Fundraising for Aid Work, Charity and NGO

One of the most frequently asked questions to any forum for community-based organisations in developing countries, is how to fundraise.

With that frequently asked question and the difficulties of fundraising in mind, volunteers for Aid Workers Network compiled this report from information available on the Internet and from personal experiences to help small organisations in raising funds.

Every donor organisation has its own requirements and ways of evaluating requests for funding - otherwise known as proposals. Read those requirements carefully before submitting a proposal.

However, our hope is that the suggestions below may help community-based non-governmental organisations in developing countries to raise funds more successfully. A small organisation must normally take these steps before it starts fundraising, so as to be better organised and to have a greater chance of success.

The suggestions are basic guidelines only, and point people to other resources that can help them in their fundraising. They are by no means comprehensive and should not be taken as a guarantee of success.

Background

The work of community-based NGOs in developing countries is vital to millions of people. However, fundraising for these organisations is particularly difficult for several reasons including:

• There is often great competition among numerous local groups for scarce local financial resources.
• International funders are reluctant to fund community-based NGOs directly because of a perception of lack of accountability, difficulty in establishing credible references, practical issues with resource transfers and even numerous tax questions.
• It is harder for donors to fund a large number of small organisations than a small number of large organisations. So, to reduce their own workload, they tend to fund larger organisations - who sometimes then pass on funding to smaller organisations.
• Some community-based organisations lack what donors regard as the necessary structure for being able to process donations, financial or otherwise. For many organisations this becomes a “Catch 22”: resources would permit the necessary administrative changes to become more donor-compliant but they cannot get those resources without making the changes.

Basic Fundraising Concepts

Successful fundraising is often an extension of successful networking. “Networking” in this context refers to the ability of one organisation to link with others, potential donors and partners both, who share similar goals.

A good fundraising strategy is to build your own network of positive connections and to start as locally as possible. As well as organisations that share your aims, perhaps there are others that could benefit from association with your organisation's good cause. Who are the largest employers in your city, region or state? How many small businesses are in your area? Do all of these organisations know what your organisation does, and what difference your organisation makes in the community? Do they know not only about your organisation's needs (money, resources, volunteers, etc) but also about your organisation's impact, value and results?

Showing potential donors the strong link between your organisation's work and positive, measurable results is the best, most effective way to generate grants. If you can build on your reputation of making a difference in your community, and if local businesses and employers "endorse" you through their donations, your organisation will become more attractive to international donors.

For all donors, remember that relationships are not formed through request letters: call them and make an appointment to discuss your work and how it fits in with their work.

A newly established NGO relies on the reputation of its professional staff. If you don't have the professional experience, then you must have a known name, for example a celebrity, who can ask for funds. But in both cases you must invest some money first.

If you don't have much experience or good connections, then it may be better not to approach any major donor agency at this stage. Start on a small scale at grassroots level, and build up a record: then approach major funding agencies. Finally, if you are in a hurry, then a very novel idea might work. But that idea has to be very novel.

Before Writing a Proposal

Know Yourself: you should be very clear about what you are, who you are, why are you doing the work that you do and what you want to achieve. If you don't already have a statement of your overall mission and specific aims, then write them down. Sometimes, you only have 5 minutes to make a presentation to a donor, so use this time well. Having documents about your organisation helps - you can always give them a copy to take away.

Know the Donor: know who the donor is, what are its areas of interest and what it wants to achieve. What kind of help can it give you (financial, capacity building or in kind)? Finally, know their requirements and only apply if you can fulfil them. If you don't know, and can't find out through a policy document or website, then ask. The donors will always be more impressed if you can share your knowledge of their work and how it fits in to yours.

Writing a Fundraising Proposal

On this page:

• A word of caution about the format of proposals
• A generic proposal format

Many donors have their own formats for proposals. If you are thinking about approaching a particular donor, always find out first if they accept uninvited applications and if they have a format. There's nothing worse than spending all that effort on a great proposal, only to find out they won't accept it, as it does not fit in their area of focus!

Remember that a typed proposal is always better, unless the guidelines state otherwise. If you don’t have access to a computer or typewriter, hire or borrow one. You can always use the computers available in Internet cafes. The money spent will pay off in terms of how the proposal is received.

A suggested format for a proposal is given below, if the donor does not have a particular format that they prefer. You can adopt it according to the circumstances.

1. Title Page

Include the name of your organisation and your logo, if you have one. Include the title of the project and the name of the donor applied to (and any specific donor budget line, you are applying to, for example "Small Embassy Funds").

2. Summary Page

Include the title, brief description of the project (2 paragraphs), the amount requested (and total budget, if different), contact details for you and your organisation.

3. Table of Contents Page

Include page numbers, but make sure you update them if you make changes. It is being placed after the project summary page, so that the summary is the first thing a donor sees.

4. Main Proposal

A. Introduction & Justification

What are you doing and why? What is the need your project will meet? Does your understanding of the situation agree with or differ from other organisations? Who designed the project? Is it your assessment of the problem or were the stakeholders (those affected by the project) involved? If yes, how were they involved?

B. Goals & Objectives

What are you aiming for? Outline the changes or differences you hope the project will make. Write your goals and objectives as clearly as possible.

C. Activities

This is the main body of the proposal. What are you going to do? Include the number of outputs (e.g. wells built, farmers trained, seeds & tools distributed, workshops held, research produced etc). Also include details of your method – how will the activities be carried out and by whom?

D. Monitoring & Evaluation

How will you monitor your work? How will any lessons learned from monitoring feed back into future planning? Will the project beneficiaries / community be involved in monitoring? How about other external agencies or people? Will you try to monitor with the help of local Government, for example? Will you evaluate the project after it has finished to see whether the changes you expected, or others, have happened?

F. Key Personnel

Whom are you employing? List by title, not just by name and give their main role in relation to the project. One page on this should be enough.

G. Capacity Building and Community Participation

What inputs are the target communities putting in? The inputs may be in cash or in kind. If you are building capacities, is that really needed, or are you just doing it because it sounds good? Explain why it is needed, in simple language.

H. Sustainability

How will the project result carry on after the project? If you are providing training, will there be refresher training? How will you know if the skills learned are being used, or will be used in the future? If the project activities will continue after the proposal period is complete, how will you fund it?

5. Budgets

Show all costs clearly. Show the donors requested contribution. Avoid unclear budget headings, such as Miscellaneous, Contingencies and Administration etc. If the donor is an international donor, put the budget in your local currency unless the donor's format requires otherwise. Put the totals in the donor's currency or in US Dollars.

6. Conclusions

These should be in a single paragraph, summarising all that you hope to achieve. You don’t have to write this if don’t want to.

7. Appendices

Attach only those appendices which are really useful to the donor in understanding your proposal. They might include:

• A work plan and a schedule of when you will undertake which of the activities
• Letters of support from other organisations, or a list of other donor-funded projects you have carried out in the past.
• A history of your organisation's achievements
• A map of the project area
• Any technical schematics that you may have.
• A document or chart outlining your organisational structure