March 23, 2000 | Read Time: 1 minute
The Key to Fundraising Success
By Peter Dalton
People, not causes, motivate donors, writes the author.
“Perhaps no better recent example of this occurred immediately after the tragic death of Princess Diana,” says Mr. Dalton, a fund raiser in Australia. “Yes, people gave to the memory of Diana — the person, not the cause.”
He writes that prospective donors usually place more importance on who asks them for money than on whatever projects their donations may support.
After playing down news-media publicity and Internet appeals, Mr. Dalton provides tips on how to ask people for money face-to-face. His approach urges fund raisers to do the proper homework on the history of the organization or program in need.
He provides step-by-step instructions and a timetable for conducting a fund-raising appeal.
Mr. Dalton’s central point is hard to miss. The acronym for his fund-raising method (Argue the case, Show and tell, Key in) is ASK, and whenever any form of that imperative appears in the book it is displayed in capital letters.
Publisher: Wrightbooks, P.O. Box 270, Elsternwick, Victoria 3185, Australia; (03) 9532-7082; fax (03) 9532-7084; wbooks@ozemail.com.au; http://www.wrightbooks.com.au; 112 pages; $10.50; I.S.B.N. 1-876627-22-0.
