This is a situation every fundraiser knows: you have found the perfect donor match for your project and send them a cold email to start your networking.
But then, nothing. The donor just does not answer to your cold emails.
How can you fix this situation?
Maybe, you made one of the following mistakes.
Maybe your email reached the wrong person at the donors’ office. Prior to sending off any communication, it is very important to do the proper research to find out who is the responsible person you want to communicate with. This is not always necessarily the grant manager. Sometimes it makes sense to try to establish a personal connection with someone at the organization. This way, your email has much higher chances of getting noticed.
One way to find a good contact person at an organization or donor that is new to you would be to browse through their staff profiles. Maybe you will find someone you already know from a conference or networking event. Maybe you will even see someone who you used to work with. Other attributes could also be used to establishing a connection. Maybe someone at the donor’s office is from the same town that you are from or from the same country. Try to find a person who can relate to you and your project or organization, and establish a human connection first.
Many NGOs ask the wrong questions when they contact a donor first. The final goal of establishing a relationship with a donor, of course, is to receive a grant, but it is never a good idea to ask for it directly from the get-go. In any kind of relationship, it would be weird, if the person just introducing him- or herself would immediately request financial support.
In the first email, you ever send to a new donor, you should ask for something reasonable. If you are able to establish a relationship of trust, later on in the communication process you can ask for financial support, but not in the very first contact. A reasonable thing to ask for would be a meeting, a call, or supplemental information about the donors’ funding strategy. Be sure though to research the donor first. You should never ask a question that you could easily answer yourself if you would have just checked the donor’s website.
Many NGOs make mistake to fail on their call to action. A cold email needs a call to action, otherwise, it is very easy to ignore it. Make sure the donor exactly knows what you want from them and do not leave it open. If you only say you are looking for cooperation or would love to discuss topics further, but do not specifically state which action you would expect from the donor, they might just ghost you. Have a clear call to action and a well thought out thing to ask for when you write a cold email to a new donor.
The subject line is the very first thing anybody will see of your email. It is also one of the most important parts because its quality will decide if your email will ever get opened. Make sure that it does not sound boring or like a sales pitch. If you use to much marketing slang, it might even land your email in the spam folder.
If you have any prior connection to the person you are emailing, try to reference that in the subject line. Have you met them at a conference – tell them. Did you go to the same school – let them know. If people think, they have a personal connection with someone, they are much more likely to care. If you have no personal connection, you should still make sure that your subject line conveys the most important information about your cold email. And before hitting send, always ask yourself: Would I open this email, if I would get it from a stranger?
If an email does not have a point and is too long, it easily gets ignored. Many NGOs make the mistake of trying to put every piece of information they consider important in the first cold email. But this is not a good idea. You have to imagine, that the person who will open your email does not know you yet and is probably very busy. They do not have the time or the interest to read pages and pages about your organization and your projects.
Make sure your emails are succinct and to the point. This way, even busy project officers will find the time to read your email, if you were able to write an engaging text.
Knowing how to connect and network with donors will give you a huge advantage over your competitors. Around 70% of funding is probably awarded through contracts and not though open calls – in these cases, an established relationship with a potential donor is of core importance. If the donor already knows you, you have the first foot in the door that can lead to further funding and more opportunities. Many NGOs approach donor networking as an afterthought – don´t make this mistake and make donor networking one of your priorities to make yourself known as a reliable partner, even before you receive funding.
In this course you will learn:
If you want to read a great example of a cold email to a new donor, check out this article: Sample of a cold email to a potential donor
Eva is based in Germany and has worked for nearly a decade with NGOs on the grassroots level in Nepal in the field of capacity development and promotion of sustainable agricultural practices. Before that, she worked in South America and Europe with different organizations. She holds a Ph.D. in geography and her field of research was sustainability and inclusion in development projects.
