1 / 18

ALUMNI RELATIONS & FUNDRAISING

ALUMNI RELATIONS & FUNDRAISING. The challenges and the successes. WHY HAVE ALUMNI RELATIONS?. Alumni Relations can play key role in underpinning your institutional effort Alumni are ready and waiting to be engaged – a wonderful time, advocacy and funding resource

dacia
Download Presentation

ALUMNI RELATIONS & FUNDRAISING

An Image/Link below is provided (as is) to download presentation Download Policy: Content on the Website is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use and may not be sold / licensed / shared on other websites without getting consent from its author. Content is provided to you AS IS for your information and personal use only. Download presentation by click this link. While downloading, if for some reason you are not able to download a presentation, the publisher may have deleted the file from their server. During download, if you can't get a presentation, the file might be deleted by the publisher.

E N D

Presentation Transcript


  1. ALUMNI RELATIONS & FUNDRAISING The challenges and the successes

  2. WHY HAVE ALUMNI RELATIONS? • Alumni Relations can play key role in underpinning your institutional effort • Alumni are ready and waiting to be engaged – a wonderful time, advocacy and funding resource • The more alumni feel engaged and in touch the more inclined they are to donate and to open their networks

  3. KEY INGREDIENTS • Know and understand your audience – (research and data, data, data!!) • Have a plan to keep alumni in touch • It’s all about being flexible and thinking laterally – can’t do it all in isolation • Have a balanced programme – events, communications, volunteering, benefits and services

  4. THE ALUMNI COMMUNITY • 150,000alumni who live in 180 countries. This will rise to c.175,000 by 2015. Two thirds of alumni live in the UK. • It is estimated that UCL is in touch with 70% of all living UCL alumni • Over 50% of all alumni graduated within the last 15 years. Top threelargest departments – Faculty of Laws, Faculty of Built Environment and School of Life and Medical Sciences

  5. CONTACTABLE ALUMNI BY DECADE OF GRADUATION

  6. ALUMNI CONNECTIONS • Myriad of different motivating factors that drive ongoing alumni connections to UCL • These factors range from a connection to courses/departments, clubs and societies, halls of residence and classmates through to academic staff.

  7. EXAMPLE: STUDENT / YOUNG ALUMNI ACTIVITY • To develop a supportive alumni community you need to start with the student experience and develop a habit of involvement immediate after graduation • Dominant aim is to weave alumni and alumni relations into the fabric of student life • Experience has shown that success in this area is derived from providing tangible benefits to the student community

  8. ALUMNI RELATIONS & FUNDRAISING • It is a two way relationship – both need one another to be a success • Interest, involve and commit - the more engagement alumni feel the more inclined they are to give money/time to an institution • It’s a long-term business • Team work – shared objectives and goals – Alumni team needs to consider fundraising as part of their activities and fundraisers must think about alumni and wider school activities

  9. EXAMPLES • Fundraising messages are integrated into UCL alumni communications and events • Academic speakers at events will ask alumni to consider donating to UCL • Alumni contacts can provide opportunities to engage key donors and prospects • Alumni can also identify ‘lost’ class mates who may be good prospects

  10. NETWORKING • Clubs and societies • Award-winning professional networking events • Alumni-led reunions • Departmental events • International events

  11. COMMUNICATIONS • Redesigned ‘UCL People’ - backbone of printed communication which all alumni receive • Alumni email newsletters, the Alumni Web Community, Alumni Website, Social networking presences and Online Surveys

  12. VOLUNTEERING • Careers mentoring – over 300 alumni currently act as a careers mentor and speak at UCL events (e.g. graduation ceremonies) • 250 alumni act as International Contacts – involves them in acting as a local contacts for alumni, organising local alumni groups and assisting with student recruitment

  13. REGULAR GIVING • Why engage alumni? • To translate engagement into multiple levels that includes giving to your university • But why do alumni give?

  14. What motivates giving • Pride • Acknowledgement for what they gained from their experience at UCL • Desire to protect what they value • Commitment to social mobility and how education is the key to this • Commitment to the transformational impact of education

  15. A Case Study • Ralph – donor, volunteer and son studying at UCL today • Initially identified by regular giving as a donor with capacity to give more • Engaged by alumni relations as a mentor • Asked to sign appeal letters and attend a CASE event to provide a donor testimonial • Started giving £40 pm – now giving £2K per year

  16. Fundraising is telling stories • We use students and key members of staff to tell stories to our alumni about the need for their support (using the hooks of what we know motivates giving) • Ask multiple times throughout the year – telling different stories and using different signatories • People give to people – for us we have found that students receiving scholarships and key academics generate the most response from alumni • What is your university’s story – where do the key relationships with alumni lie?

  17. Get them while they’re young

  18. QUESTIONS?

More Related