3 Tips to Beat the Summer Fundraising Slump

Summer can be a tricky time to raise funds as donors are often distracted with vacations and soaking up the best of Madison’s favorite season. Here are a few tips for focusing summer development efforts.

1. Gratitude Meetings

Whether your organization’s fiscal year ends June 30 or December 31, summer is often a great time to focus on donor appreciation. Whether you are out networking at events or scheduling coffee meetings, now is the time to cultivate lead volunteers and donors by spending time thanking them and sharing updates about your organization. Focus on engaging volunteers and donors through a gratitude meeting or writing a short note, the purpose of which is to thank them for their support and work on behalf of the organization.

2. End-of-Year Planning

If your organization’s fiscal year ends December 31, now is the time to start effectively planning to make your year-end goals! Areas of importance are: communication and messaging, donor stewardship and retention, new donor recruitment, and major gift strategy.

3. Corporate Giving research for 2025

As we know, corporations are flooded with requests. Because of this, they often have spent the majority or all of their giving for the year by the end of Spring. Early summer is a great time to review your organization’s current corporate giving goals and prepare the strategy and prospect list to begin making asks for 2025 in late summer/early fall.