Interview with Heather Nelson CFRE

President and Principal Consultant at BridgeRaise

Building and sustaining a strong relationship with corporate partners

Heather Nelson is a corporate partnership and sponsorship expert who leads her own consultancy, BridgeRaise. Heather focuses exclusively on raising money from companies for non-profits and has developed an extensive following of fundraisers who want to join her in raising money based on building relationships and impactful partnerships.

Interview with Heather Nelson CFRE

President and Principal Consultant at BridgeRaise

Building and sustaining a strong relationship with corporate partners

Heather Nelson is a corporate partnership and sponsorship expert who leads her own consultancy, BridgeRaise. Heather focuses exclusively on raising money from companies for non-profits and has developed an extensive following of fundraisers who want to join her in raising money based on building relationships and impactful partnerships.

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Summary of video interview with Heather Nelson CFRE

Section 1: Background on Heather Nelson’s fundraising career
  • A background on Heather Nelson’s early years in fundraising and key lessons learnt
  • Reflecting on a successful campaign in Heather’s role as the Director of Fundraising and Communications at Street Kids International
  • Moving into a role with Food Banks Canada and how this led Heather to starting her own corporate partnerships consultancy, BridgeRaise
 
Section 2: Approaching corporate partnerships strategically
  • Why corporate partnerships are important to the overall fundraising strategy
  • The process of creating a corporate partnerships strategy
  • Acquiring new corporate partners
  • How corporate partnerships can vary across different sectors and charity sizes
  • Some tips for creating corporate sponsorship proposals
 
Section 3: Corporate relationships
  • Common problems when it comes to fundraising teams managing relationships with corporate partners
  • Advice to better managing these relationships
  • To what extend should nonprofits be promoting their corporate partners
  • The role of the CEO and board when it comes to corporate relationships
  • Advice for fundraisers managing a corporate relationship when it starts to deteriorate
 
Section 4: Professional development for fundraisers and BridgeRaise
  • A success story from a time when BridgeRaise innovated to get a good result
  • Recalling a time when a tactic didn’t go to plan and lessons learnt
  • Serving on nonprofit boards and how aspiring fundraising leaders can serve on their first board
  • Planning for a successful fundraising career
 
Section 5: Summary
  • Plans for Heather and BridgeRaise in the next 5 – 10 years
  • Heather’s final advice to inspire and fulfil fundraisers

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