December 15, 2016 | Read Time: 2 minutes
When the presidential race was in full swing last spring, staff members at Emily’s List were busy fundraising and mobilizing members to support Hillary Clinton’s campaign and those for numerous other candidates for office.
But the political-action committee, which aims to elect pro-choice Democratic women, was working on another effort, too: the launch of a planned-giving program, now called the Emily’s List Legacy Fund.
The organization already had a handful of planned-giving donors on its radar, but it did not have a formal way for supporters to notify Emily’s List if they’d included it in their wills, said Kelly Biggs, the group’s member-services and planned-giving manager. Donors sometimes told a fundraiser of their intention to leave a planned gift, but often the PAC learned of a bequest only when it received the money from a deceased donor’s estate.
“We began to notice it was a pattern,” said Ms. Biggs. Donors had questions about these types of gifts, and Emily’s List officials sensed a greater potential to cultivate them during contributors’ lifetimes. While it would have been easy for the PAC to put off preparations for planned giving as it focused fundraising energy on the election, staff members decided to audit the group’s development programs to see if offering legacy-giving opportunities made sense.
Emily’s List didn’t have a dedicated planned-giving staff person, but its annual-giving program was well-established. And its overwhelmingly female, mostly college-educated donors trend above-average in income and retention — good signs for planned-giving prospecting. A donor’s philanthropic capacity is not necessarily the best indicator of whether he or she will leave a planned gift, Ms. Biggs said; rather, fundraisers look for people with real passion for the cause who have given consistently and to multiple program areas.
In the spring of 2015, the organization surveyed donors to gauge interest in planned giving and see if the time was right to develop the Legacy Fund.
Seventeen supporters indicated they intended to leave a planned gift, 176 said they would consider it, and 208 requested more information on planned giving. This was especially positive because gifts to PACs like Emily’s List are not tax-deductible.
Today, two full-time staff members split their time between planned giving and membership services. The group’s major-gift fundraisers are trained to recognize cues from potential planned-gift prospects, and messages about planned giving are included in direct-mail campaigns, newsletters, acknowledgments, and other communications with supporters.
In 2016, Emily’s List identified nine new donors who have included the group in their wills, bringing the Legacy Fund to 44 members, including donors who had announced their intent before the Fund’s launch.
See the survey Emily’s List sent to its donors.
