Define success so that donors will care deeply about your work and support you year after year.

You want your donor to say: “You had me at hello!”

A good pitch includes a success statement that hooks the donor right away and keeps them coming back year after year. The best way to do this is to effectively define success. Inspire the donor about your work immediately! 

I am offering you this information today because I just published my live training about how to define success on my podcast in season five.

To create a good success statement - ask this question first: 

What are you passionate about related to the mission and goal of the nonprofit that you serve? Think about what enticed you to make the nonprofits’ work an essential part of your life, so much so that you spend a significant amount of time devoted to its success. 

The best fundraisers are those who have a good personal story to explain why they are now devoting their life to a specific charity. You want the donor to similarly weave their personal passions and interests into the work that your nonprofit does every day.

Keep thinking about the hook that brought you to this cause - and keep trying to define success based on this hook.    

Pro tip:

Present your success statement right at the beginning of your written or oral pitch.

_________[your organization] is succeeding at __________[the major success you are pursuing]

Avoid these three mistakes

I want you to avoid three major mistakes that I see regularly. I don’t want this to be you, my nonprofit friend. 

As a reminder, I get pitched by hundreds of nonprofits a year for my clients who are philanthropists and funders. This means I see it all! And I don’t want you to fall prey to the mistakes that end up leaving money on the table. 

Below are three mistakes I notice when many of you try to define success (pun intended).  Don’t let this be you!

Mistake #1 - You bury the successes at the end or in the middle of your written or oral pitch so it’s hard to find.

Mistake #2 - You write an overly complex success statement that is filled with acronyms and numerics, which creates a feeling that the solutions are overwhelming and unclear.

Mistake #3 - You fail to include your successes at all, and describe activities that fail to have clear outcomes.

Real-life examples of good success statements (facts slightly changed to honor confidentiality):

X nonprofit and partners are launching the largest market-facing climate-smart forestry initiative in the Western US. 

Notice that this first sentence is powerful and grabs the reader right away. It’s inspiring because the funder can be part of this major effort.

We seek to build broad market recognition to quantify, accelerate, and reward climate-smart forestry practices. By 2026, over 190 private forest owners and five tribal communities, comprising 2 million acres of forestland, will be implementing climate-smart forest practices with improved recognition and value for climate-smart wood products in the marketplace.

This success statement does more than state that the nonprofit seeks to build broad market recognition. It also offers clear numbers right up front that define success.

X nonprofit will continue to work on strong implementation of Washington and Oregon’s new clean electricity policies and to engage utility commissions in the transition to a 100% clean electric grid.

This is also a strong success statement because in one sentence it explains a bold vision and a clear goal.

Real-life examples of failed success statements (facts slightly changed so as to honor confidentiality):

X is requesting funds for a Bicycle Playground costing $329,500, with $236,000 of the budget secured.  The X, on an abandoned tennis court at the X School, will be 15,000 square feet in size and have various features for kids to ride bikes, scooters, skateboards, and/or rollerblades.  The space will include rollers, tunnels, pump tracks, rock gardens, and teeter-totters that are designed not only to be fun but also to safely build confidence on a bicycle.  Additionally, there will be a green space that will feature seating areas for friends to gather and artwork developed by local students.  

The paragraph above includes numerical goals, but it fails to offer an inspiring reason for the project. It also includes lots of statements like, “safety on a bicycle” but seems to be working on much more than that. It is unclear exactly why this renovation is important specifically, and it, therefore, fails to inspire the reader upfront.

With a dramatic rise in youth engaging in risky behaviors, this is a first step to provide a positive outlet for them to engage in.

This sentence above is buried halfway through the statement and it is confusing because at the beginning it discusses helping people to ride a bike, but this seems much broader. It is hard to make the direct connection between the numbers first listed and how exactly the playground will directly stop risky behavior (or what that “risky’ behavior is that the program is trying to solve).

X nonprofit empowers youth in ten X and Y counties with camp, outdoor school, service learning, and leadership training. Our programs cultivate curiosity, environmental stewardship, and a healthy community. Last year we served over 600 students with outdoor school alone, with the potential to serve more. Other programs served an additional 1200 youth and families. 

This paragraph above is good, but it is buried in the middle of the pitch.

COVID-19 drastically impacted our programs. Keeping youth safe requires smaller groups and more staff, PPE, and sanitization supplies. We have lost $110,000 in contracted revenue just for our outdoor school. We adjusted our outdoor school from district-based to small cohort-based to continue to serve youth and families in our region. 

The paragraph above helps explain how this nonprofit is dealing with the COVID situation, but it is confusing when included in a short success statement. It makes it seem that the organization may not be able to accomplish its pitch of renovating the playground and it’s unclear how it fits into the overall statement of success.

Operating in this environment is expensive. Underserved populations in our community have the greatest need for our services but are the least able to afford them. Your gift will help us make these inclusive programs available to any child who wishes to attend.

This paragraph above is powerful but it is confusing in the context of the previous paragraphs because it appears that the ask is to create a playground for bicycles, and the pitch fails to make the connection strongly about why this type of playground is going to truly serve underserved populations in this area. Is the bicycle playground the solution? I am not convinced based on this pitch because the success statement is not included in the pitch up front.