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When you’re looking for grantmakers to support your organization’s work, a Google search won’t do the job. Most private foundations don’t have websites and most don’t have staff.

When looking for the grantmakers most likely to support your organization’s work, start close to home. The idea of a fat grant from a large national-level foundation is alluring, but unless your organization is doing work of national importance, these large funders probably aren’t a good bet.

When confronting pressing community problems, the program planning of nonprofits is understandably motivated by their passion to set things right. The enthusiasm to make things better is a primal, driving force you’ve got to appreciate and nurture. But you’ve also got to temper the excitement behind a well-intentioned idea with a solid understanding of how to plan programs so they will really make a difference.

Nonprofits are dedicated to their missions, pouring every ounce of time, energy, and money they can muster into their fight to make positive change.

There’s much more to winning grant awards than writing! To win, it’s imperative to approach the right funder with a solid program plan that’s capable of producing meaningful results. But the quality of the writing does matter.

Accurately identifying the problem or need your organization wants to tackle is the single most important factor in developing a powerful grant proposal.

Federal resources and systems for grantseekers have been changing. If your organization participates in the federal grants process or plans to, it’s imperative to stay on top of developments at Grants.gov, SAM.gov, and the federal agencies with which you are most involved.

It’s a well-accepted best practice that the development of grant proposals should be well coordinated with the administrative, financial, human resources, and programmatic functions of the organization.