Creating a Prospect Pipeline System
A successful prospect pipeline takes into consideration the priorities of the organization. It reflects prospect development resources, frontline fundraiser capabilities, and campaign mandates. Therefore it is important to create a prospect pipeline system by understanding the strengths and weaknesses in these areas.
This can take the form of many different shapes. For example, when working with fundraisers who are new to prospect development policies, create a simple pipeline structure with only a few key statuses and rules. Introduce more advanced statuses and techniques as they get more familiar with the system and closer to the campaign goal
Keeping situations like that in mind, a solid starting point might look something like this.
Keep prospect statuses to a minimum― while it might affect the level of reportable data on campaign progress, having too many statues will confuse fundraisers and make them more reluctant to use the system. And when they don’t use it, that responsibility might fall on you, which is less than ideal.
Intuitive naming conventions― have statuses that are clear, concise, and obvious. If a fundraiser has to think about what the word behind a status means, you’ve lost.
Disciplined management process― meet on a regular basis, one-on-one and as a group, to go over individual prospect status changes, take about new identification names, or anything else related to the pipeline. Don't cancel this meeting and don't allow fundraisers to come unprepared for it. They should have a basic understanding of every prospect in their portfolio and a reason behind any changes they made to a prospect’s status.
Successful prospect pipeline creation and implementation takes the collective effort of the entire fundraising staff. While the responsibility might fall mostly on the prospect development professional, using these tips can help make this process run more efficiently.
