Tips to make any capital campaign more successful with Lyn Watner of LMW

At some point in time, most successful and accomplished women find themselves in a situation where their input, efforts are requested to assist in a signficant fundraising effort. This is often called a “Capital Campaign”. Whether it’s for a favorite school, charity or community organization, the idea of a capital campaign can be daunting. MyCity4Her reached out to subscriber and fundraising expert/consulting Lyn Watner to illuminate us about how to ensure a capital campaign can be more successful. This is what she had to share…

Capital improvements for any non-profit is vital in giving the institution a face lift and expressing their earnestness about being taken seriously. What many institutions don’t understand is that raising money for a capital campaign is easier than raising money through the annual fund. Why, because capital improvements are tangible, because you can see the bricks and mortar as well as the ability to offer naming opportunities

Capital campaigns also allow the development staff to be creative and have a few “aha” moments.  While working at Johns Hopkins University during their first capital campaign, at the Krieger School of Arts & Sciences we were not only raising money for the School,  but we were also  raising money for a new athletic center.  I had the opportunity to work with wealthy alum from Texas who was a lacrosse aficionado and only wanted to give to athletics. 

I had roughly 8-10 visits with the alum. Then one day when we were sitting in his office where he had a huge wall covered in Blue Jay memorabilia, the official mascot of Johns Hopkins University athletic department.  The alum was upset that his children didn’t go to Hopkins and no one cared about his collections of Blue Jays. 

All of a sudden, I had an “aha” moment, and decided to try something. I ventured to the potential donor “if the athletic department was willing to put your Blue Jay collection in the lobby of the new athletic center, would you be willing to name the athletic center?” When he asked how much it would cost to name the athletic, I replied, “Just $3M”.  He was delighted and said YES!

Now, not all asks are this simple, but the point I’m making is that, sometimes being successful at raising money requires some creativity and an understanding of what the donor would value, or find meaningful.

The real goal of a successful capital campaign depends on convincing the investor* that this campaign will provide their constituents with better services as a result of the capital improvements. We must remember that fund raising is an emotional business with some logic drawn in. The job of an effective fund raiser is to create “emotional resonance” by showing the investor/donor how lives can be improved by becoming personally involved with the changing environment of the institution.

Four Tips to a Successful Capital Campaign

  • What many institutions don’t understand is that raising money for a capital campaign is easier than raising money through the annual fund. Why, because capital improvements are tangible, because you can see the bricks and mortar as well as the ability to offer naming opportunities.
  • The real goal of a successful capital campaign depends on convincing the investor* that this campaign will provide their constituents with better services as a result of the capital improvements.
  • We must remember that fund raising is an emotional business with some logic drawn in; your job as the fund raiser is to create “emotional resonance” by showing the investor how lives can be improved by becoming personally involved with the changing environment of the institution.
  • Your case statement must go beyond the numbers and strategic planning to write the most fantastic and powerful stories that trigger strong emotional support to your constituents. Effective case statements should contain rational arguments and explanations of the organization’s history, vision, mission, goals, objectives, program descriptions, a financial overview and current/future funding needs.

By the way,  I prefer to call donors, investors because the connotation is that they are engaged as any other investor that would like to see a return on their contribution.

If you’d like to learn more about effective fundraising, capital campaign strategy and more, feel free to visit my web site by clicking here.

About Lyn Watner

Lyn Watner has been a professional fund raiser for over 20 years and has worked in healthcare, higher education, women’s issues, Jewish issues, and elder care and consults with small to medium sized non-profits to help them reach their fundraising and development goals.

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