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I'm with David munch sign of the moonshine group here because I read about his business and a lot of big companies do an awful lot for nonprofits and for charities but it's part of what they do David's business serves exclusively nonprofit organizations he's a marketing and fundraising firms only clients or nonprofits is that right that's right Jeff what a great thing we think so yes what house business business it's terrific knock on wood we're very very fortunate where's the demand coming from for you well how many of you well we work in all of the major nonprofit sub sectors so that means that we've worked with clients who are in higher education colleges and universities hospitals and healthcare systems also independent schools as well as arts and culture we get a lot of calls from Human Services organizations so it's really diverse mix so what do you do for all these people who are trying to do well well there are many projects that relate to capital campaigns that's really the big transformational signature project of a fundraising consulting firm we are more than just a fundraising consulting firm as you noted we're also communications firm and we also help clients with strategy and implementation so we may hear from clients when they have major initiatives such as a building campaign or something where they're really looking to take things to the next level those usually are capital campaigns usually a couple of years two or three years or no yes it depends so small organizations two to three years is generally the timeframe larger more complex institutions those hospitals healthcare systems and universities you're easily looking at a 7 to 10 year campaign how do you keep it going for even 3 or 5 years well it requires many many things including plans to give volunteers right which are the essential ingredient in capital campaigns we have to give the volunteers a great experience and we have to give them an experience that has a beginning a middle and an end so if you're talking about a campaign that will last the better part of the decade you should plan in advance that you're going to have to turnover and expand and augment that initial leadership group do some clients say oh we never thought of that sure the other thing the right place I mean yeah the other thing I would say is that half or more of the campaign will be in what's called the quiet phase or the silent phase so that is a different allocation of resources capital campaign will provide 90% plus of the funds from 10% or fewer of the donors so there's a lot of work in the background before you get to the the big community phase so the quiet phase what would you do to help them quietly in the quiet phase coach them on how to ask for money yes that's a big part of it but prior to that we say campaigns are won or lost in the planning so there are a few different planning stages before you really get down to the business of asking for money and reaching out to increasing numbers of prospective donors so we'll typically start with some sort of a feasibility or campaign planning study so you'll have long-term clients we do that's part of the reason why you know business is good we have as a professional services firm we have a combination where there are typically a few large long-term projects multiple year projects and then we have a series of short-term engagements you could have a six-week development communications assessment and social media audit you could have a project to do a board retreat or a training workshop and everything in between we get a lot of calls which we love repeat calls from clients we've done a number of communications projects for some clients and they love the unified brand look that we work with them to establish so it just makes sense once they get into a good rhythm with us that they're gonna pick up the phone and call us again how do you train board members and volunteers to ask people they know for money whatever the cause is well what do you tell them well one of the things that we tell them is not to focus on how they feel when they ask for money but rather to focus on how they feel when they give money Americans lead the world in generosity so it feels good to give and we need to remind volunteers that because otherwise they tend to get gripped by fear anxiety money sure so they're gonna think now maybe I'll make this I'll help this person feel good about supporting Big Brothers Big Sisters absolutely absolutely and rather than just focusing on the institution's needs the best fundraising conversations will focus on the donors needs and where they line up right so how we can help a donor fulfill their objectives whether it's for larger scale philanthropy or the simple act of making a contribution to help a nonprofit keep the lights on there's a campaign that comes to mind that you did you are happy with and did you point to with pride yeah well you know I'm gonna talk about one of the smaller projects because just like the volunteers need to have a beginning in a middle and an end we as consultants you know especially these days nonprofits tend to be professionally staffed they have their own in-house talent and because of the internet we're in we're in the information economy the knowledge economy it used to be the case that the consultants would come in and maybe take up residence in the nonprofit's office space and really be fully embedded sometimes even on a full-time basis nowadays the consultant may be needed for pieces or for that planning and the quiet phase so to see a campaign all the way through we did a campaign a few years ago for a great nonprofit theater company in Hoboken called mile square theater and mile square theater was operating in a black box 110 seat space without a lease in an art center in town and they they lost the opportunity to continue to perform there and there was a new opportunity uptown in a new building which was residential condos and they had the opportunity to take the retail spot so there we had to do a relatively quick right because this organization is not getting operating income from their performances so we had to do a relatively quick campaign it started at $500,000 and then when we really got in and started working with them and started looking at the numbers it came much closer to being a million dollar campaign and that was very successful we took a lot of pride in it first of all because I had previously lived in Hoboken so I knew some of the people who were involved personally and also because this particular client needed help with more than just the fundraising piece and even more than just the fundraising and the communications and so it was an early opportunity for me to test the theory of our firm and our four buckets of service so we got very involved I got personally involved in helping them to secure construction financing from a local community bank BCB Bank was terrific in that particular case and without that they would have had to wait up to five years to collect all the pledges that they raised in this capital campaign so your four buckets of service I like the phrase what are your four buckets of service fundraising communications strategy and implementation you said in this case you help them get a loan which bucket is that into or is that a new bucket strategy and implementation what you said strategy and implementation you smiled I've never seen anybody smile at that phrase hey are you an accountant no but I'm married to one because you're so organized and methodical about this well I could see why clients need you because they can get all hopped up about the cars or the budget or 800 different things well I credit my team my staff at the moonshine group for a lot of that organization and a lot of that follow through and for keeping me organized you have to have a certain temperament to be able to change subject matters throughout the day throughout the week and continue to compartmentalize and have the proper command of each organizations details because from one nonprofit to the next uniqueness is is the rule how do you do that David compartmentalize between all these projects what's worked for you well I think it's just you know you can have energy in a business setting and too much energy without another crucial ingredients which is focus can can run rampant you're all over the place so I just try to stay grounded and focused and just keep coming back to you know what do I need to be worried about at this at this moment in time where do you take the business from here could you have more clients if you hired more employees if you could find them as the man-hug demand demand is pretty good so we we have a pipeline and some probably the most important piece of the pipeline is those multi-year projects we may have a three year campaign we may be engaged a year at a time so so the opportunity to renew the client base when those contracts and projects turnover is very important but at any particular time we'll have a pipeline that's about equal to the size of the client base and those opportunities can take months to come to fruition or not and sometimes it's the ones that call you and they are really hot to trot and then you get in there and you talk to them and realize that as an outsider you can bring that fresh perspective and sometimes those circumstances will change during the sales process I think that's scoping out what the client's needs are and not taking it for face value that what they tell you in the first call first of all there's multiple stakeholders at every nonprofit organization so the person you're talking to will have an important perspective but it's one person's perspective much of the time so really the other scenario is the clients who tell us that they have a much longer process but they're getting ahead of the game and so forth and sometimes those are the organizations that will call you and want you to start on the first of the month