Hello. In this lesson, we will look at opening the door for the initial visit with a prospective donor. At the end of this lesson, you will be able to establish a positive mindset before the initial visit, identify best practices for scheduling an initial meeting with a prospective donor, clarify interchangeable terminology used for first-time visits in the development profession, and strategize to overcome four obstacles to a successful initial donor visit. Let's move toward opening the door. Perhaps it is best for us to start with a discussion of how to actually meet a prospective donor as none of our other areas of emphasis come into play until we have actually had that first visit. Ironically, in a profession full of self described "people persons", who all enjoy sharing the stories of their organizations and encouraging donors to join them in making a difference. Many fundraisers dread the cold call. It's not fun. It can be uncomfortable, and you may feel awkward. You will experience rejection, and it's easy to fall prey to call reluctance. Now that we understand all of this, get over it. The discovery call is the very lifeblood of a major gifts program. We need to be consistently meeting and qualifying prospective new donors to move into our pipelines. Major gift development takes time to see success. We need to have multiple players in the game to make it worthwhile. In the text for this module, John Greenhoe, author of Opening the Door to Major Gifts: Mastering the Discovery Call, has provided a simple resource with some outstanding tips to help you be successful in this endeavor. First, as John has done in his text, allow me to highlight some interchangeable terminology that will be used within the industry for a first-time visits. You will hear the terms Identification, Qualification, and Discovery used interchangeably. All are accurate descriptions of the activity. My personal preference, and at UC Davis, we use the term Qualification for this work, as we are attempting to qualify the prospect as a potential major gift donor. The identification or the discovery of a donor in my opinion is done prior to the first visit. It is the act of first bringing a prospect to the attention of the organization through prospect research or other methods. The first suggestion I will make to all of you as you venture into cold calls is to keep a positive mindset when approaching this task. The perspective I have taken during a 25 year career in higher education, is to first remind myself that the vast majority of my calls are being made to people who already have a connection with the university as alumni or annual giving donors. In some respects, it is flattering for the university to be reaching out to them. With over 200,000 alumni of record in the database, there are only one of a select few who are being contacted. It's a validation of their success. Most importantly, on all of my attempts, I make certain to remind myself the goal of the call. I am simply seeking a meeting. That is it. I am not presenting the entire case for support. I'm not trying to ask for or close a gift, don't oversell. Keep it simple and get the meeting. So, now that we have the positive mental attitude that we need, what is our first step? Do we just pick up the phone and start dialing? It is an option and one that some have success with. However, I encourage the idea of a pre-call contact to help increase your chances of getting that first meeting. When making a pre-call contact, you have several options. You can consider a letter, a postcard, email or even a hand-written note. Note that I refer to each of these as pre-call contacts. Some might consider email alone to be an effective option to schedule a meeting. However, I have found that on their own, emails are too easy to ignore, get quickly deleted or often find themselves caught by a spam filter. The benefit of the pre-call contact is that it forewarns your prospect and adds legitimacy to your phone call. This removes the stigma of the cold call. As many of your calls will occur during the day and at someone's place of work, you can imagine the difficulty of having to start a cold pitch at the sound of someone saying hello. A pre-call contact can also add legitimacy to your request. There are a lot of organizations looking for support, not to mention a fair number of scams and false charities that may be reaching out to your prospect. Finally, the pre-call contact can help you assure the prospect that the requested visit is one of introduction and acquaintance only, and not a solicitation. How do you do that? You might ask. By stating it outright. Let's review the elements of an effective pre-call contact. Items to note when crafting your pre-call contact, an effective letter clearly states who I am and the organization I represent. It provides context for why I will be seeking a visit, forewarns that I will be reaching out in person, and assures the prospect that this is a meeting of acquaintance and not a solicitation. Also, always include a reference to a specific time. We understand that our prospects are busy, and we are only seeking 30 minutes of their time. Another question related to the pre-call contact is, who it should come from? It can come from you directly. It could also be authored by someone in leadership of your organization, introducing you and indicating that the outreach is coming at their request. Another effective option is to have a volunteer write the letter. This can be effective whether your volunteer knows your prospect or not. Of course if they are acquainted, this third party endorsement can help greatly. If they are not, the context of the letter can provide the prospect, some assurance that others have experienced a similar outreach. So, our pre-call contact piece has gone out, and it's time to pick up the phone, what do you say? Here are a few thoughts for you to consider as you look to find a reason that you want a meeting, apart from the obvious. A few suggestions for why you would be asking for a meeting would include you wish to thank the individual for their gifts and share their impact with you, you want to build and improve upon our alumni or volunteer network, I'll be in the area, don't let them think that they're your anchor visit, you want to ask for their advice, you're making contact at the direction of the head of your organization. All of these can be used in some form of combination as well. Here are some other tips for the first time phone call. Always start by thanking them if at all possible, either further past donations or past volunteer work or for some other community work they've done, even if not for your organization, be passionate and upbeat. Passion is contagious, and people are more likely to want to spend time with someone they perceive as being upbeat. You are selling yourself as much as the organization and trying to set up the meeting. Always focus on their convenience and not yours. Always offers first to meet them at their home, their office or a nearby coffee shop or restaurant. Let them choose. Be willing to meet early in the morning, just after work, or even during the evening. Always propose a specific date and time. Don't ask, "Can we meet?" Ask, "Can we meet on Tuesday, the 22nd at 3 pm?" This assumption of yes will get them focused on when you should meet, not whether you should meet. If your visit requires travel, always have an alternative trip in the future you can suggest as an alternative. The further out you set a proposed date, the less likelihood that conflicts will get in the way. If you ask for a time,10 days out, and they say they're already booked, it gives you an easy and hard to refuse follow up ask for a later time when they're not booked. If they say it's a bad time to talk, ask if you can call back in an hour or tomorrow. Use peer pressure. If you know their friends, colleagues, or rivals of someone else you've met with, or a meeting with, figure out how to drop that into the conversation. If they say something that divulges something personal, an example would be I'm going to my son's wedding, don't be afraid to follow up with a question designed to make the relationship more personal. "Congratulations, where is the wedding?" You should be genuinely interested in them as a person, not just a checkbook. Always be prepared to pivot back to a second ask if they initially say no. Most eventual yeses and successful donor visits will start out with the donors initially saying, "I'm too busy or don't waste your time with me. I'll donate regardless or some similar statement." Make the case why it's valuable and ask again.
