Donor Stewardship: Brad Ton on Why a Human Note Beats a Polished One

The update your donors remember is rarely the polished one. Brad Ton is a senior account executive at FundMiner. He studied sports marketing at Indiana University and sold tickets for the Chicago Bulls and the Indiana Pacers before a sales boot camp through TechPoint, an Indianapolis nonprofit, introduced him to fundraising through OneCause. After eight or nine years in fundraising technology, he moved to the donor relations side, where he works with community foundations and hospital foundations on what happens after the gift. Sarah describes the email she suggests to the rural nonprofits she works with. Open a blank screen and write that you just saw Susie come in, over the moon, because they finished her porch. Brad's first reaction was that there's no ask in it. Send that out. Then he pointed out that before they hit record, Sarah had asked for his mailing address so she could mail him a handwritten note. "That's everything," he said. If stewardship keeps waiting for a free afternoon, this conversation is about sending it anyway. In this episode Why donor relations gets treated as work that doesn't raise money, and why Brad says that couldn't be further from the truth Sarah's porch email, and why the less fancy the update, the better Ten handwritten notes or 500 newsletter emails, and what makes a touch point count A few ideas to apply at your nonprofit Count last week's new donors. Write each one a short note about one thing their gift touched, with no ask. Keep a running bank of small stories as they happen, so impact updates and year-end reports never start from a blank page. Put stewardship on the daily list, not the someday list. Brad keeps his short, works it in order, and crosses things off. Resources Mentioned Connect with Brad FundMiner: https://www.fundminer.com/ LinkedIn:   / bradton   Connect with Sarah Nonprofit411: https://nonprofit411.org LinkedIn:   / nonprofit411   The Generosity Roadmap, a free class: https://nonprofit411.org/generosity_map Chapters 00:00 Introduction 01:40 The hobby question 04:02 From ticket sales to nonprofit tech 08:24 Fundraising isn't begging 09:40 What happens after the gift 12:05 Technology that frees us to be human 13:08 The porch email 13:57 Why stewardship gets pushed aside 15:21 One email, one reader 17:30 A bank of stories 18:07 Making it a habit 19:08 The bar for human connection 20:02 Ten notes or 500 emails 21:45 Count your new donors 23:13 Technology as a habit tool 24:35 Human is better than done 25:25 Video messages, stumbles and all 27:34 Where to find Brad 28:12 Stack days