I am the director of the American Alpine Club Library, located in Golden, Colorado. The AAC Library is the world's largest library dedicated to mountaineering and rock climbing. My primary interest is helping libraries and museums with their fundraising challenges.
Last night I witnessed an impressive piece of fundraising. It happened at the American Mountaineering Museum’s Hall of Mountaineering Excellence Gala, which was almost single-handedly organized and run by my colleague and museum operations manager, Sarah Wood.
The event was well-attended (about 200 people), and included names such as American mountaineer Ed Viesturs and Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard. At the beginning of the event, Sarah welcomed everyone and engaged in other niceties with the audience. She recapped the museum’s first two years of operations. Continue reading ‘Learning From a Pro’
I recently posted about endowment building for libraries. If you are trying to take the very first step in building an endowment for your own library, developing your “case for giving” should be it. Your “case for giving” is the statement you can take to all your current and potential donors to ask them about their participation in building an endowment. The Association of Fundraising Professionals has an excellent guide to help you develop your case for giving.
It is important to get a handful of big gifts for your endowment before you take your campaign to the outside world. The reason for delaying general promotion of your effort is to give your endowment a chance to be a success. If you already have half of your target goal in your endowment, other donors are going to be much more likely to contribute. It is likely that the first half of your endowment will come from one or two major donors – donors who are already committed to your cause and who also have extensive resources.
The next 25% will probably come from gifts that are still fairly significant in size. The last 25% will consist of small gifts ($500 or less). This is a standard pattern of development for endowments, according to the Association of Fundraising Professionals.
Endowments have an essential place in libraries because they’re among the best vehicles for your donors to leave a legacy. Many major donors are interested in legacy giving. Be sure to give them ample chance to do so with your institution.
Building an endowment is one way to ensure a library’s success. But it takes time. And a lot of effort. Your entire organization will have to get on board if an endowment of any significant size is to be developed.
You’ll need to make some preparations before you go out and ask major donors for money to start an endowment. Start with these:
- Strengthen your library’s case for giving. Announce to donors the measures the library has put in place (say, over the last three years) to save costs and increase productivity and relevance to the communities you serve.
- Set ambitious new goals for the library director and/or major gifts officer to spend more face-to-face time with their donors and prospects. Enlist willing board members and key staff to join in the effort and provide additional support for the library director/major gifts officer. Ensure that all major donors are contacted personally every three or four months and brought fully up-to-date on what’s happening in your library.
- Make the greatest possible use of online communications such as the website, blog, electronic newsletters, Facebook, and Twitter to recruit new supporters at low cost. Reinforce messages to members and the public through other channels (such as events), and convert online activists to library donors.
- Step up donor cultivation activities and events.
- Find low-cost ways to learn more about the most loyal and generous donors, and integrate new information into personalized appeals to them.
These are the main ingredients to building a strong organizational foundation for your endowment. I’ll write more about each of these components later.
One good way for libraries to raise their own money is by writing an appeal letter. This is usually done once per year by the institution’s development officer and mailed to past donors.
Good appeal letters have five elements:
1. A defined project. This is your reason for writing the letter. Even if your letter’s purpose is primarily to support general operating expenses, be sure to call attention to a special concern, project, or event.
2. A personal story. Personal stories that illustrate how your library makes a difference is a great way to draw people into reading your letter.
3. The financial challenge your library is facing. Be clear about the costs associated with your project (see #1) and how donations can make a difference.
4. A reminder of your library’s overall mission and how your appeal fits into it. When you ask for a contribution at the end of the letter, it will be in the spirit of asking the donor to reaffirm his or her support of the library’s underlying mission.
5. A request for a donation. Always be direct in telling people what they can do to make your project (see #1) happen. If it’s money, ask for it. If it’s for volunteer help, ask for it. Depending on your technological capabilities, you may want to refer to the donor’s most recent contribution and ask him/her to increase it by a certain amount.
Appeal letters should be straightforward, simple, and one page in length.
It’s hard to tell what the future holds. At present, things look bleak. Whole library systems are being shut down. Douglas County Public Library Director, Jamie LaRue, wrote an excellent post on this topic a while back. One could easily argue that Americans don’t value their public institutions. Continue reading ‘Why Libraries Are Under Pressure: A Theory’
Pay close attention to your library’s homepage. In less than 15 seconds, does it tell you:
- Who you are?
- What your library is trying to accomplish?
- Does it have a tagline that explicitly summarizes what your library does?
The design and content on your homepage should address each question in a way that balances breadth and depth. Don’t overwhelm your reader with too much information. Install “read more” links that allow the reader to dive in deep should s/he decide to.
Keep your homepage content dynamic. Put a tickler on your calendar to change something significant on your homepage at least once per month. Consider using a modular or block design that allows certain features to be easily swapped out. So many of us are visual creatures, so build a library of reusable images that you can use to keep your homepage content fresh.
Simple, dynamic, and compelling content on your homepage will draw your donors in. Don’t forget to put a link to your giving page!
What You’re Saying