How Much Do You Need to Invest to Have a Successful Capital Campaign

Jan 11

You've heard the old saying that "it takes money to make money." The same applies to raising money. But how much should it cost for a successful capital campaign?

If you're gonna have a capital campaign or any special campaign to raise money, in addition to your normal operating budget, you're going to need to spend more money in order to attract the additional donors who are going to make that campaign a success. So how much should you spend? Rule of thumb is that your capital campaign’s expenditures should equal about five to ten percent of the total goal for the capital campaign.

Now for a smaller organization you may need to invest in some more infrastructure and background support, you might be closer to that ten percent. For a larger organization who already has a lot of the processes in place, it might be closer to five. But remember that you do need to invest in order to have a larger outcome. If you keep doing the same thing year after year, you're going to get the same results. So to expect a larger outcome or raise more money you're going to need to invest so look at your budget and look at where you need additional revenue and invest somewhere between five and ten percent of your campaign goal.