Five tweets for fundraisers on 21 February 2019
Howard Lake | 21 February 2019 | News
Here’s another round-up of tweets that might help, inspire or simply tweak the curiosity of fundraisers.
They cover the possible offence of asking some professionals for free services, the challenge of stagnant levels of giving, and a reminder that inspiration for fundraisers is everywhere, including a thank you letter from an eBay buyer.
1. Some free advice on asking for free services
“Can you do that for free please?” The charity sector is very experienced at asking for donated services and skills. As a result plenty of skilled, professional people get asked, quite a bit.
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That can irk some of them. And some professions seem to get asked more than others (musicians? photographers?), so this thread should remind us of the need to ask respectfully, and to avoid certain assumptions, such as that musicians are always delighted to perform for charity so that they can get more exposure…
2. Time to get off the merry-go-round?
Mark Phillips suggests that, while many fundraisers do a remarkable job, we haven’t managed to increase the total amount that individuals give to charity each year for the past 10 years.
What might break this logjam?
3. More charitable giving statistics
Alec East at Narrative UK shared a useful collection of stats on charitable giving in the UK from a variety of sources. All of them are sourced.
4. Thank you for buying from eBay
Inspiration is all around us. David Burgess of Apollo Fundraising spotted a thank you letter from an eBay buyer that outclasses plenty of charities’ thank you responses for donations.
5. Funding for social change ideas
UK Fundraising covers plenty of funding opportunities for charities and organisations. This one is perhaps more relevant to fundraisers themselves, or indeed any charity staff member. Do you have a side hustle? An idea that you would love to take further and test out to show it has the potential for social impact?
This fund, in memory of the much-missed Stephen Lloyd, could be for you:
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About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.