Foundation Center classes and the return of Big Duck

Hey there,

So I was in a Fundraising committee meeting for SpeakeasyDC last night (of which I am a board member), and one of my fellow board members mentioned wanting to take advantage of the resources of the Foundation Center's location in Washington DC.

It's been a while since I've been, but they have a regular schedule of classes and trainings, many of which are free. You can check out their calendar here.

And before the night was over, I signed up for several of them. The first two are ones that they provide regularly (one of which is tomorrow and they still had space for!!), and the third one is a special program:

• Introduction to Finding Funders - 1/9/13
• Introduction to Corporate Giving - 1/17/13
• Getting Your Donors to Fall in Love With You - 2/14/13

What I love about that last one, other than the Valentine's day themed title, is that the guest presenter is Farra  Trompeter, VP of Big Duck. My first experience with Big Duck was also at the Foundation Center DC last September, and it was with Principal and Founder, Sarah Durham.

You check out select tweets from that workshop on Brandraising, a model Big Duck developed, storified here. After that, I posted at my Hashtag the Arts blog, my top ten takeaways from it. This also informed a piece I wrote as prep for an #ArtsMgtChat I was hosting, Your Artists on Social Media: An Essential Part of Brandraising.

Needless to say, I'm a fan, and am grateful for the perspective I was introduced to, and am VERY excited to attend this class with Ms. Trompeter. And if you're free and available, I would highly recommend you register and sign up for it as well.

Wondering if you should attend? They recommend the following attend:

Nonprofit executive, communications, development, board members, or marketing staff. This workshop will be most helpful if you have an existing list of supporters, a website that can process donations, a database for tracking contributions, and a system for sending email blasts.

Definitely check out the class page for more info, including what you'll get from the workshop. And hopefully see you there, either for some donor love or either of the other classes.

JR