Led by a Professional Fundraiser with over 30 years of experience in generating significant grant income for Town & Parish Councils, City Councils, Schools, Churches, Charities, Social Enterprises, and Voluntary Community Organisations across Essex.
We can advise and assist in a wide range of activities to make your fundraising activities successful, from getting funding ready, receiving and publicising the grant, to monitoring and evaluating outcomes to help shape future work and show the impact of your work.
Binnacles Fundraising Service offers the following:
Advice & Guidance: Whether you are an established charity or a small voluntary organisation, we can advise you on all aspects of fundraising and help you get prepared so that you are ready to apply for and manage multiple grants. With lots of community connections across NE Essex, we can advise you on where to go for free support and advice as well as link you up with your local fundraising networks and potential community partners.
Developing your Fundraising Skills: We are here to help you develop fundraising skills through training and mentoring. You can learn how to seek out suitable funding streams, how to write applications to Trusts and Foundations, and how to create a robust case for support and evidence base to show funders the importance and need for the work you do in your community. Training and mentoring can be 1-2-1 or delivered to 2-3 people per organisation, working with staff and/or volunteers to ensure your fundraising function is embedded strategically into operations and runs smoothly year-on-year.
Bid Writing: We can help you to develop a really good application for funding! We can help you to write specific questions and/or we can draft it all for you, so that all that is left for you to do is tweak it here and there before submitting. We will work with a designated individual(s) from the organisation to get all the details needed to complete the application as per the funders’ guidance. The draft application will be sent to the organisation for checking and approval before the organisation submits it themselves.
Developing a Budget for your project or service: This can be a challenging element of asking for funds, especially when you are looking to fund a new project or service. We will help you to think about all the costs your project might incur so that your project is fully funded and it doesn’t leave the project out of pocket
Writing a Fundraising Plan: It is essential to have a fundraising plan that spans 2-3 years and has an annual review. This ensures you know your cycle of fundraising needs and opportunities ahead of schedule and can factor in the time and resources needed to be successful and sustainable in fundraising.
Independent Evaluation: Capturing evidence to show funders and donors the difference your project makes within your community is an important part of the fundraising function. Independent evaluations are looked upon favourably by many funders and can be funded by including costs within project budgets to Trusts and Foundations. We can assist you with costing this important part of every project and service by providing a written explanation to include within the body of applications to funders during the bid writing process.
Initial online consultation sessions available – lasting up to 20 mins
We pride ourselves on offering affordable and accessible, high-quality, and result-focused services.
Service Fees are available on request.