Thanks to everyone who participated in the pop-up video symposium today: Pledge Drive Communications Now. We had 46 people on the Zoom – great to see everyone’s faces and thank you for contributing via the Chat function!
Many thanks to The First UU Society of Burlington, Vermont who allowed me to use their materials as a good example. Here is a copy of their full email blast that the stewardship message was taken from.
Here is a PDF of the PowerPoint I used. I include all of the slides, because the functional slides (While you are waiting, Breakout Rooms guidance, etc.) might be useful for you as you create your own.
Here are your tips – which the participants all created and shared in the chat. Hooray!
Using Tech Tools
- Have multiple online giving tools – ways to give electronically
- Make sure people know how to use online giving
- Set up and use Text To Give (check with your database or electronic giving provider)
- Use Slack (another App) for communications within groups (like the Board)
- Give trainings for using the video platform (like Zoom)
- Use an electronic form from Membership Database (Breeze) to replace paper pledge forms
- Zoom needs to be controlled by the Host – otherwise problems!
In Zoom everyone should be sure that screen-sharing is OFF for participants (in Settings) - Our church cluster is making a shared You Tube channel with all services posted
- Managing Zoom break out rooms: https://support.zoom.us/hc/en-us/articles/206476313-Managing-Breakout-Rooms
- During Video call, put a donation link in Chat
- Identify/recruit a few members who are tech experts, who could be willing to be available for virtual events
Creating Connection
- Cottage meetings for stewardship through Zoom
- Send a tea bag with the stewardship mailing and invite people to “have tea with us”
- Increase virtual offerings to stay connected
- Visiting stewards to make pastoral care calls 1/week for one month followed by stewardship call
- Ask and explore with all church committees to examine how they contribute to pastoral care for the community
- Start a “buddy list” to help people stay connected: calls once a week
- Break out rooms for coffee hours with Zoom after the YouTube service
- Facilitate opportunities for folks to help each other virtually
- Be sensitive to the “digital divide” people who are not familiar or don’t have the equipment for the virtual meetings
- Send out multiple links too – one for newcomers, one for RE families, etc
- Virtual coffee hour with break out rooms and then mixing them up and reassigning break out rooms after 15 mins
- Speed Dating via video chat
- Great opportunity for churches in different places to be in more inter-congregation communication
- Facilitated small group conversations should be limited in size to have ample time for conversation – I’ve settled on 8 to 10 max for 90 minutes of content
Messaging
- Coordinate messaging, a communications person to manage timing and message content
- Talk about the important and relevance of the community, lead with mission
- Start with caring for each other then turn to the necessity of paying staff and planning – all in the name of nurturing our community
Stay Tuned for more support and intelligence – we are blogging and offering online learning more often. This might be easier if you sign up to receive our communications – which you can do by filling out the blue box on your right. And check UUA.org for more from Regional staff and Stewardship & Development staff as well.
Do you have what you need? If not, let us know. If we cannot provide what you need, we will connect you to other folks in the UUA or a peer congregation.
And please use the comment function below. We want to hear from you with topics you want to hear about or more suggestions for other congregations.
Be well – stay connected – spread the love!
Mark Ewert is a stewardship consultants with the Stewardship For Us team. Mark works with congregations on their stewardship programs and can be reached at Team@stewardshipforus.com, via the UUA’s Congregational Stewardship Resources page (http://www.uua.org/finance/fundraising/consulting) or through your regional staff.
Mark Ewert is a stewardship consultant, a Chartered Advisor in Philanthropy® (CAP®), and a professional leadership and philanthropy coach (PCC) certified with the International Coaching Federation.
His experience includes founding a nonprofit, working as a fundraiser, and leading a national organization. Reach Mark at Team@StewardshipForUs.com
I got this message from Rev. Feder and he gave me permission to post it as a comment here, as he (like many ministers now) has many pressing duties right now:
“I think my colleague Rev. Tricia Hart is great but the Burlington email you included did her a disservice using the Dalai Lama quote without some reframing context. You should have done her the courtesy of not republishing that part of it. What small donor wants to be compared to mosquito, one of the few animals most likely to be cited as having no redeeming value by the average person? Why send the implication that we want your money but your ability to make an impact is to be irritating or a disease vector? The Dalai Lama was joking but we need to go out of our way to tell our small donors, and even congregants too poor to donate financially through a pledge drive, that they are no joke to us.
I really appreciate this regular newsletter and the work you do putting it out. I hope you can more thoroughly and sensitively address the small donor challenge in the future. It’s a major concern for me every year, virus or not. And knowing Tricia, she has a lot more valuable things to say about it than the way this came across.”
Rev. Barnaby Feder, Champlain Valley UU Society.
Thank you for the thoughtful comment Rev. Feder, you are correct that the Dalai Lama quote was out of context and Rev. Hart’s quote was also out of context – from an in-person worship sermon. So much has changed so fast since just those few weeks ago! Apologies to all, I am certain the intent was not to denigrate any size donation or imply that one person cannot create change (without being as irritating as a biting insect).
A question for all readers: how are you acknowledging and valuing pledgers/donors giving small gifts? Particularly now that we do not know how people’s giving capacity might have changed? Please comment here! Mark
Thank you for bringing this information together. We at First Universalist Church of Denver decided to delay our Stewardship campaign because of the quickly evolving COVID-19 situation in Denver. We instead decided to turn our attention to making sure our community felt cared for and connected. We have implemented much of what was recommended in your summary and will be revisiting when to begin our campaign next week.
I’ll watch this thread for more helpful content.
Thanks Again
Thanks Cris, let us know how it goes. Be Healthy!