up and over fair market value. You may set the stage for never being the winning bidder, for always paying over value because people know you will, or, worst of all, for an IRS audit if this becomes a habit. Keep in mind that most government agencies are specifically prohibited from paying more than fair market value. There’s a reason for this, and it’s similar to your legal and tax structure – you are in existence for the public benefit you provide. Careful consideration of the market and working with a reputable appraiser, as well as using smart negotiating skills to appeal to the seller’s sense of greater public good or potential tax benefits, etc., should result in a winning result at least some of the time.
Send us your questions! Free legal advice! We’re looking for questions to be featured in this section. Send any questions or suggestions to Karen Bassler at karen [at] gatheringwaters.org.
Visit the Events section of the Gathering Waters website for more information about the following events:
Hosted by Gathering Waters Conservancy
5/4-6/06— Land Trust Staff Retreat & Board Leadership Workshop
Other Conferences and Events
3/23/06— West Wisconsin
Land Trust Annual Member Meeting
3/24/06— 2006 Midwest Land Trust Conference
3/31/06— Conservation
in Common – Actions and Strategies to Protect Your Rivers, Parks
and Trails
4/1/06— Prescribed Fire Burn School At the Aldo Leopold Nature Center
4/4/06— Fire on the Prairie: Introduction to Prescribed Fire in
Land Management
4/6/06— Economic Impacts of Great Lakes Coastal Resources
4/8/06— Prairie Smoke: An Introduction to Prescribed Fire
4/22/06— Wisconsin Conservation Hall of Fame 22nd Annual Induction
4/25/06— Wetlands in the Context of Stormwater Management
4/27/06— Creative Solutions to Runoff Pollution
4/27/06— Wetlands in the Context of Stormwater Management
5/13/06— Reptiles and Amphibians of Wisconsin
5/20/06— Your Land, Your Vision Seminar
6/10/06— Little Grass on the Prairie: Prairie Plant Identification
and Habitat
Land
Trust/Non-Profit Job Opportunities
Visit the Jobs
section of the Gathering Waters website for more information about the
following job opportunities:
• Summer
Photography Intern, Gathering Waters Conservancy
• Summer
Research & Editorial Intern, Gathering Waters Conservancy
• Milwaukee
Program Director, The Conservation Fund
• Weekend
Coordinator, Urban Ecology Center
• Environmental
Educator, Urban Ecology Center
• Washington
Park Program Manager, Urban Ecology Center
Quick Links
Info for Land Trusts • Publications • Services • Support Gathering Waters