Looking back at the letter from Jack to his parents in Chapter 1, how successful do you think the identical letter would have been if his parents had received it from a total stranger? Right. So why would you send a proposal to a funder that has never heard of your charity?

By educating a foundation staff member (and hopefully one or more trustees) about your charity before submitting a grant proposal, you greatly increase your chances of success. Occasionally, a cold proposal will get funded, but by warming up funders, you definitely increase your success rate. In the fundraising biz, we call this cultivation.