Photos: My Life Through A Lens and (insert) Christina@wocintechchat.com, on Unsplash
The material on this page is for beginners. If you have three or more years’ experience of trust fundraising, you may find the pages on writing more useful that are in the menus associated with this page: https://goodgrantfundraising.org.uk/emotional-power-in-trust-fundraising/.
Innovation?
There’s a discussion in our sector about how far trusts like work that’s innovative. The issues are:
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Some trusts do, definitely look for innovation
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Some trusts say they like innovative work, but are actually risk averse in practice and innovation can carry risks
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Some trust fundraisers say they raise more for new work
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Some fundraisers have had a lot of success fundraising for existing services and emphasise the benefits with existing services of a track record of success, plus good case studies, quotes and photos
I personally view the claim that “trusts only fund innovation” as probably a mistaken view and I tackle that in the webpage on extreme views.
As you develop as a trust fundraiser, you’ll form your own view. However, a good starting point may be: whether you are fundraising for new or existing work, it will have its strengths/opportunities and weaknesses/threats to success.
Freshening up the application
You’ll sometimes hear people talk about trusts getting bored and liking applications that are fresh. Whatever your view of innovation, there’s something to be sais at least for trying to freshen up your applications for the work. You can freshen up an application by:
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Emphasising the bits of the work that are new
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taking the latest year’s changed numbers and building something from that
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Re-presenting the work when you rewrite last year’s proposal, bringing out different facets of the work
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If you cut last year’s work off the project and look at what’s left, it may look like something different
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New case studies, quotes and pictures often bring the work alive in slightly different ways