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| Taronga and Western Plains Zoo |
| "We were seeking a way to attract more philanthropic gifts to the Taronga Foundation to support our fundraising campaign to raise $56 million towards the Zoo's capital development program. |
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| We realised that the need to improve the way we ‘sell’ the intangible benefits of philanthropy when we were introduced to Accela by one of the Governors of the Taronga Foundation. |
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| One of the challenges of philanthropy is to develop the approach of our fundraisers at different levels of the organisation from staff at the grass-roots level, to our senior management team, board members and Foundation governors. |
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| The challenge is that they all come with varying levels of experience in fundraising and from very different demographic groups yet we needed to bring them together on the same message and process. |
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| This was the strength that Accela brought to the table; they unfolded a way to get us all on the same page in a style that engaged and appealed to the diverse range of stakeholders involved. |
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| There is no standard or model in this business; it was not an off-the-shelf approach that we were looking for. Accela developed a process that suited our brand and reflected our philosophy. |
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| Following the training, we applied the donor development process to a prospect who had registered some interest in supporting the Zoo. By using what we had learnt through the Accela sessions we were able to build significantly on that initial connection. |
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| We had practised active listening skills to find out what they were really interested in and developed a number of options to meet their needs. The result was a highly engaged supporter who more than tripled the initial donation offer and committed to a minimum five year relationship with the Zoo. |
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| The Accela approach was integrated all the way. Our team responded to the training session extremely well as it involved their opinions and experience and made the sessions highly relevant to our work. |
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| It wasn’t like any training sessions we had ever come across. We were facilitated expertly and came away from the session feeling that we had done groundbreaking work, and had really achieved our objectives. |
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| Accela were so integral to our sales process and so great to work with, we have set up an ongoing relationship with them including making them Official Supporters of the Zoo. |
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Shanthini Naidoo
Head of Fundraising and Development,
Taronga and Western Plains Zoo |
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