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Rich Tips is a free electronic newsletter published by Richard Male & Associates (RMA), a nonprofit consulting firm. Please send any suggestions or comments to editor@richardmale.com. Richard Male & Associates is expanding into new territory: Web Conferencing! For the past year and a half Richard Male & Associates has come to nonprofits across the country with our free Rich Tips e-newsletter (http://richardmale.com/richtipsarchive.htm). We are now putting the information contained in these e-newsletters into a much more interactive medium. The web conferences dubbed *Rich Tips Live Webinars* are each one hour in length, and cost only $29 per event. For those of you who fear anything high-tech, fear not the webinar...these webinars are very low-tech: all you need to join a webinar is a computer with Internet access and a telephone - we will take care of the rest! ----------- For registration information and a complete calendar of the Rich Tips Live Webinars, please visit http://www.richardmale.com/webinars.htm . Please help us with a next installment of Rich Tips on the topic of successful principles of nonprofit organizations. If you have any interesting words of wisdom to add to this topic, send them to editor@richardmale.com ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- This week's tips: Getting a Foot in the Funder's Door We at RMA spend considerable amounts of time helping clients understand the “strategic” aspects of raising grant dollars. Typically, the proposal itself only counts for about 10-20 percent of the overall strategy.The bulk of the grant process involves researching and targeting funding sources; setting up interviews with funders; understanding exactly what the funder is looking for; and studying the “politics” of the funding source. However, the first step in the strategic process is getting your foot in the door. Your odds of receiving grant money from foundations, corporations, and religious institutions are dramatically improved if you personally meet with the funding source. Remember: one of the first tips in fundraising is that people give to other people. Raising dollars is still a very personal business. No one can sell your organization better than you can. So how do you get your foot in that door? 1) Ask one of your current funders that has a relationship with the potential funder to email or call the potential funder to facilitate the introduction and appointment for you. This is usually very effective. 2) Contact a grantee of the funding source and ask them to make the introduction. It is easy to research funder's grantees by going to www.guidestar.org 3) Random acts of strategic run-ins – When you hear that the funder is on a panel or will be attending a workshop, attend the event and introduce yourself to them during a break or after their presentation. Ask them if they would be interested in meeting with you over coffee to discuss your programs. 4) Trustees – Go down to the Foundation Center's depository or pick up your state's grants guide. Write down the names of the trustees of the funders you would like to contact and pass them out to your board members, volunteers, and staff. I bet that someone in your network went to school with, or goes to church with, or knows a few of the trustees. Frequently, trustees are shy about mentioning their foundation, but if you find someone who knows the trustee personally, you have a better chance of meeting with them. 5) Write a 2-page letter of introduction (LOI) – Write this letter as a way of introducing yourself to a funding source that you have researched. The purpose of the LOI is to open the door and get an interview. After you mail the letter to the appropriate contact at the foundation, call this person and if a secretary answers tell him/her that "_______(the person to whom you addressed the LOI) is expecting my call." This statement is true because you said in the LOI that you would be "calling him/her within the next few days." 6) Email – Call the secretary or look on the web and get the grant officer's email address and write a note to this person asking for an appointment to introduce your organization. 7) Host an educational luncheon – A slightly more sophisticated but extremely successful strategy is to ask your “friendliest funding source” to host a luncheon where they invite 10-15 of their colleagues from other foundations. The purpose of the event is to educate the funding community about the cutting edge issues within your field (be it education, disability, environment, etc.). 8) Influential – Ask an influential person in your community to contact the identified funding source to introduce your nonprofit. You will then follow-it up with a phone call to set up a personal interview with the funder. 9) Research – Do a bit of homework and research to discover where the person you are trying to meet attends church or synagogue, and attempt to obtain an invitation to either speak at or attend one of their services. 10) Become a customer or member – If approaching a bank consider opening up a bank account (it is always better to be a customer of the business); or if you are approaching a religious institution, see if someone you know personally is a member of the religious institution. ------------------------------------------------------------- New Grant Opportunities (if you need grant research or grant writing help, please contact us! We have an experienced team of grant writers with a tremendous track record who will be happy to handle your grant research, grant calendars, grant writing, and grant tracking. For more information be sure to contact Nicolle Fogleson at RMA at grants@richardmale.com.) Save the Tiger Fund This is a call for proposals for tiger conservation projects to be funded under the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation's (the Foundation) Save The Tiger Fund. The Save The Tiger Fund (STF) is an international effort to assist in the long-term survival of Asia's remaining populations of wild tigers. STF is a partnership of the Foundation, the ExxonMobil Foundation, and the Critical Ecosystem Partnership Fund. STF is directed by the Save The Tiger Fund Council, a panel of conservation experts appointed by the Foundation to provide guidance and assistance in the granting of all funds donated to the program. STF supports a variety of efforts aimed at the conservation of tigers, their prey, and their habitat, placing the highest priority on proposals which: Target on-the-ground conservation in tiger range countries; Leverage other donor funds; Build local and regional capacity; Incorporate partnerships and collaboration in the project. Please keep these points in mind when submitting a proposal to Save The Tiger Fund. For detailed information go to: http://www.nfwf.org/programs/tig_rfp.htm First Data Western Union Foundation The First Data Western Union Foundation giving philosophy focuses on health care, education and basic human services where poverty, language barriers and cultural differences present challenges to individual opportunity. For detailed information go to: http://www.firstdatawesternunion.org/grants/ Bikes Belong Coalition The Bikes Belong Coalition accepts and fund applications for three types of projects in order to put more people on bicycles more often: Bicycle Facilities; Education; Capacity building. For detailed information go to: http://bikesbelong.org/site/page.cfm?PageID=21 Roche Foundation for Anemia Research The Roche Foundation for Anemia Research (RoFAR) encourages innovative research that will open new avenues of exploration in the study of anemia, its mechanisms, erythropoetic agents, and outcomes. The foundation aims to accelerate the review process for applicants by asking them to provide a Letter of Intent (LOI) of the proposed research project on the RoFAR Web site under "Letter of Intent Submission." LOIs are evaluated according to several criteria, including relevance to the objectives of the foundation, feasibility, scientific excellence, and originality. For detailed information go to: http://www.rofar.org/Rainbow/ --------------------------------- Federal Grant Opportunities (if any of the following grants sound appealing, please contact Mourene Tesler to learn more about the application procedure - mtesler@tcg-systems.com) ------------------------------- Federal Family Education Loan Program Closing Date: Amount: Eligible Applicants: Agency/Department: SUMMARY: Listed in: For detailed information go to:
----------------------------------------------------------- Other Announcements No new announcements this week.
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