When you're conducting a fundraising call or visit, the first thing you have to do is talk to the person, either in person or over the phone and get a sense of whether now's a good time for them to help if they want to help. If you've called up a friend who's asked you for money before, and this helped you before, and the first thing out of their mouth is Oh my God, I just lost my job. I don't know how I'm gonna pay my mortgage, now is probably not a good time to ask them for money. So chat with them don't just in the first 10 seconds, so you give me money. You've got to build some rapport. Ideally, you already know the person and you can talk about areas of commonality.

Next, talk about the particular organization. let the person know, hey, I'm really trying to help this organization, the heart fund, whatever it is, build their resources so they can do x y. y&z Be as specific as possible. Can you help me? Here? First question is simple. It's not write a check for a million dollars for me in the next five minutes.

That's too much pressure that's coming on too strong. But after you've established that now is a good time to ask them for money. And you get the sense that they are interested in this. Simply ask, can you help? And don't say anything. If they say, Wow, it's just really not a good time to say, Hey, I understand.

Thanks so much. Don't go on and on. Don't spend the next two hours talking to don't call them every single day. If somebody tells you, now's not a good time, or they can't, or they won't, or they don't like the organization or they have philosophical problems with the organization or you're raising money for it. campaign and they're already raising money for the opponent. Okay?

Don't waste time, don't continue to throw your good time after something that's not going to reap any investment. So that is your first step. You've got to simply ask, can you help are organized now they know you're trying to raise money. So if they say yes, I'm willing to help. They are implicitly saying go ahead and ask me for money. That's your first step.

Make a note of it right now start an outline so that when you are talking to people on the phone, or you are meeting face to face, you know, that is the first step. asked people specifically, will you help us with this organization?