Universities across the country deploy regional development teams to engage and cultivate alums who are far from campus. While cultivation opportunities have become more accessible virtually, remote alumni still crave in-person engagement with campus leadership for an impactful experience. The UC Berkeley East Coast Major Gifts team developed a program to efficiently and effectively bring campus leadership, from Deans and Vice Chancellors to the University Chancellor, across the country specifically for development work and donor meetings. This system, tailored over years of iteration, has resulted in historic fundraising revenue from the region, contributing over $373M to the recently completed Light the Way Campaign. Brown University deployed a similar strategy on the West Coast, including a bespoke events program focused on campaign priorities and key donors. In this session, we will outline the strategy and implementation plan to collaborate with campus fundraisers, build a sustainable regional donor pipeline, and use qualitative and quantitative data-informed strategies to bring campus leaders to regions in which their time will be used effectively to drive forward major gift conversations.

In today's evolving philanthropic landscape, digital engagement officers are proving to be indispensable in enhancing fundraising strategies and cultivating robust donor pipelines. This session explores how digital tools—such as video, texting, email, virtual meetings, and even traditional phone calls—can transform donor interactions and drive substantial results.

Gain insights from a successful program that developed a digital engagement strategy from the ground up, now generating over $1M annually. Learn actionable tips for streamlining your digital outreach efforts, discover valuable resources, and receive practical samples to implement in your own organization. Benefit from the experiences of seasoned development officers who have navigated this digital frontier, and leave equipped with the knowledge to elevate your donor engagement and fundraising success.

Each and every message we send and receive over the course of the day is coded by the
sender and decoded by the receiver. This leaves room for misinterpretation and confusion
if we aren’t careful. Using Schramm’s Communication Model, this interaction session will
demonstrate the power and impact of coding and decoding of messages and attendees will
leave with a new perspective on the intentionality we should consider with every
communication we send (or receive).

Career programs and initiatives are expected from an alumni association. Not only are you asked to serve students with alumni volunteers, but you are asked to create meaningful opportunities for alumni and their career development processes. In this session we will explore the three C's framework to guide your team to develop a strategic and impactful suite of programs. Content, Connections, and Commendations are the three C's that any team can frame their programming strategy on any budget or staff size. This session will explore the three areas and share some realistic examples that participants can think about implementing on their campuses. The presenters will share sample programs and resources to help your team implement initiatives that will work for your school. Whether you are just getting started or you have a robust alumni career team, this program will give you sample events and programs that can meet your alumni's needs.

This session is designed to equip fundraising leaders with the tools and strategies to elevate their entire advancement team’s awareness of planned giving, even among staff who don't specialize in it. Attendees will learn how to train their teams to recognize planned giving opportunities, identify key donor signals, and seamlessly introduce these conversations into routine donor interactions. By the end of the session, leaders will be prepared to empower their staff with practical knowledge that strengthens donor relationships and ultimately increases planned gift commitments.

Engaging donors around planned giving opportunities is a powerful fundraising approach. As Professor Russell James, expert in Planned Giving strategies, puts it: cash is not king. Gift officers are often aware of planned giving vehicles but are challenged to find organic ways to guide donors to understand these opportunities. Planned giving vehicles can also seem technical and intimidating to many development officers. Planned giving training often focuses on the mechanisms themselves, which can generate curiosity but leave unanswered questions about how to turn theoretical knowledge into gift closures. This session follows a different approach. Through story-telling and case-studies, this session builds from the relationships and conversations development officers have with their donors to show the path forward to planned giving strategies and partnership approaches that close gifts.

Want to maximize your Gala ROI? Discover the transformative power of volunteer engagement. In this presentation, we will delve into innovative strategies to enhance your return on investment (ROI) by empowering your volunteers. Learn how the Chinese American International School (PS-8), leverages our volunteer's unique skills and passions to create a more dynamic and efficient event that not only meets but exceeds our fundraising goals.

The #1 way to ensure your institution's success & your future success as a fundraiser is ambitious, consistent discovery now. But discovery is one of the hardest parts of fundraising! When you're getting in the door with amazing new potential donors, discovery can feel like an adventure. When you're slogging through names in your database and getting zero responses, discovery can feel overwhelming and oppressive. Join this session for tactical discovery tips from sending better emails to cold calling to turning the conversation to money in that first visit.

With competing communications priorities and a limited news team, Cal State Fullerton’s Office of Strategic Communications and Brand Management created a user-generated website for the campus community to share news, announcements and accomplishments. Learn how we launched the site, set guidelines for content submission, promoted its widespread use and grew submissions by 20% from year one to two. Additionally, our user-generated content site has become a tool for fundraisers to increase the volume of donor stories and capture information for prospect research; a tool for talent management teams to recognize faculty and staff achievements at all levels; and a tool for expanding internal news and promoting inclusive coverage by empowering campus partners to share their information.

We will provide tips and lessons learned on how to maintain daily operation of the site (managed by professional writers!), discuss practical and ethical considerations for non-writers sharing content, share the campus feedback we have received, and give you a preview of our next steps as we get ready to launch version 2.0.