How to Harness the Power of Planned Giving to Reach

or Exceed Your Campaign Goals

Minnesota Planned Giving CouncilPrepared by Michelle Janssen, CFRE

November 2, 2010

– Frame the role of planned giving within the context of planning and executing a campaign• A bit of history• Rules of the Road

– Discuss tools developed in Valparaiso University’s $200 million campaign to drive endowment goals using planned giving

Purpose for the Session

In this session, I want to take the following

information back to my office about this topic:1.2.3.4.

Parking Lot Exercise

Historical Perspective• Prior to 1990, deferred gifts rarely encouraged as

gifts for capital campaigns/projects• Deferred gifts that did materialize during the

campaign counting period were counted, but the goals for the effort were not set with this source in mind

* Robert Sharpe/Sharpe Group, Memphis, TN

Planned Giving in Context of Planning and Executing a

Campaign*

Recent History• Comprehensive counting has spawned campaigns

that count annual renewable as well as planned giving towards the campaign

• Bequests and other planned gifts can account for 35% of total campaign goal

* Robert Sharpe/Sharpe Group, Memphis, TN

Planned Giving in Context of Planning and Executing a

Campaign*

Comprehensive counting comes with its share of problems:

• Difficult to set goals for ‘realized’ bequests unless you have a mature planned giving program

• Hard to attribute dollars actually raised from those emerging from actual solicitation activity

• Challenging to communicate the success of the campaign to both internal and external consistencies

* Robert Sharpe/Sharpe Group, Memphis, TN

Planned Giving in Context of Planning and Executing a

Campaign*

– Ability to set larger goals

– Opportunity to grow endowments through documented and matured bequests

– Ability to recognize donors for larger gifts by incorporating an outright gift plus a planned gift

Why Incorporate Planned Giving Into a Campaign?

Planned Gifts utilized in the context of a campaign• Bequests–Documented/revocable–Matured

• Life insurance policies• Charitable gift annuities• Lead and Remainder trusts

Definitions and Road Rules:

CASE (Council for Advancement and Support of Education)

• Count matured estates at face value

• Report irrevocable gifts at face and present value

• Report bequests separately from outright and irrevocable gifts– Discount value of bequests from younger donors

Definitions and Road Rules:

Fundraising model sustains a continuous campaign

• Three years of campaign counting – (five years in most recent effort)

• Two years of campaign preparation and ‘rest’

Campaigns and Planned Giving at Valparaiso University

– Lighting the Way raised $37 million on a $35 million goal• Planned gifts were not intentionally sought, but were

counted as part of the comprehensive counting

– Three Goals, One Promise raised $121 million on a $75 million goal• Introduced the ‘triple ask’

– Our Valpo, Our Time raised $236 million on a $200 million goal• Planned giving intentionally incorporated into campaign

planning and execution

Results of Valpo’s Fundraising Model

− Endowment goal for Our Valpo, Our Time totaled $80 million

• $50 million (outright)• $30 million (documented bequest expectancies)

− In order to document $30 million in bequest expectancies, several tools were created to support field officers

• Top 700 strategy• Triple Ask• Project Mission (3,2,1)

Results of Valpo’s Fundraising Model

– Applied gift capacity of $100,000 to $1 million

– Coupled with an affinity score (medium to high affinity) to a prospect pool segment

• Surfaced the best 700 prospects for cultivation and solicitation activity during the campaign quiet phase

• All 700 prospects were assigned during the campaign

Top 700 Strategy

Request for the prospect to consider:

- Best annual renewable gift

- Best pledged (outright) gift to support one of the campaign objectives

- Document plans to include Valparaiso University in estate• All three elements count as the total gift both for

recognition as well as campaign counting purposes

Triple Ask

- Triple Ask is not ‘one size fits all’- Tools were needed to support field officers to

effectively ‘set up’ the triple ask in order to optimize success• PM3-Focused on alignment of mission, vision and values

• PM2-Focused on campaign objectives

• PM1-Solicitation using triple ask- Solicitation by written proposal

Project Mission (3,2,1)

- Planned Giving watch list- Tracked ‘maybes’ or soft declines to the third leg of the

triple ask

- The ‘Presumptive Thank’- Created a predictive model to surface prospects

receptive to inquiries about bequest giving

- Deployed retired university president to make phone calls with two aims:

1. Thank donors for recent gifts 2. Inquire about the inclusion of the university in current or

future estate plans• Positive responses assigned to field officers for follow up• ‘Maybes’ tracked in planned giving watch list

Other Planned Giving Strategies

Questions?Discussion