Are you avoiding your donors?

Too often I’ve seen some ‘fundraisers’ do whatever they can to avoid actually talking to donors.

“I can’t call ’em yet. I’m waiting for the wealth screening.'”

“I really should send a letter to first.”

“Well, we have this big event in 2 months. I’ll meet her then.”

“I need to make sure someone else hasn’t been talking to her before I call.”

“The annual fund team says she’s ‘their’ donor and they don’t want to ‘lose the revenue’.”

“My portfolio is being refreshed.”

“I have too many internal meetings to attend.”

“I need to work on our case for support/message first.”

“I’m getting ready to get ready, and after that, I think I’ll probably need to get ready a bit more.”

Really?

There’s never a good reason to avoid engagement, but there are tons of good reasons to reach out. Here are 5:

Plain and simple, your donors pay the bills, including your salary. You owe it to them to engage politely and persistently in ways that deliver value to them.
If you have their name and phone number, you have all you need to get started (although I do recommend you try to focus on the 80/20 so your time is used wisely).
Major and legacy gift fundraising takes time. Trust builds slowly. Therefore, every day you don’t cultivate supporters, you’re only pushing back your own finish line.
If you don’t engage with them, another more dedicated and diligent fundraiser at another organization probably will.
More engaged donors, give more. Duh!

So quit making excuses. Pick up the phone and engage!