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Welcome to the LACGP Newsletter. This e-newsletter is sent out on a monthly basis. The newsletter provides links to this page. Please see below for the items that appeared in the June 2023 issue. Thank You for a Successful WRPGC 2023 On behalf of the Southern California Charitable Gift Planners (Formerly LACGP), we extend a warm thank you for attending the 2023 Western Regional Planned Giving Conference. We were thrilled to have you join us and we hope that you found the event valuable and informative. To our sponsors, keynote speakers, and session presenters: You made this conference truly special, and we are grateful for your support and expertise. The insights you shared will greatly benefit our nonprofits and impact our communities. To our attendees: You continue to make this conference worth having, and we were glad you were there! Thank you for attending this event. We truly appreciate your support and look forward to seeing you in 2024! Anticipating What’s on the Minds of Donors Featured Sponsor Article by PNC Institutional Asset Management® PNC Institutional Asset Management ® provides planned giving investment and administrative services for nonprofit organizations. Potential donors' knowledge of your organization and mission will vary. You want donors to find value in your story. Below are donors’ questions and tips on how to best answer. Describe your organization? Donors want to make sure their values align with your mission. Always have an “elevator pitch” - a concise and compelling description of your organization and mission. As your organization grows, update your story. End your pitch by asking for support. Why are you different? Donors want to understand what sets your organization and its mission apart. Distinguish your organization from similar organizations: programmatically, culturally, operationally, and philosophically. Strong explanations can make the difference in funding. Why should I give to your organization? Donors want to understand how your organization will translate their gift into real impact. Have an updated and straightforward strategic plan to share. Every member of your organization—from volunteers to board members—needs to properly convey your why. Explain why your mission is critical, how your organization achieves its mission, and how your mission makes an impact. Include highlights and factual data. Do you measure and communicate your impact? Access to impact data enables the donor to see the power of their gifts. Transparent reporting increases donors’ confidence in your organization. Donors want to see that data plays an integral role in your organization’s decision-making, strategic planning, and donor acquisition practices. Share information via newsletters, email marketing, annual reports, etc. Who makes financial decisions, and what is your board’s composition? Donors want to understand your decision-making processes and any support/guidance your organization receives. Focus on who is responsible for financial decisions, who safeguards the process, and who oversees it. Share any procedures you have in place, including board succession planning and measures to instill board engagement. How is your financial health? Donors want to know if your organization has the cash flow to sustain its mission and operations. Donors also want to understand the diversification and concentration of your revenues. Share your 990s, audited financial statements, and annual reports. Additionally, you might consider using Schedule O on your 990 filing to provide supplemental information. It is important to demonstrate all aspects of your financial health. How do you protect donors’ information? Holding a significant amount of donor data makes nonprofit organizations a prime target for cyber criminals. Explain the safeguards you have implemented to protect donors. Familiarize yourself with PNC’s 5 Es of Cybersecurity(Establish, Enforce, Educate, Empower, and Evolve) and be ready to communicate your plan to donors. Who is your typical donor? Donors want to know that there are others like themselves contributing to your cause. They want to know if your support comes from individuals, government sources, corporations, or foundations, as well as if there is any operational/earned revenue. A representative donor list and key demographic information is valuable when answering this inquiry. Accentuate your donor base’s diversity, while also sharing their unity in supporting your nonprofit. To learn more, visit pnc.com/nonprofits. The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. (“PNC”) uses the marketing name PNC Institutional Asset Management® for the various discretionary and non-discretionary institutional investment, trustee, custody, consulting, and related services provided by PNC Bank, National Association (“PNC Bank”), which is a Member FDIC, and investment management activities conducted by PNC Capital Advisors, LLC, an SEC-registered investment adviser and wholly-owned subsidiary of PNC Bank. PNC does not provide legal, tax, or accounting advice unless, with respect to tax advice, PNC Bank has entered into a written tax services agreement. PNC Bank is not registered as a municipal advisor under the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. “PNC Institutional Asset Management” is a registered mark of The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. Investments: Not FDIC Insured. No Bank Guarantee. May Lose Value. ©2023 The PNC Financial Services Group, Inc. All rights reserved The Greatest Gifts Come from Wealth, Not Disposable Income By Andy Ragone We LOVE our major gift donors… So does every other nonprofit in town. Think about it… a small pool of generous donors being sought after by every capital campaign endeavor or every frontline fundraiser who has been tasked with relationship building and convincing these generous donors why our particular cause is the most important. Ooof. Now that is a challenge! Furthermore, the spoils often go to the organizations with the greatest resources available to reach out and steward these mission-aligned and affluent unicorns. Let’s take a deep breath, step back and ask, “What if there was another way?” What if we found and prioritized an otherwise untapped revenue stream that could provide transformational amounts of income from not only our major donors but through a vast network of supporters that have not yet been relationally stewarded? Planned Giving, or Gift Planning, allows donors to make larger gifts than what they may have been able to give during their lifetimes. The average amount given to nonprofits in the form of a bequest is $70,000. Of course, some bequests, beneficiary designation gifts, or other complex planned gifts can be much larger depending on each donor’s background, financial and family situation. With an approximated $140 Trillion held in American wealth, less than 3% is held in cash or equivalent. That means more than 97% of American wealth is held in non-cash assets, such as real estate, equities, business interests and retirement plans. Nearly 30% of American wealth is held in retirement accounts, and more than $10 Trillion is held in traditional IRAs. What if we could empower our donors to give from this wealth instead of disposable income? When we ask for cash donations, we are asking donors to give from that less than 3% category of American wealth. That's a ridiculously thin slice of the American wealth pie. We are also asking donors to give from the scarcity of limited disposable income instead of the abundance of wealth that comes from non-cash assets. This is the reason why so many fundraisers work hard to steward major gift donors, since they are the ones with enough income to give larger amounts. Our fundraising efforts are focused on where we think the money is. But… What if our fundraising efforts could tap into a much larger reservoir of wealth? Pursuing major cash donors often rules out stewarding those who give less than a certain threshold. Since they don’t give large amounts of cash, we decide to spend our time elsewhere. However, what we as frontline fundraisers might be missing is the vast estate wealth that many of these smaller cash donors have. They might be living on a fixed retirement income or have lifestyle expenses that measure closely against their income, so donating from said income might be quite challenging for them. Yet, these can be the millionaires next door, living modestly with estates that easily go into the tens of millions. If Americans have most of their wealth tied up in non-cash assets, doesn’t it make sense that the greatest gifts will not come from disposable income but from these assets? Moreover, if there are greater tax advantages that come with giving to nonprofits from asset wealth–incidentally, a cash gift is the most expensive way to give–then isn’t it reasonable to assert that building a robust planned giving program is worthwhile? After all, asset wealth is where the money is. Helping our donors prepare for the future of their estates is the essence of charitable gift planning. We help these mission-aligned donors, as they aim to help their families and become more philanthropic along the way. Planned giving opens a whole new stream of future income that would have otherwise been transferred only to family and the government. The greatest gifts come from wealth and not disposable income. The greatest gifts are asset wealth gifts… estate wealth gifts… planned gifts… because that is where the money is. What could we accomplish if we helped our much broader pool of donors discover how to give from their wealth? New Member Interview Questions With Jennifer Henry, Executive Director, Links for Life, Bakersfield, CA What is interesting to you about planned giving? — Planned giving is the cultivation of community trust and organizational excellence. We want our planned giving donors to be an extension of our organization's legacy. Together we provide services and establish trust that no other organization in Kern County provides to those facing breast cancer. Our interest in the process focuses on making these connections grow, flourish, and extend into new spheres of influence and giving circles throughout the community. a. Do you have a particular passion in the field? — Community relations and donor cultivation have always gone hand-in-hand for our organization. Our goal is to grow our endowment by cultivating and securing more planned giving donors to ensure long-term future funding sustainability. b. What do you feel is the most important thing you can learn this year? As philanthropy, marketing and outreach continue to evolve, we want to understand our donors’ priorities. Whether it’s recognition at community events, social media collaborations and/or endorsements. We want to learn how they would like their legacy to be reflect within our organization. Kern County is a tight-knit community, and we want to ensure our planned giving assets are well recognized and utilized. c. How can LACGP help you accomplish this year’s goals? — We believe that by establishing a stronger connection with LACGP and its members we can grow professionally as well as individually. We believe it is important to look outside of our normal sphere of influence for new perspectives. Sharing best practices with our peers is one of the most effective ways to self-evaluate and open doors to creativity and progress. Jennifer Henry has been the Executive Director for Links for Life in Bakersfield, California since 2005. It was then that Sharyn Woods, founder of Links for Life, was looking to retire. But she wanted to ensure that the organization was in good hands. That’s when she approached Henry and asked her to manage the day-to-day operations of the non-profit as Executive Director. Under Henry’s leadership, Links for Life has led fundraising efforts that have resulted in the organization being able to invest more than $10 million for the women, men, and families facing breast cancer throughout the Kern County community. As the only breast cancer non-profit in Kern County, 100% of the proceeds stay local. Henry graduated with her Bachelors of Art in Marketing from the American College of the Applied Arts in 1993. The joy of her life is her family. She and her husband Matt have two children. For more information about Links for Life visit: https://linksforlife.org/ or to contact Jennifer: https://linksforlife.org/contact/ |
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