Introduction to Donor Cultivation: Mobilize Your Donors

About

Individual donors, the core of philanthropy in USA, are the single most influential factor in an agency’s ability to raise funds. Yet, very few organizations or development professionals seek to genuinely understand/know their prospects or individually communicate and interact with donors to effectively respond to their needs. This workshop will:

• assess the donor landscape
• depict the donor cycle
• emphasize the importance of a ‘donor centric’ approach
• offer tactics to create ‘balanced and blended’ donor communications
• share “best practice” techniques for engagement

Donor motivation is explored with the specific intent of discovering appropriate pathways for development professionals to deploy “best practices” to effectively communicate with and engage individual donors of all levels to stimulate their interest and build meaningful and mutually productive relationships.

Presenter
Diane Demarco, CFRE, Principal, Consultants for Institutional Advancement

Diane DeMarco, a seasoned fundraising executive, consults with non-profit boards, senior administrators, and development officers in colleges, universities, independent schools, cultural and community/social service organizations, and humane and environmental groups. Thirty years of field experience has offered Diane the opportunity to work with numerous clients supplying a range of services that includes capital campaign management, pre-campaign assessments and feasibility studies, major gift programming, assessments and audits, interim program management, strategic planning, staff mentoring and board leadership development.

Prior to functioning as independent counsel, Diane held positions as Director of Major Gifts for the Massachusetts Society of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, Associate Director of Development for the Joslin Diabetes Center, and Associate Director of Development for The Trustees of Reservations.  She entered the fundraising field in 1978 at Tufts University in the resource office of the Medical and Veterinary Schools.  Augmenting her work as an independent practitioner, DeMarco concurrently served as Vice President and Senior Counsel at Copley Harris Company for eight years.

Initially designated a “Certified Fundraising Executive” by CFRE International in 2000, DeMarco has routinely sustained her certification (most recent Nov. 2018) by meeting CFRE’s rigorous continuing education requirements and demonstrating a commitment to the highest standards of ethical and professional practice in the philanthropic sector. She is one of 106 fundraising professionals in Massachusetts, and one of 6,000 internationally to hold this accreditation. Diane is a longstanding member of the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP). DeMarco conducts workshops for professionals and grant funders, presents at development conferences in New England, and created and taught a 32-hour course on annual giving to ESC Fellows in the Fall of 2017.