How to Find the Right Trust Funders: A Prospect Research Guide
What is prospect research and why does it matter for trust fundraising?
Knowing how to find the right funders is one of the most valuable skills in trust fundraising. A small list of carefully researched prospects will always outperform a long list of speculative approaches. Before you start, you need to know who your beneficiaries are, where they are located, how much funding you need and by when. With that clarity in hand, the research becomes far more focused and far more effective.
Not every trust will be appropriate for your organisation to approach and identifying a pipeline of suitable potential trusts and foundations can help you to build this into a strong, sustainable income stream for your charity.
What do you need to know before you start researching funders?
Knowing for what and where to look is the crux of the problem I find. On a regular basis I hear colleagues asking if they know of a funder who supports a very specific item. Whilst knowing for what you need the funding and how much it’s going to cost is essential to effective prospect research, so is knowing who your beneficiaries are (generally and specific to the service or project in question), where they are located, for when you need the item/funding in place, why you need it, and how many people (animals, plants, etc.) will be impacted. As you are going through the lists of potential funders, this will help you shortlist those who fit your situation and organisation the best. Without having this in mind, you can quite easily fall into the proverbial ‘rabbit hole’!
For any given funder you may find a lot, or a little, information. You can use this knowledge to target your approach more closely, connecting the dots between their staff, trustees and purposes and yours. Cast your net wide – don’t rely only on research databases, look at their accounts, their website, the charity regulator where they are registered, and find news about them on the internet. All of this can give you a really rounded picture of what they like to support and if they are right for your organisation. Regardless, as you go along write down the essentials somewhere to refer back to when you are setting your approach strategies and work plans.
To get you started, below is a list of some useful resources* across a range of charitable sectors. You should be able to access them for free, or at most a minimal charge. Some of these sites are listings of funders and some are portals with links to subject-specific websites and databases.
Free and low-cost tools for finding trusts and foundations
https://www.myfundingcentral.co.uk/ (NCVO – England)
https://funding.cymru/ (WCVA – Wales)
https://funding.scot/ (SCVO – Scotland)
https://www.grant-tracker.org/(NICVA – Northern Ireland)
https://www.disability-grants.org/community-grants-charities-trusts.html
https://mycommunity.org.uk/funding-options/raising-finance-options/grants/
https://www.helpmusicians.org.uk/creative-programme/funding-wizard
Statutory funding opportunities to explore
Should you invest in a subscription research database?
There are also plenty of subscription research databases available. Many will offer a free trial or similar to see if they are right for you (not just their cost – which may be more than just ££). If you decide to go with a subscription, know what you need or want it to help you with, know your budget, shop around, ask colleagues what they like to use, and check social media groups as this is a topic which comes up regularly.
* External links updated and correct on 19 January 2023.
Build your funder list with confidence
Our free Proposal Matrix helps you assess funder fit and structure your case once the research is done. Download it free.