I am a planner. I’m almost obsessive about it. If it’s not on a calendar somewhere, it’s probably not going to get done. Naturally, it’s helpful for me to plan out my fundraising, so I thought I’d pass along my system for planning out my fundraising.

Here is what you do:

There are free calendars all over the Internet, or you can use Microsoft Outlook as well. Print blank calendar pages for March, April, and May, or whatever time frame you need for your event (I went ahead and examples in a PDF and attached them – just open and print.)

Put your important deadlines on there – For example, your re-commitment date, final charge date, etc.

The basic method I use is to plan a fundraising activity For each week, whether it’s letter writing, sending email, holding an event, etc. Start with the basics of letter writing, emailing, using Facebook and Twitter, then put some events in there like a garage sale or restaurant fundraiser. Get all your fundraising activities on your calendar, then stick to your plan! If you have it planned out and it’s realistic, you will be far more likely to take the steps you need to make that fundraising goal. As a bonus,

Take a look at the sample calendar I have attached, and you will see what a great tool this is. Print that baby and put it where you will see it every day.

Sample Fundraising Calendar

Blank Monthly Calendar Pages, March – May 2010

Do you have some cool fundraising methods you’d like to share? Leave a comment below!

This entry was posted on Thursday, March 11th, 2010 at 7:06 am and is filed under Fundraising Tips. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.