The Wild Woman’s Guide to Fundraising – Review

I’ve been a fan of Mazarine Treyz, founder of Wild Woman Fundraising, for awhile now.  Her blog posts are thought-provoking and Mazarine brings a unique edginess to the oftentimes staid world of nonprofit — while at the same time espousing sound common sense.  Now Mazarine has written her first book, The Wild Woman’s Guide to Fundraising.

In it Mazarine covers everything the recent college grad or corporate transfer to the nonprofit world would need to know to cover the basics in fundraising.  You’ve got chapters on:

• Tips for finding that fundraising job
• What to do once you get the job
• Different chapters on building your organization’s fundraising base, including grant writing, drafting your first annual appeal letter, how to market and more.

And, while I’ve worn more hats than a marching band when it comes to fundraising I was tickled pink to learn more than a thing or two about volunteer management and phone-a-thons as well.

With The Wild Woman’s Guide to Fundraising, Mazarine has not only put together an excellent primer for the novice fundraiser, she’s also written a compelling “insider’s story” for nonprofit bloggers and authors who may never have experienced the true realities of life in a small community agency where the development director is also the marketing director, database manager, grants manager, director of individual giving and communications manager … all rolled into one.

While reading The Wild Woman’s Guide to Fundraising you get the feeling that Mazarine has been right there alongside you as you struggled to ready a segmented individual appeal to 800 — using Microsoft Word 97 (and it’s 2010) on a refurbished computer, printing on a temperamental printer, and using an Excel database.

In other words, working in the field of nonprofit ain’t always pretty.

But Mazarine interjects a roll-up-your-shirtsleeves-and-let’s-get-this-done sense of joy into the entire process.  A terrific addition to your fundraising library.