How Do UK Charities Build a Fundraising Strategy?

Your charity's fundraising plan lists grants, corporate partnerships, major donors and a new regular-giving campaign. Each opportunity looks reasonable on its own. Together, they ask the same two people to do four different jobs while keeping the existing income coming in.

A useful fundraising strategy helps you choose what to resource and what to postpone. This guide turns those choices into a plan a UK charity leader can take to trustees, then use in monthly delivery meetings.

What belongs in a fundraising strategy?

Use this diagram with the Your Funder and Institutional Pipeline Playbook (toolkit).

The strategy should explain where income comes from now, what the charity needs next and which relationships and activities will support that need. The operating plan then assigns the work, budget and review dates.

NCVO's guidance on writing a fundraising strategy organises the task around where you are, where you want to be and how you will get there. It also calls for alignment with the wider organisational plan. Use that structure before building a campaign calendar.

Start with income quality and capacity

Review the last complete year and current commitments. Split income by source and by what it can fund. Separate gifts tied to a specific purpose (restricted gifts) from income you can use across the charity. Also separate committed funding from open applications, and recurring support from one-off receipts.

Then ask which relationships need attention to protect existing income. A major funder's renewal, regular donors leaving and donor follow-up with no assigned owner may deserve attention before a campaign to recruit new donors.

Record the work behind each income line. Include research, relationship building, proposal writing, approvals, delivery, reporting and renewal. If those tasks sit with one development lead, the strategy needs to reflect that capacity.

Choose income priorities instead of adding channels

Use this diagram with the Your Funder and Institutional Pipeline Playbook (toolkit).

Write down why each proposed income stream fits the charity. Consider your cause, evidence, existing relationships, delivery capacity and the time before money may arrive. NCVO recommends considering the balance between restricted and unrestricted, short- and long-term, and sustainable and time-limited income in its strategy guidance.

For each priority, answer:

1. What funding need does this address?

2. Which donor or funder relationships can we credibly develop?

3. What must be in place before the first ask?

4. What will it cost to deliver and steward?

5. Which current activity will stop or receive less time?

Keep a separate list of opportunities you are not resourcing yet. That protects your team when a trustee suggests an event or a new partnership midway through a campaign.

Use a one-page planning brief

Repeat the following fields for each chosen income priority. These are suggested planning fields, not a regulatory template.

Priority: The donor or funder group and the funding need.

Starting position: Current relationships, prior results and gaps in the evidence.

Target: The income aim, its restrictions and the expected receipt period. Separate confirmed income from prospects and describe the assumptions.

Owner: One accountable staff lead, with supporting roles and an approver.

Work: The relationship building, ask, donor care and reporting activities needed to pursue the target.

Resources: Fees, production, systems, media and staff time.

Dependencies: Decisions or materials needed from trustees, finance, programmes or external partners.

Review: The dates, evidence and decisions that would cause you to continue, change or pause.

For a trusts-and-foundations priority, do not count the prospect list as a forecast. Distinguish researched funders, suitable opportunities, submitted applications and confirmed awards. The Funder Pipeline Playbook provides a practical starting point for that work.

Make trustee oversight part of the plan

Trustees need to understand how funds are raised and how risks are managed, including where work is delegated. The Fundraising Regulator's governing-body standards explain responsibilities for fundraising oversight and risk management.

Include approval thresholds, complaint escalation, the information trustees will receive and the decisions reserved for them. Avoid a plan in which every routine message needs a full board meeting, while significant risks have no escalation route.

For charities in England and Wales, Charity Commission guidance CC20 sets out trustee duties in fundraising. Do not assume that this Commission guidance defines the regulatory position in Scotland or Northern Ireland.

Confirm the applicable fundraising, data and charity requirements with a qualified adviser in your jurisdiction.

Turn the strategy into the next quarter's work

Use this diagram with the Your Funder and Institutional Pipeline Playbook (toolkit).

Start with the activities already committed and the relationships at risk. Add the chosen priorities only after identifying who will deliver them. Set dates for the steps before an ask, including the case for support, prospect qualification and sign-off.

For every campaign, schedule the donor follow-up as well as the appeal. If the plan ends on donation day, the next campaign begins with donors who have heard nothing about the previous gift. Use the Donor Journey Blueprint to map that follow-up.

Show finance and programme colleagues when income is likely to arrive and any restrictions on its use. A signed pledge and cash in the bank are different planning inputs.

What should a monthly review cover?

Compare receipts and costs with the plan, then review the evidence behind the next period's forecast. Ask which relationships progressed, which tasks slipped and whether a dependency is still unresolved.

Use measures suited to the work. A funder pipeline, your record of potential funding opportunities, needs application and award stages. A regular-giving programme needs active donors, failed payments, cancellations and receipts. An acquisition campaign needs costs and subsequent donor behaviour as well as first gifts.

End the meeting with decisions: keep the activity, change the offer, move a deadline or stop work. Record the owner and the reason. NCVO's implementation guidance stresses that everyone involved needs to know what is expected and that workloads may need to change. Your review should make those changes explicit.

If the plan is sound but delivery capacity is missing, compare strategy and execution options against your budget. If you are still deciding which constraint to address, complete the fundraising diagnosis. The result appears before any booking decision.

Put this into practice

Choose these tasks as a starting assignment for your team. The roles and review timing below are suggested working arrangements, not benchmarks.

1. Choose income priorities

Suggested owner: Fundraising lead. List current receipts, commitments and funding needs alongside staff capacity. Write why each selected income stream fits and which opportunities are not being resourced yet.

2. Turn the choice into dated work

Suggested owner: Income-stream owner. Record the next relationship action, cost, dependency and approver. Include stewardship and reporting as well as the ask, and identify what must move if workload exceeds capacity.

3. Prepare a decision-focused review

Suggested owner: Executive lead. Bring receipts, costs, pipeline evidence and workload concerns to the review. Record a continue, change, defer or stop decision with an owner, keeping trustee oversight explicit.

Check progress: At a monthly review, compare actuals with the plan and revisit the assumptions behind future income. Confirm that every active priority has a funded next step and a recorded decision.

Your homework

A workable fundraising strategy protects your existing income and directs limited team capacity towards a small number of viable priorities rather than chasing every available channel. It turns those choices into concrete, resourced briefs with explicit dependencies, agreed approval thresholds for trustees, and scheduled post-donation stewardship.

Regular monthly reviews then track pipeline evidence and delivery costs, allowing leaders to adjust workloads or pause unviable activities before resources are exhausted.

Before you move on to anything else, complete these three tasks:

1. Compile a one-page income audit by this Friday, dividing the past year into restricted and unrestricted funds, confirmed commitments, and a written list of opportunities your charity will not resource.

2. Write a one-page planning brief for each chosen income stream by next Wednesday, recording the single accountable staff owner, delivery and stewardship costs, key dependencies, and which existing task will stop.

3. Convene a sixty-minute review meeting with your executive team by next Friday. Use a written decision log to record whether to continue, change, defer, or stop each active fundraising activity. Base each decision on pipeline evidence and costs.