Capital Campaign Management
Partners’ Capital Campaign Management services help a congregation build a successful plan toward their fundraising goals. Partners’ focus on the internal assets within each congregation strengthens internal fundraising efforts and can result in increased annual giving. With Partner’s support, congregations can engage civic leaders and stakeholders, partner with community institutions, and build a strong case for the public value of an historic sacred place, leading to successful community-wide fundraising efforts.
Maximize Support from Your Members and the Wider Community
No two congregations are the same, and it follows that no two successful capital campaigns can be the same. Partners works with each of its clients to design and implement a fundraising strategy that represents and celebrates the congregation’s distinctive history, heritage, and culture. Partners provides comprehensive consulting services that address both the internal and external components of a successful campaign.
The Silent Phase: Successful campaigns require a significant amount of time devoted to research and planning in order to develop and implement successful fundraising strategies for the congregation’s unique identity and situation. Partners guides congregational leadership to complete the necessary steps for a successful public phase:
- Build a strong infrastructure of leadership to steer the campaign
- Develop a compelling case statement for support
- Identify potential donors and their capacity for giving
- Design attractive campaign materials
- Implement an effective media strategy
- Identify and train volunteers
- Solicit top donors to meet 30% – 40% of the campaign goal before Public Phase
The Public Phase: After laying a strong foundation for the campaign during the Silent Phase, Partners assists the congregation to confidently launch into the Public Phase. Open solicitation of congregation and community members and the beginning of capital project work characterize the Public Phase. Partners works with the congregation in the following activities to meet (or exceed!) the campaign goal:
- Plan a public launch celebration
- Train volunteer solicitors
- Coordinate giving events
- Implement an effective follow-up strategy
- Evaluate the success of the campaign to inform future fundraising efforts
Additional Services: Along with the basic service plan for a successful capital campaign, Partners provides services that can strengthen the congregation’s reach and appeal, which are often recommended based on results from the initial study.
- Strategic Planning
- Economic Halo Effect of Sacred PlacesSM
- Space-Use Assessment and Training
- Asset-Mapping
- Design Charette
- Financial Stewardship Training
- Grant Writing
National Fund for Sacred Places: Congregations Complete Their Capital Projects in 2021
The National Fund for Sacred Places, a program of Partners for Sacred Places in collaboration with the National Trust for Historic Preservation, works to help many of America’s most significant congregations advance the care and use of their historic properties. The only program of its kind in the [...]
Fear Not! Capital Campaigns in the Time of COVID
Congregations that had begun capital campaign projects before the pandemic or those just about to launch a campaign successfully developed novel solutions. Capital campaigns are organized, planned efforts to raise substantial sums of money in a relatively short period to make capital improvements, fund new ministries, or perhaps create an endowment – and are never easy in the best of circumstances.
2019 Annual Report Now Available
A Message from our Leadership Looking back at the last year from the perspective of 2020, we are struck by something said by The Rev. James Moody, pastor of Quinn Chapel AME Church, the first African American church established in the city of Chicago: By restoring the congregation’s connection to t [...]
Webinar: Stewardship Triage & Recovery: Strengthening giving during and after a crisis
In the first few weeks of social distancing, faith communities across the country are struggling to meet their budgeted annual giving goals. Join Partners for Sacred Places for a discussion of how the basics of healthy stewardship can be applied to the congregations’ current realities, and how cler [...]