October 15, 2009 ADVERTISEMENT Did you know...31% of all nonprofits offer bonus compensation to the CEOs/presidents. See how they earned it in the new NonProfit Times 2009 Nonprofit Organizations Compensation & Benefits Report. Order your subscription today! Click here. In This Edition: The Concentric Circles Of Prospect Research Demographics ... Facts regarding Baby Boomers you need to know Fundraising ... Hispanics online continue expediential growth Donors ... Alternatives for workplace giving ADVERTISEMENT   Smithsonian is one of the largest and most influential publications in the nation. Smithsonian educates, excites, entertains and inspires its readers with powerful articles on the arts, environment, history, technology and pop culture. Readers are highly educated, active and engaged; they get involved and stay involved. Whether donating money or time, Smithsonian subscribers respond. Contact Belkys Reyes at (914) 925-2406.    NPT Jobs NPT Resource Directory Subscribe to NPT NPT Latest Edition NPT Advertising Contact Us      Please forward NPT Instant Fundraising to your colleagues so that they can also subscribe. Tell-a-friend! The Concentric Circles Of Prospect Research By Waddy Thompson In theory, everyone in the world is a potential contributor to your nonprofit, but that’s obviously an impossibly large list. Some board members think they are being helpful by giving the development director the Forbes list of wealthiest Americans, suggesting that all of them should be solicited. After all, they have lots of money; never mind that some of them live thousands of miles away, have demonstrated no interest in philanthropy, and know nothing about your nonprofit. To read the complete article click here...   Demographics ... Facts regarding Baby Boomers you need to know Just as there is a new Baby Boomer reaching 60 years of age every hour or so, it seems as though there is a new fact coming to light about Boomers every day. At the Conference for Nonprofits sponsored by Blackbaud Inc., David E. Ratcliffe, director of the Merrill Lynch Center for Philanthropy and Nonprofit Management, offered several things to keep in mind about Baby Boomers. There are lots of them. Get ready; 10,000 of them turn 50 each day. One out of three adults is a Boomer. They’ve got rocking economic power. They spend $2 trillion annually on consumer goods and services. The 50-65 age group will grow by 70 percent during the next 15 years. Implication: They DO NOT identify as seniors. 50-year-old Boomers identify themselves as 12 years junior, and will not respond to traditional messages of “old age.” Boomers see 50 as “Middle Age.” Old age starts at 70. They are not “over the hill.” They “move the hill.” Boomers demand now, more, better and faster, and rarely are content to stay in one place. Stodginess is not a virtue. They want their contributions to have an impact, measurable, reported, documented, verifiable. Boomers expect investments to yield consistent returns. Boomers are politically diverse and embrace ideological conflict but reject the traditional “red and blue.” Fundraising ... Hispanics online continue expediential growth The online U.S. Hispanic market is growing twice as fast as the general U.S. market and the segment is highly active on social media sites such as Facebook and MySpace. Couple that with a projected $1.2 trillion in purchasing power by 2012 and you might finally realize that you need to be online reaching Hispanic donors. “It’s a market you can’t afford to ignore,” said Lee Vann, founder of Captura Group in San Diego, Calif. Vann shared strategies and tactics for reaching Hispanics online during the National Catholic Development Conference in Arlington, Va. Here are some tips: Spanish preference. More than 7.1 million online Hispanics prefer to communicate in Spanish. By not including a Spanish-language site you might be alienating some potential donors. Already there. Vann explained that some Hispanics are already going to your Web site and feel comfortable in English. A Spanish Web site would capture those who prefer Spanish. Bad Spanish sites. Vann said that there are a lot of poorly made Spanish sites. “It’s better to do nothing than do something wrong,” he said. Make sure you put the same time and effort into a Spanish site to make it an engaging, fulfilling online experience. Your Hispanic visitors will notice. Language barrier. During the past few years, translating Web sites have flourished. The only problem is that these computer-generated translations don’t take into account subtle nuances of languages -- but your readers will. For example, Vann said you can’t use “casa” for “home page,” but it happens all too often. Preferably, you should have a native Spanish speaker writing your online copy. That way the language and culture cues are right. Hispanic online experience. Nearly 50 percent of Hispanic online users have been online two years or less. Think about when you first started surfing the Internet. With anything new, there will be doubts and suspicions. These users are less inclined to give credit card information or email. Try to include another option, such as a toll-free phone number, that they might feel more comfortable using right now. Donors ... Alternatives for workplace giving Competition in fundraising is keen nowadays, as nonprofits seek to tap into the tightening funding that is available. One aspect of that competition can be found in federated fundraisers, such as United Way, which fundraises through employers, but which has faced competition even in that sphere. In her book Contesting Communities: The Transformation of Workplace Charity, Emily Barman offers the idea of alternative funds, which differ from the United Way approach in that the intermediary fundraising organization itself exists solely to gather and distribute funds. There are several types of such organizations, which generally operate with a vision of community as collective identity. They are: Race and ethnic funds. The first of these in workplace charity arose in the African-American community, but they have expanded to include the Hispanic/Latino community and the Asian-American community. Women’s funds. The principles underlying women’s emancipation are not new, but the women’s movement of the 1960s represented the first organized movement over which women had complete control. Gay and lesbian funds. The “sexual community” pretty much started with the Stonewall riot in 1969 and was inspired by the success of the earlier social movements of the decade. Social movement communities. This area of fundraising is particularistic, interdependent and translocal. It does not week to encompass a divergent and mixed assortment of members. Don't Forget Us! Changing positions? Or have you moved to another organization? Then, make sure you still get NPT's family of eNewsletters by simply updating your profile. Copyright @ 2009 The NonProfit Times. To read our Privacy Policy click here. To forward Instant Fundraising to your colleagues so they can also subscribe click here.