Episode 97: Making the Case for Funding
Funders fund programs, not businesses. It's not their responsibility to cover business expenses, yet 90% of Founders and Executive Directors expect them to. Keeping them in poverty mode. Learn what the Funder's Perspective is, why it matters, and what you should be asking funders for so your proposals are funded (and how to cover the rest!).
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🔦 NONPROFIT SPOTLIGHT 🙌🏿
Project Joy Part 1
👉🏿https://www.projectjoyusa.com/
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🚀 RESOURCES TO HELP YOU RUN A SUCCESSFUL NONPROFIT 🚀
How to Demonstrate Measurable Impact
https://fusion.amberwynn.net/product/how-to-demonstrate-measurable-impact/
90 Days to a Profitable Nonprofit
https://www.amberwynn.net/profitable-nonprofit
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Podcast Transcript
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to On Air with Amber Wynn, where nonprofit leaders learn to fuse passion and commitment with proven business strategies to create long-term funding impact and sustainability. And now here's your host and resident, Philanthropreneur, Amber Wynn.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
Good morning fam. It's Amber Wynn, Philanthropreneur, your girl on the scene. And today we're talking about justification. Justification. You say justification, I say making the case for funding. Listen, I can't tell you how many times potential clients come to me and say, Amber, I just got my 501(c)(3). How can I get a grant? To which I say, baby, you shouldn't be focusing on a grant. And I know it doesn't make sense because your goal is to make an impact in your community, and so you need funding. But the reality is nonprofits have to show funders that there's a need. It's not enough to have a 501(c)(3) tax exempt status. Listen, those come a dime a dozen every year about a thousand new nonprofits are incorporated. So the reality is that there is competition for a small pot of money. So in today's episode, we're going to talk about justification and making the case for funding. When we return, we're going to dive in deep and just get to some of that good juiciness.
Speaker 3 (01:32):
If your grants aren't getting funded, it could be because the funder can't see how your programs are making an impact in your community. Get the how to demonstrate impact workbook to quantify the work you're doing in your community in a way that a funder can see a potential return on your investment. Funders need proof that your organization will use their grant dollars to improve your community. That proof is called impact, and impact is quantified through measurable outcomes. Leverage my 30 years of program development experience to help increase your chance of securing funding. Order your copy today.
Speaker 2 (02:07):
Welcome back to On Air with Amber Wynn. Today we are talking about justification and making the case for funding. There's always more applications than there is money, and it's important for nonprofit leaders, whether you are a startup, you've been around a while, you're established to understand that a funder's purpose is not to fund your organization. It's not a nonprofit is a business. It's just a business with a philanthropic purpose. And so the funder's purpose is to have their funding goals accomplished, their mission accomplished. And so what they do is they partner with qualified nonprofits to help them accomplish their goals. And I think it's important for nonprofit leaders to understand that because when you go in from the funder's perspective, then you better align your proposals with the funder's funding goals. So when we talk about justification, it's not enough to say, we need money for rent and we need money for programs.
(03:14):
It's is there a need in your community? And people will say, of course there's a need. We've got high rate of crime, we've got a high rate of drug use, we've got sex trafficking, we've got all the perils that our communities are dealing with. But when you are competing against other nonprofits, it's important for you to be able to justify that request and trust and believe successful nonprofits know that and they are doing that. So what do you mean by justification? Amber? Let me tell you to justify a need is to be able to provide proof. So if you go to your government agency website, county state level, even on the federal level, and you type in statistics for sex trafficking and you put in your zip code or you put in your county, that data's going to come up and it's going to say, Inglewood's rate of abduction for sex trafficking and Hawthorne's rate for abduction and sex trafficking.
(04:24):
And you look at that and you look at the community that you serve. Is your community experiencing whatever cause you're supporting at a higher rate? If so, that's justification. You cite that source and you put that in all of your documentation. If there are agencies that specifically provide research on what it is that you're doing, cite that source. If there's a subject matter expert, a person whose research focuses on that, that's what their PhD is in, cite that person and the information should prove that what you're saying is true. We have a higher incidence of this or we have a lower success rate of this, and therefore we have a need for services. And that's your justification. It's not enough just to say we have a lot of kids out here who don't have homes and that's not enough. Funders are looking for documented justification.
(05:25):
So when we're talking about making the case for funding, that's what we're talking about. It's you doing the research to find the subject matter experts to find the resources, the databases, the articles, all of those things that prove to a funder that the work that you're doing and how you're doing it, it's not enough that it's just the work that you're doing. Remember, nine times out of 10, there's going to be one, two, maybe five other agencies doing the same work. If you're coming into this space and you're doing the same thing as another organization, then you've got to demonstrate to a funder why what you are doing and how you're doing is different than your competitors. So you're going to need justification for that. For example, let's just say right now we're dealing with this new generation. I don't even know what the letter is.
(06:17):
It used to be zenio. I don't know what comes after Z Anyway, let's just say we're talking about this new generation and you're talking about doing outreach to them. Back in the day when we were doing outreach to youth, we would go to the parks or we would go to the high schools or we would go to the churches. If you were competing against me today, you would say, Hey, we're doing outreach to these youth. We're using Instagram. We're using whatever social media that these youth are using. You would then be more competitive than I am because there's a higher likelihood that you're going to reach the youth because you are reaching them where they are. Versus my old school method, kids aren't in the parks anymore, right? You can say you're going to go online and do some ads where the kids who are on the internet playing with each other, we'll be able to see you.
(07:15):
I'm not doing that. So you've got to be able to justify not only the need, but how you're going to provide your services and how it's unique. That's so important. I just really wanted to share that with you guys because it's not enough to have a 501(c)(3) tax exempt status. Anyone in the space has that. It's not enough to say that you're going to make a difference. Everyone's going to say that when you are competing against other nonprofits, you have to be able to justify the need. So we're going to come back and focus on a question from my community. I think it's important for you guys to be able to ask your questions, but before we go into that, we're going to spend a little time with this product that I have out for you. It's called 90 Days to a Profitable Nonprofit, and it is your road map for all things nonprofit. If you're unsure about how to run your nonprofit as a business, here's your solution right here.
(08:22):
Are you struggling to fund your programs? Can't get a grant to save your life. Most consultants will share the what of how to start a nonprofit or how to fundraise. They may even share the why, but they don't share the how because that's where they make their money. Now, I'm not hating. I'm a business woman too, but I've been where you are trying to make the world a better place, struggling to keep the doors open up to the wee hours of the night writing grants and doing whatever needed to be done. And because I've walked in your shoes, I'm not here to make you spin your wheel, waste your time or your hard earned money. We ain't got time for that. The world needs you. I'm here to show you how to transform that pit. You keep dumping your hard earned money into a profitable nonprofit.
(09:12):
I take my 30 years of nonprofit experience as a founder, executive director, program developer, grant writer in funder, giving out over $7 million annually in grants, and I save you literally thousands of dollars in hundreds of hours. I walk you through setting up your nonprofit organization so that you can be generating enough revenue to cover your monthly expenses in just 90 days. How would that feel? Not paying bills from your personal bank account. I share my insider secret tips, tricks of the trade and provide you with a step-by-step road map on how to turn your bootstrap organization into a profitable nonprofit. Within six months, you could be generating enough revenue to pay your salary or fully fund your programs. The choice is yours, but you have to get the blueprint. And it took me three years to develop it, but it's here and it's going to change your life.
(10:09):
Join my other successful clients who are just like you, full of passion and determination, but they had no idea all that it takes to run and fund a successful nonprofit. Now they're winning grants and drawing a salary, and they know what it is that they're supposed to be doing to run a successful nonprofit. They're no longer making it up as they go. They have the road map and they're clear about next steps. And I want that for you too. So what do you get in this course? You'll walk away with knowledge, products, processes, and systems, not just a bunch of promises, but exactly what you need to turn your organization into a profitable nonprofit. I promise you don't need grants. What you need is a solid infrastructure, and this course is going to give you all of that and more. And what's more it comes with the money back guarantee.
(11:02):
So go ahead, click the link below to register for this course. Welcome back. You're on air with Amber Wynn, and now it's time for you to ask your questions. Ask Amber, is the part of the episode where you get to ask your pressing questions? Listen, I'm here for you and I have tons of knowledge, but I want to make sure that the information that I'm giving you is information that you can use. So if you're interested in asking any questions, you can hit me up on any of my socials. I'm on Instagram, you can visit me on my website, you can email me at amber@amberwynn.net, but I'm here for you. And today's question comes from Los Angeles. The question is, hi Amber. My name is Tenese calling Los Angeles. I just got my 501(c)(3). Hey, congratulations, Tenese. I recently posted a fundraiser on Facebook. Some lady reached out to me saying that I needed to shut down my fundraiser because we have the same organization name.
(12:09):
She said she's been around longer, so I have to change my name. Is this true? So the short answer is probably because if you're using another organization's name or if it can be misconstrued as another organization, then potentially you could be impacting their business practices and could be negatively impacting their brand or finances. For example, since this organization was already incorporated, if you come out with fundraisers, people may be sending money to you instead of them. So what should have happened is you should have ran your name through three agencies to check for name availability first. You should have ran it through the US Department of Commerce to make sure that there were no trademark trademark names. Secondly, you should have run it through the Secretary of State's business search section. You put the name in the Secretary of State's business search, and if it didn't come up, then that should have been okay for your state.
(13:25):
And then finally, you wanted to run the domain name through who is domain lookup and to see if that's available. So if you had run your name through those three particular searches, you should have come up because generally speaking, the Secretary of State is not going to allow you to form a corporation with an organization's name just because of that reason. They don't want people getting into litigation over, this is my name and this is my name and how it's being used. There's a big lawsuit going on with kids cars for kids right now for the same reason. So try and do a name check, have a conversation with the woman, but more than likely, yes, if she was already incorporated first, then if she were to take you to court, then more than likely the judge would say that you are infringing upon her rights as an organization and potentially damaging her brand and ability to generate finances. I'm sorry, but definitely take a look into that. Alright, so that was Ask Amber. Now we get to move into my favorite time of the episode where I get to shine the light on some amazing nonprofit. In this month's episode, we are breaking down a conversation I've had with an amazing nonprofit leader in four parts. The nonprofit is Project Joy, and we're going to spend some time with Kim Watson. So let's go listen to Kim Watson of Project Joy.
Speaker 4 (15:22):
And I'm going to take you on the journey from cradle to career. But in the cradle stage, we're working with prenatal families and we just launched a pilot with a collaborative that we co-founded called the Black Maternal Alternative Care Alliance. So that's the cradle side. So under youth development, we have mentors. They're young adults, college students, African-American, primarily mentors who go to elementary schools, and they provide that positive presence on campus. And in addition to that academic enrichment in addition to that structured play and sport. So it's hitting a couple of different key components that our young children need, and that's our effort to break the pipeline to prison, that school pipeline. So we're breaking that by putting positive young men, high engagement with positive young men on the school grounds to take the youth development a step further, once our children in our community are in high school to early adulthood, it's really ages 16 to 24 that I'm talking about. Now we have an artificial intelligence program. So we've been running that program for three years. We call it youth AI. So under the Youth AI, it's career exploration. It's a very immersive type program, very experiential. They're learning by playing, by putting their hands on different AI tools and software. They're learning what AI is and what it is not dispelling the myths around it. But also our purpose with the youth AI is to equip our black and brown children with the knowledge they need about the career fields they're interested in.
Speaker 2 (17:32):
Welcome back, you're on air with Amber Wynn, and we're doing what we do best, which is to support the most amazing individuals on the planet like Kim Watson of Project Joy. I'm so excited to be in your space today. We talked about justification, and I just really want you to understand that once you get your 501(c)(3), it's not automatic grants aren't sitting there waiting for you. It is not the funder's responsibility to fund a nonprofit. That's not why they are in existence. Funders look for organizations who are qualified, who if they invested money into your organization, they are more than likely to get a return on their investment. How do they determine whether or not a nonprofit will give them a return on the investment? It's based on the justification, your ability to make a case for need and your ability to demonstrate that you can meet that need.
(18:31):
So when you're joining the ranks of successful nonprofits, you understand that in order to be viewed as a qualified organization, you've got to have proof, which is documentation, either from a subject matter expert or an agency that collects data. All right? So thank you so much for joining me this week. If you enjoyed today's episode, be sure to share it with somebody in your community. Be sure to subscribe, like all of that good stuff. And until next week, I want you to take care of yourself, like you take care of your community. See you next week.
Speaker 1 (19:10):
Thanks for listening. If you enjoyed this episode, subscribe and leave a review on iTunes. Head over to www.amberwynn.net/podcast for this and resources mentioned in today's podcast.
