It's the most wonderful time of the year! Time to engage those who respond well to an End of Year Ask.
Our theme this year is: Easy as P.I.E. - Plan, Invite, Engage.
With these three steps, we believe you can easily and thoughtfully create an appeal that will be impactful and fruitful!
What is an End-of-Year Ask? | Why is it important? | Who should I invite? | Do I wait until the end of the year to invite? |
---|---|---|---|
A special invitation to a ministry giving opportunity at the end of the calendar year. | Statistics indicate:
| This appeal speaks to a different type of donor than your monthly one. It attracts irregular givers, those who only give when asked and those who tend to be higher capacity and customarily give at year end. | Nope! The earlier the better! |
October: PLAN IT OUT | Seek the Lord's DirectionDetermine an amountGather your namesChoose your method |
November: INVITE PEOPLE TO GIVE(before Thanksgiving) | Take a snapshot of your givingBuild your materialsInvite people to give!Aim for your invitations to hit the week before Thanksgiving. This puts you ahead of the pack and gives more opportunities for reminders and follow-ups. If you'd prefer a relational primer before inviting someone to give, send a snail-mail or email piece. This can be an "I'm thankful for you" card around Thanksgiving, your year-end appeal letter with a hand-written note, a prayer magnet, a postcard, etc. We've partnered with ChalkLine to make it even easier to create and send your printed pieces. Simply use their templates or create your own, send your mail-merge to ChalkLine, then schedule when you want them to snail-mail it. *We recommend sending the week before Thanksgiving. |
December: ENGAGE PERSONALLY | Follow up!Our MTD efforts are most effective when there's a personal invitation to give, then some follow-up until a decision is made. Follow-up can include text messages, phone calls, emails, snail-mail letters, greeting cards, postcards, video messages, video calls, and other Creative Ways to Connect. On Giving Tuesday, personally follow-up on your giving invitation Around December 15th, send a second follow-up Around Christmas, consider a "Merry Christmas" message (no mention of support) Around December 30th, last follow-up |
Additional Resources
- Steps 1& 2 of Revisiting Cultivation - Good resource if you tend to have a hard time inviting people to give at year-end because you feel like you haven’t done a good enough job of cultivation.
- The Easy Peasy EOYA
- Sample EOYA Letter for Backpay
- Chalkline - Reliant Magnet Templates
- Chalkline - Thanksgiving cards
- Chalkline 2024 printing/mailing deadlines
- EOY Scripts/Samples
- Fundamentals for Large Donor Asks
- Sample Timelines - EOYA
6 Comments
Jenni Saniuk
Keva Ambre Can you read over this email and let me know what we should add or change? I'd like to send something out by the end of this week if we can! If not, we may combine this email with Octobers.
Keva Ambre
Pop in for MTD Office Hours Wednesdays 2-2:30pm, EDT, starting Oct 9th
Our focus for the months of October, November and December will be the End of Year Ask, specifically the “Easy as PIE” model. But feel free to join in with any MTD question. Come regularly if you’re looking for accountability and someone to cheer you on toward your year-end goals.
Here’s the Zoom link:
https://reliantmission.zoom.us/j/84654934972?pwd=FoXyBEEsTL5DceFgkH0oRMz4r3Otn4.1
Meeting ID: 846 5493 4972
Passcode: 685307
Keva Ambre
Love this for November:
Scientists have recently discovered something Paul the apostle wrote in his letter to the Philippians around AD 62! Researchers have proven that the part of the brain that processes worry is also the same part of the brain that processes thanksgiving. Therefore making it impossible for our brains to worry and be thankful simultaneously.
Here is what Paul wrote in Philippians 4:6-7, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything with prayer and thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which passes all comprehension will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.”
When you're feeling tempted to worry this month, kick it to the curb with thankfulness!
Keva Ambre
I actually don’t encourage support-raisers to focus their EOYA on their regular givers. This appeal speaks to a different type of donor than your monthly one. It attracts irregular givers, those who only give when asked and those who tend to be higher capacity and customarily give at year end.
Here are some categories to think through:
The year-end appeal is a great opportunity to invite those people into the conversation of joining you on the great adventure by funding Kingdom work. Since monthly giving doesn’t work for everyone, we want to provide opportunities for those types of donors to engage with our ministry. The year-end appeal is an excellent opportunity for you to do just that.
Keva Ambre
"What is a year-end appeal?"
Great question!
A year-end appeal (End of Year Ask) is a special invitation to a ministry giving opportunity at the end of the calendar year.
We like to encourage Reliant staff to participate in this appeal because statistics indicate:
This appeal speaks to a different type of donor than your monthly one. It attracts irregular givers, those who only give when asked and those who tend to be higher capacity and customarily give at year end. So, it’s not really for your monthly donors.
The year-end appeal is a great opportunity to invite those people into the conversation of joining you on the great adventure by funding Kingdom work. Since monthly giving doesn’t work for everyone, we want to provide opportunities for those types of donors to engage with our ministry. The year-end appeal is an excellent opportunity for you to do just that.
Here are some donor-types this appeal usually resonates with:
Would love to talk with you about this more… and even help you figure out a simple plan to participate in the year-end giving season this year. Would you let me know if you’d like to set up a strategy call? I generally have availability Monday and Wednesday afternoons, EDT.
Keva Ambre
Jenni's PPT presentation on the EOYA
End of Year Ask Workshop.pptx