You can learn many things from that “Dear Mom and Dad” letter that will serve you well as a grant writer. Let’s take a closer look at the letter to see some of the points of similarity.

Because Jack’s letter home was not the first time he had ever asked for money, he was seeking a renewal grant. So Jack naturally started out telling his parents how he had used the last money they sent. And note that his very first word was “Thanks”—the magic word that can open so many doors. It’s so important to always acknowledge past support. No one—not a parent or a funder—ever wants to be taken for granted.

Jack follows his opening by telling his parents what has been happening at school to make them feel involved and current. Every funder will want to know what significant things are happening in your organization right now, whether they’re related to the specific grant or not.

Eventually Jack had to actually ask for money, which to be convincing, had to include some ideas on how he’d spend this new money. Jack’s pretty vague on this, so he must be looking for general operating support.

Note that he does at least ask for a specific amount. People like to know what you expect of them, so always be specific in your grant proposals—don’t make them guess how much the new bus will cost or how much it takes to build a website. And don’t ask a funder for too much or too little. Your best guide to how much to ask for is how much the funder has given to organizations similar to yours. Check the funder’s annual report or IRS return for lists of grants.

Usually, when seeking general operating support, you would make a point of covering a wide range of issues your charity addresses. Jack can assume his parents have an intimate acquaintance with his general operating needs, so he doesn’t have to go into detail here.

Jack knows to end on a high note, staying positive and connecting emotionally with his parents one last time to remind them why they really want to write him that check. He isn’t shy about pushing his parent’s emotional buttons. (Who knows better where they are; he probably “installed” some of them!)

Jack’s big advantage over you or me in writing a grant proposal is that he wrote based on a relationship built up over nearly two decades. The prospects were knowledgeable about the cause to which they were being asked to contribute. And because of the long relationship, they were predisposed to responding positively to his request.

So how do you create a level of knowledge and (hopefully) a predisposition to a positive response? In the fundraising business it’s called cultivation, by which you develop the prospect over a period of time so the proposal arrives on the desk of someone who is well informed about your organization (if not necessarily about your project). “Cultivation before solicitation” is my favorite saw, and one everyone who works for me is tired of hearing. You don’t have to hear too much more on the subject from me until Chapter 10.

Now let’s use Jack’s letter as a guide to write a simple—very simple—grant proposal:

That’s a much simpler proposal than you’ll ever write, but you get the point. Grant writing is no big mystery. It doesn’t require a Ph.D., but you do need to know how to put the parts together, avoid amateurish pitfalls, and convince others of the importance of what you’re writing about.

If you were good at writing please-send-money letters to home from college, you’re going to be a great grant writer. And if you lived at home and never wrote one of these letters, well, congratulations! You probably have experience in face-to-face solicitation, which is also a good skill in fundraising.

You say you never needed money from your parents? Well, maybe you’ll soon be the one making grants to your own kids. But whatever your experience, this book will take you from simple show-me-the-money letters to fully developed grant proposals.