Customer Reviews

Fundraising for Social Change

5 star:		(12)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This book covers all types of fundraising--events, direct mail, phon-a-thons, personal requests and more. There is more than enough information on each of these topics to help you implement the strategy. She helps you to visualize your fundraising efforts within the entire context of your organization and over the years you will be in your community. Further, she reframes fundraising to help you understand that you are not "pitiful beggars" plaguing people with your requests for help, but actually helping people to make meaningful contributions to their community. I purchased several books on fundraising that turned out to be mistakes--and books on fundraising are not cheap. This book saved our organization its price within seconds of its purchase.

I love this book. It's been around for a while in one form or another. Currently it is in its 5th revision. And with each revision the author has refined it. As a result, it is very well written and outlined. It is also really good because the author is a fundraising practitioner and teaches what she does. She really knows her stuff when it comes to fundraising. At least that's the impression I get from reading her book.

Fundraising at a nonprofit, whether large or small, is basically a profit center. It's a business! This book treats it as a business and has the feel of a startup guide for that business. As a SCORE volunteer believe me when I say this book has the feel of a startup guide; I've read my fair share of startup guides for for-profits and counseled enough wanta-be entrepreneurs on how to start a business. This book is a startup guide.

So how is this book a startup guide? Well, it advocates preparing a written fundraising plan BEFORE you put together your fundraising office and start raising funds. It describes a "fundraising framework" that you must understand before you can prepare a sound and successful plan. Then it tells you about time-tested strategies for acquiring and keeping donors - the strategies that will enable your nonprofit to build a foundation or base of donors from which all successful fundraising will emanate. And next it tells you about the time-tested strategies for upgrading donors so they will (or can be expected to) give larger gifts as time moves forward. There are also sections that explain how to setup and manage a fundraising office, and how to prepare a budget and write a fundraising plan.

The book could have stopped there. That's all that a startup really needs to know and do to be successful at raising sufficient funds to provide its services and distribute its products. However, the author tells us more. She talks about feasibility studies and capital campaigns. And she talks about actually being a professional fundraiser, and about special or unique circumstances where traditional fundraising methods don't always work well.

I really have only one problem with this book. I would like it so much better if the author would change its title to something like - A Fundraising Startup Guide: The Nuts and Bolts to Building a Successful Fundraising Profit Center. I realize the author's background is in helping cash-strapped nonprofits that advocate social change, and that this book was initially created to help her help those organizations (and herself). But the book is not merely about nonprofits that advocate social change. And I wish the title would properly reflect what the book covers. 5 stars!

This is a must read for any staff member of a small not for profit organization. It's a bit freeky how she knows so much about my group, and then cuts to the chase on how to address the problems identified.

I ordered the book for a class I'm taking. I find the book to be very interesting and it keeps my interest. Key points that I need to know are included in the text. Excellently written.

The book's content is precise, to the point and not repetitive in hard to understand grammer. The context was really reliable for the course I am currently taking. The chapters are not long and drawn out yet the examples the author uses are up-to-date, on point and target. I truly liked this book because it is a great read outside of higher education.

Kim Klein is a nationally known expert in the area of fundraising, and demonstrates comprehensive knowledge of all aspects of fundraising in the book. She presents the information in an easy to understand format, and shares her expertise in a motivational manner. I highly recommend this book, even if you have been in fundraising for a number of years.

This is a very good text book for my online class, and it has tons of information beyond the class criteria.

This is a great book for anyone looking to do fundraising. I really like the step-by-step nature of the advice - it's not just broad, general rules of thumb (although those are in there, too).

Great how to book that is easy to follow and tremendously practical. Great handbook for nonprofit board members and staff.

This is the best all-around book I have read on the subject. It explains to you in down to earth language how to handle the many facets of starting or improving your Board.