The important parts of an LOI

After spending a week reading proposals and letters of inquiry, I thought it might be a good time to offer a refresher course on a properly designed letter of inquiry, sometimes also called letters of introduction.

A letter of inquiry (LOI) is basically a way of introducing your organization to a prospective funding partner and requesting their monetary support. LOIs are meant to elicit an invitation to submit a fully fleshed out proposal, not as the final funding request.

It should be formatted as a formal business letter, with attention to proper business formatting and language. It should contain the date, inside address and the appropriate salutation. Closing signatures should be properly formatted as well. If you aren't sure of the formatting there are innumerable examples online.

The tone should be respectful and business-friendly, even if you know someone at the prospective funder's office quite well. This is the place for "Dear Sir" not "Hey, dude".

If it is done in hard copy, letterhead stationery is recommended for the first page and corresponding paper with a footer showing your address and name for subsequent pages.

As to length, if there are no guidelines offered by the funder, two pages is a good rule of thumb. By no means should it exceed three pages. Some funding organizations are now limiting LOI's to a certain page, word or character count.  Always try to check the requirements with your target organization either via their online profile or by actually contacting someone at their offices for guidance.

Introduction

A modified Executive Summary.

Who are you and what do you want?   Since this may well be the only part that is ever read, it is important. If you were referred to the funder by someone, this is a good place to mention it, as follows:

"Joe Black indicated to us that you are accepting letters of inquiry" or words to that effect.  Just mention the person briefly. 

Introduce your agency. Include a short thumbnail version of your organizational biography (1-2 paragraphs); a short but complete outline of your mission goals; a statement of mission alignment (seeks to show grantor that you recognize their priorities and shows why you think your request for funding fits within their mission).

The amount you are requesting (unless funder guidelines prohibit this).

Your qualifications to accomplish your mission (previous successes, advantageous partnerships, community involvement etc) 

Statement of Need

Briefly outlines the problem you are seeking to solve, the impact the problem is having on your target population and why your program is needed (no one else is addressing it or other agencies are overwhelmed, etc).

Program specifics

Present the macro details of your program.  Be sure to include specific outcome goals that prove impact, and mention how you will verify outcome data. Briefly introduce key program staff and synopsize their qualifications relative to the program. Include a total projected figure for the program, but this is not the place for a line item budget.

Other support (if any)

List any other funding sources or pledges of support including dollar amounts (If your other funders agree.  Otherwise, use percentages, such as "XYZ  has pledged to underwrite 20% of the program costs for the first year).  Remember that no funder wants to be the sole source of support for your organization and your programs.

If matching funds are required, mention where and how you plan to obtain those funds.

Closing.

Thank the funder for the opportunity to present your organization/programs to them and restate the ask. Sample closing:

"Thank you for the opportunity to present our organization and our mission to (name of funder).  We are looking forward to an invitation to present a full proposal further explaining our request for $35,000 for the (name of program)"

The LOI is your only chance to make a first impression.  Do your best to make it a good one. 

Should you use a templated proposal?

It depends on what you are calling a template.

Periodically I have people ask me to write a template for them to use to reply to RFPs or LOIs (Letters of Inquiry or Introduction). What they seem to see as a template is a one-size-fits-all canned response, like a sales letter, that they can send out shotgun-style to multiple grantors.

In some cases, they will send me to their "about" or Facebook page and tell me to use that wording verbatim, but "put it into a grant format."

It would oh-so-easy for me to just add a couple of paragraph headers and collect a few bucks and move on.

The problem with that is the client would probably never win a grant with it, and here's why.

All Requests for Proposals (RFPs) and all grantors are different.

It follows then that there will be differences in the verbiage in your application. While they may have a similar macro-focus their goals will be different.

Take youth program funding for instance. That's a macro-category. To one funder that may mean providing money to purchase tablets or laptops. The next one may see it as providing after-school care.

If you send out your canned LOI, but none of your programs address laptops or after-school care, you just wasted your time.

What CAN be templated or reused.

When I think of a template I think of the headings in an application or proposal. Things like program descriptions, statistics,  board member biographies, prior year outcome reporting, annual reports and organizational history tend to stay fairly constant for at least a year, and these can be pasted into a proposal.

Most RFP's have sections for these things. Statements of need can utilize statistical reporting such as population, race, age or gender percentages, income profiles of the targeted populations, etc. That wording can be pretty much left as is for as long as they are accurate.

Other things will have to be written so that they apply to the specific grantor.

   

Program descriptions and goals tend to stay pretty much the same, but sections of them may need to be highlighted or even extracted to show relevancy to the grantor's goals.

Board members, key personnel and their bios usually don't change much for at least a couple of years  but should still be reviewed and any additions or subtractions noted such as promotions or a change in title.

   

Notice that I don't include the executive summary as a static document. If the proposals are slightly different the executive summary will also change. That's why it's called a summary. Sections of it might not change, but it should still reflect the proposal you are submitting.

I distinctly remember one summary I read that was still talking about funding for an event that had happened several years in the past. I do a lot of these documents, and I always verify that all, and I mean all, of the information is up-to-date and applicable to the grantor.

So the answer to the title question is a qualified maybe.

If the grantor or the request you are sending, say for assistance with a capital campaign, is exactly the same you could get away with sending out nearly the same proposal or LOI to several grantors during the year. If not, you may need to do a substantial rewrite.

BTW - Do be sure you have the right grantor's name in your executive summary or request for funding. I remember one person who used a foundation's name in the original LOI, and then hit "send to all" to seven different funder  prospects. Awkward!

Questions or comments?  Drop me a line at rightwords@ida.net

Are you over-connected and under-noticed?

There comes a point in every business where you simply hit a development wall. Nonprofits are no different.

In many ways, the internet connectivity we all prize (or maybe despise!) contributes to that sudden stop.

The internet of today is a cacophony of digitized noise. Try following a few Twitter feeds and see how much real thought goes into them and measure how much value you are getting from them.

   

In the rush to have the most likes, followers, retweets or comments it's easy to lose sight of the real purpose of all those connections.

In a business sense, connections are supposed to be about interactive communications that provide value for both sides.

Take a look at your own favorite sites. What keeps you clicking on them?

Is it just to kill time?  To keep score to see how many of your own comments are being commented on?  To have some sort of social life?  Because everyone else is doing it?

If your connectivity isn't producing value, why are you still doing it?

Case in point. I recently reconnected with a person I had known fairly well at one time; not a BFF exactly but we had a pretty close acquaintanceship until she moved away. This was a while ago…before Twitter even existed.

I ran into her at the grocery store, and while we were trying to do the whole catching up thing, she never took her eyes completely off her phone. Twitter was scrolling the whole time. At one point she did mention she was looking for work, but when I asked for particulars, she was busy re-tweeting something and didn't answer.

It didn't take very long for me to see that our face-to-face meeting was only occupying about 10% of her attention, and I did the "well, it was nice to see you…call me sometime" thing.

That's sort of what happens when you focus on just one outreach strategy. You get so busy trying to build a broad audience, you forget that you need to develop real focused relationships.

For instance, let's say one of your grantor targets or a major donor prospect doesn't accept LOI's and you have no contacts in common. Think about something you have or can create, like a white paper or case study that has value to them. Drop them an email and offer it to them, no strings attached.

 Your email might read like this:

I noticed that you are seeking information on X.  I (we) have a case study on X that may help you.  I (we) would be happy to forward it if you are interested."

All of a sudden you are connected. Will that always result in an invitation to apply for that $100K grant or a $1 million endowment? Maybe, maybe not. The purpose is to get on their radar, but by offering something of value, there is an upside for them to notice and contact you.

It gives you a chance to present your organization, prove that you have value to add to their mission, and gives you an excuse to connect again to get feedback on the offering.

This works. One nonprofit that tried this strategy received program funding for three years as a result of this kind of outreach.

     

If you don't have any material that you can offer, it could be time and money well spent to develop a case study, white paper, manual or other outreach material that goes beyond the typical brochure, tweet or Facebook posting.

If you or someone you know would like more information on implementing this strategy, give me a shout at rightwords@ida.net.

Is your LOI killing your grant opportunities?

Many foundations require an LOI, or letter of inquiry. This is your one and usually only chance to make a good first impression. Since I edit a lot of these for clients in my business, I have seen a pretty good cross-section of  approaches, and some things stand out.

Many LOI submissions read more like a letter to a friend than a proposal outline. Others almost sound like the writer is bored with having to write it in the first place.

The LOI is essentially an executive summary of your longer grant proposal, not a "Hi, nice to meet you" social media post, or a mere formality. It needs to stimulate the grantor's interest in inviting you to submit a full proposal.

LOI submissions are normally size limited. Some online submissions are as short as one page, but in general they run from two to four pages. Some grantors give you a maximum length, but in general, if your pitch can't be synopsized in three pages, it may be too long or more properly, not focused enough. I have yet to see any grantor request more than five pages.

Others don't follow the specific instructions from the grantor. If they say "do not include graphs or charts" that's what they mean. Requesting a "brief program overview"  means hit the high points. If they want a full program explanation they will ask for it if your LOI is selected for follow-up.

Many LOI writers don't address the grantor's field of interest. This is a common failing of the templated or boilerplate LOI. Just as in every other life event, one size usually doesn't fit all. You may know that your program or organization is a good fit, but the grantor doesn't know how or where you will fit in, so you need to tell them. This is particularly true if the grantor is funding several fields of interest.

You need to stand out from the crowd. If you have a particularly novel problem-solving approach, highlight it. LOI's today need to address outcomes, either existing or planned. If you have outstanding results, at least allude to them to pique the grantor's interest in knowing more.

Should you include a specific monetary request or target?  In general, yes, but it has to be done correctly. If your program is budgeted to need $50,000, but the grantor doesn't award above $10,000, you will need to mention where you expect to get the other 40K. Some LOI's require it.

Some grantors don't want a specific number, but in general they will include that information in the LOI guidelines. If they don't, it never hurts to pick up the  phone or email them to ask for clarification. You can also review their previous grant awards to get a sense of how much they are likely to consider reasonable.

Your LOI is sort of the nonprofit equivalent of a sales letter. You need to strike a balance between sounding like a late-night commercial and taking the reader for granted. You need to show there is a benefit to the grantor in partnering with you rather than the other fifty organizations that submitted LOI's for consideration.

The LOI is an important fundraising tool. Use it wisely and well.