6 Types of Grants for Nonprofits (and how to find them)
Summary
TLDRIn this informative video, Amber Melanie Smith discusses various types of grant-making organizations for nonprofits, including corporate foundations, corporate giving programs, family foundations, community foundations, federal government grants, and local government grants. She outlines where to find these grants, their operational mechanisms, and the pros and cons of each. Amber also offers strategic advice on determining the best fit for a nonprofit's cause, emphasizing the importance of aligning with the grant-makers' priorities and the potential for establishing long-term funding relationships.
Takeaways
- 😀 Grants are a valuable source of funding for non-profit organizations to launch or expand programs.
- 🔍 Six main types of grant-making organizations were discussed: corporate foundations, corporate giving programs, private or family foundations, public or community foundations, federal government grants, and local government grants.
- 🏢 Corporate foundations are established by companies to provide charitable grants and can be found through online search tools or company websites.
- 🤝 Corporate giving programs often involve employee engagement, such as matching gifts or committees deciding on charitable support.
- 👨👩👧👦 Family foundations are private foundations managed by individuals or families and can be identified through tools like GuideStar.
- 🏛️ Community foundations pool funds from various sources to support local non-profits, focusing on community needs and priorities.
- 🏦 Federal government grants are substantial but require extensive paperwork and are suitable for non-profits with a proven track record and infrastructure.
- 🏙️ Local government grants are made from city or county budgets and can significantly boost a non-profit's credibility if awarded.
- 💼 Building relationships with companies or individuals before applying for grants can improve the chances of receiving funding.
- 💡 The suitability of a grant type depends on the non-profit's size, cause, and alignment with the grant maker's priorities and giving interests.
Q & A
What are the six types of organizations that give out grants for non-profits?
-The six types of organizations that give out grants for non-profits are corporate foundations, corporate giving programs, private or family foundations, public or community foundations, grants from the federal government, and grants from local government.
How can you find corporate foundations that offer grants?
-You can find corporate foundations by using search tools online like foundationcenter.org, visiting a company's website and looking for a section on charitable giving or corporate social responsibility, or by searching with the company name plus 'foundation' on Google.
What are the pros and cons of seeking funding from corporate foundations?
-Pros include the potential for larger grant amounts and the possibility of establishing a long-term funding relationship. Cons are the competitive nature of these grants and the difficulty in getting initial access, which can be eased by building a relationship with the company before applying.
How do corporate giving programs differ from corporate foundations?
-Corporate giving programs may involve employee committees voting on causes to support, employee matching programs, or other forms of giving that are not through a separate foundation but directly through the company.
What is a family foundation and how can you find them?
-A family foundation is a private foundation run by an individual or family to organize their charitable giving. They can be found using foundation search tools like foundationcenter.org or guidestar.org, or by conducting internet searches.
What are the advantages and disadvantages of applying for grants from family foundations?
-Advantages include the potential for larger and ongoing support once a trusting relationship is established. Disadvantages include the difficulty in getting noticed by these often-private foundations and the requirement to align with their specific giving priorities.
How can non-profits identify whether a family foundation might be a good funding fit?
-Non-profits can review the family foundation's past funding, look at their tax records on platforms like GuideStar, and assess if their cause aligns with the foundation's interests and priorities.
What is a community foundation and how can non-profits find them?
-A community foundation is a public charity that pools funds from multiple sources to invest in local non-profits. They can be found through online searches or by visiting the website of the Council of Foundations.
What are the benefits and challenges of seeking grants from community foundations?
-Benefits include easier initial engagement and the potential for multi-year support. Challenges include aligning with the foundation's current giving priorities and the possibility of intense competition for funds.
How does one find and apply for federal government grants for non-profits?
-Federal government grants can be found on grants.gov, where one can search for available grants and requests for proposals. The process involves meeting specific qualifications and undergoing rigorous reporting and record-keeping requirements.
What are the characteristics of local government or municipal grants for non-profits?
-Local government grants are made from the city or county's annual budget and are typically awarded based on alignment with the government's giving priorities. They can be found through internet searches and often involve less paperwork than federal grants.
Why might a non-profit consider grants as a funding source, and what are some alternatives?
-Grants can provide significant funding for program launch or expansion, especially for those with a track record of success. Alternatives include building an individual donor base, hosting fundraising events, or exploring earned income or fee-for-service models.
Outlines
💼 Introduction to Grant Funding for Nonprofits
Amber Melanie Smith introduces the topic of grant funding for nonprofits, explaining that grants are a way to secure funding for launching or expanding programs. She outlines six types of organizations that provide grants and plans to discuss where to find them, how they operate, and how to determine if they're suitable for a specific cause. Amber shares her personal experience with running a nonprofit and the importance of grants in generating funds for impact.
🏢 Corporate Foundations and Giving Programs
Amber discusses corporate foundations, which are separate entities set up by companies to provide charitable grants. She suggests using online search tools or company websites to find these foundations. The pros include potentially large grant amounts and the possibility of ongoing support, while the cons are the competitive nature and the difficulty of establishing a relationship. Amber also covers corporate giving programs, which might involve employee committees or matching gifts. She advises building relationships with company employees to increase the chances of being added to approved charity lists.
👨👩👧👦 Family Foundations and Their Grant Priorities
Family foundations are private foundations managed by individuals or families to organize their charitable giving. Amber recommends using search tools like foundationcenter.org or guidestar.org to find these foundations. She highlights the pros of potentially receiving larger and ongoing grants from family foundations once a trusting relationship is established. The cons include the difficulty of getting noticed by these often-private entities. Amber emphasizes the importance of aligning with the family's giving priorities, which can be discerned from their past funding and tax records.
🌐 Community Foundations and Their Local Impact
Community foundations pool funds from various sources to support nonprofits based on community needs or the foundation's giving priorities. Amber explains that these foundations are often more approachable and open to conversations with nonprofits. She mentions that while community foundations can provide significant funding, the alignment of the nonprofit's cause with the current priorities of the foundation is crucial. Amber also notes that these foundations might have specific application processes that need to be followed.
🏦 Federal and Local Government Grants
Amber covers grants from the federal government, which are found on grants.gov, and are characterized by significant funding but also by extensive paperwork and reporting requirements. She points out that these grants are suitable for nonprofits that can demonstrate the ability to meet the government's service needs. Local government or municipal grants are also discussed, which are funded through city or county budgets. These grants can boost a nonprofit's reputation but may also require audits and specific reporting.
🤝 Choosing the Right Grant Opportunities
In the final paragraph, Amber emphasizes that there's no one-size-fits-all approach to grant funding. She suggests that while grants are valuable for program expansion, building an individual donor base or exploring earned income models might be more straightforward for fundraising. Amber invites viewers to share their experiences with grant applications and encourages them to subscribe for more content. She also promotes her Facebook group for further discussions on social change and nonprofit impact.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Grants
💡Non-profit organization
💡Corporate foundations
💡Corporate giving programs
💡Private or family foundations
💡Public or community foundations
💡Federal government grants
💡Local government grants
💡Grantmakers
💡Brand alignment
Highlights
Grants are a way for nonprofits to find funding for launching or expanding programs.
There are six types of organizations that give out grants to nonprofits.
Corporate foundations are set up by companies to give charitable grants.
Corporate giving programs may include employee committees or matching donations.
Private or family foundations are established by individuals or families for charitable giving.
Public or community foundations pool funds from multiple sources to support local nonprofits.
Federal government grants are available for nonprofits through grants.gov.
Local government grants are made from the city or county's annual budget.
Corporate foundation grants can be large and may lead to long-term funding relationships.
Corporate giving programs can be easier to access but may involve smaller donations.
Family foundations require a relationship building process and can be private.
Community foundations are open to conversations with nonprofits but prioritize based on community needs.
Federal grants offer significant funding but require extensive paperwork and compliance.
Local government grants can be substantial and enhance a nonprofit's reputation.
Grants are competitive, and success depends on alignment with the grant maker's priorities.
Building individual donor bases and exploring earned income models can be alternative funding strategies.
The choice of grant opportunities depends on the nonprofit's size, cause, and the grant maker's funding priorities.
Transcripts
Grants are just one of the many ways that your nonprofit can find
funding to launch or expand a program but
where do you find grants, and who are the organizations giving them
out? So in this video i am going to talk about six
different types of organizations that give out grants for non-profits,
where to find them, how they work, and how to think through if they are the best
fit for your cause. Welcome back to my channel! My name
is Amber Melanie Smith, and I make these videos here on youtube to help aspiring
change makers with tips and strategies to help you change the
world while living a life of impact and purpose. So some of you know
my story - years ago I started a non-profit
organization that i now run full-time, and throughout that whole
time grants were just one of the ways that we
were able to generate the funds to grow our impact.
And I learned throughout this process that
there are many many different types of organizations that offer
grants. In this video, I'm going to talk about six types of grantmakers
in particular - and that includes corporate foundations,
corporate giving programs, private or family foundations,
public or community foundations, grants from the federal government, and grants
from your local government. And for each of these types of grant
makers I'm going to talk through what they are, how you find these types
of grants, the pros and cons of all these types of
grants, and how to think through whether or not
that type of grant could be a good fit for your specific non-profit
organization. All right, so let's get down to it. Grant
maker type number one is a corporate foundation.
What is a corporate foundation? A corporate foundation is a
separate organization set up by a company for the explicit purpose
of giving out charitable grants to nonprofits
now this would fall under the private foundation category since
it is owned and operated by the company in its own interest they make all the
decisions there are a couple of different ways you
could find corporate foundations one is by using a search tool online
something like foundationcenter.org where you can search around for
different foundations different company
foundations you can also just go directly to a company's website
and look for something called charitable giving or corporate social
responsibility a page that has that title and usually that is
where they will describe whether they have a corporate foundation
and a little bit about how it works and how to get more information
not all companies have a foundation but of course you can
roll the dice and google something like company name plus foundation and see
what comes up maybe you'll find one okay so what are the pros and the cons
of going after corporate foundation funding
for your nonprofit the pros are that these grants can sometimes come in
fairly large amounts and once you're able to
get your foot in the door and establish a relationship with a
company they might be likely to continue to fund your work
year after year not indefinitely of course but you might be able to have a
long-term relationship with a particular corporate foundation
the cons are of course that like many grants and dare i say
most grants they can be quite competitive and it's a little bit hard
to get your foot in the door having a relationship with a company
before you apply for a grant through their foundation
might help you get a leg up so you could try something like
inviting that company to have their employees come volunteer with you
or do a talk for that company something to get them
to build a relationship with you before you go ahead and apply for a grant
could increase your odds so how do you know if a corporate foundation grant is
a good fit for your nonprofit in another video i talk about corporate
sponsorships and i talk about this idea of brand alignment
and that applies here too companies are looking for
causes to fund that align with the issue areas that they care about
and that also have some good brand alignment with what they do as a company
on the one hand companies tend to fund issues and causes that have some kind of
correlating relationship with what they do as a company for example
banks will often fund something like financial literacy programs or
education or housing and homelessness programs because they have
the sort of direct and or indirect relationship with the banking process
meaning in this case that these issues and causes relate to
a community's need for banking services on the other hand sometimes a company
decides what to fund based on the interests
of the ceo or the leadership of the company if
if they're particularly personally passionate about a cause they might
direct their entire company and its foundation to support that cause
as a result here i'm showing you an example of the bank of america corporate
foundation page where you can see that they have
identified specific issues and causes they are interested in funding through
their foundation so this is what a page might look like on
any other company's foundation page you're looking for the language that
talks about the issues and pri and priorities that they have in terms
of what they want to fund the second type of grant maker is still within the
corporate structure but it looks a lot different and that is a
corporate giving program
this could take a couple of different forms a corporate giving program might
allow their own employees to form a committee and
vote on a particular cause that they want to give
some sponsorship dollars to or some of the corporate funding to
it could be an employee matching program where if an employee of that company
makes a personal donation to a cause the company promises to
match the donation by also donating that same amount
up to a certain cap for example um okay so how do you find opportunities to
benefit from a corporate giving program oftentimes a charity will end up
on a particular company's corporate giving program
approved charities list because the employees of that company have
asked their higher-ups to add the non-profit to that list
so to get on these approved charity lists at different companies you really
want to be getting to know the employees of these different companies
you want to be inviting them to volunteer with you and then tell them
hey you know if your company has a corporate giving program or an employee
matching program please let us know and help us get on
your approved charities list because we'd love to be
able to work with you all and receive your
support in this way there are also some great websites out there that
list the different companies across the country that offer
employee matching programs some of them include
double the donation or matchinggifts.com so check those out sometimes you can
just do a search to see if a particular company you have in mind
has a matching program and sometimes those sites will even link you to
information about how those programs work and who to contact to get on
those programs lists so let's talk pros and
cons of corporate giving programs one major pro is that it is a little bit
easier to get your foot in the door for an opportunity
like this because all you really need to do
is to meet and convince a couple of the employees of that company to help you
get on that list for your nonprofit this can be a little bit easier than trying
to convince the ceo of a company to give you a grant
the cons are that these donations tend to be a little bit smaller and of course
you still have to convince the employees at the company to pick
your charity for charitable giving at the company
it's one thing to be on a list of approved charities but
that's just the first step the employees need to know who you are
they need to care about your cause and then they need to pick
your cause when they're choosing where they want their donations to go
as for whether this is a good option for you employee giving programs and
corporate giving programs can be a good fit for organizations that are smaller
just starting out because it takes a little bit less to get your
foot in the door you don't necessarily need to have this
long established reputation yet though that always helps because then more
people know about you and might choose you
to donate to and get their money matched from their company of course
but really it's a great option for organizations of any size
because if you can accumulate enough of these
individual employees donating money and then having their company match it
through a corporate giving program it can add up to quite a bit
the third type of grant maker i'm going to talk about is a family foundation
now this is another type of private foundation meaning that it is run and
all the decisions for it are made by a specific person or in this case
a private individual or a family people establish
family foundations when they want to organize the way that they
give to charity or perhaps they need some help administering grants but
it's a way for folks to be able to give out their money in a more organized way
it's also a way some people put their funding into a tax exempt
entity to get that benefit of that but you do have a requirement when you
have a family foundation that you have to be giving out
at least some percent of your your funding that's available in the
foundation every year in order to keep your irs tax-exempt status so how do you
find family foundations once again you can
use a foundation search tool something like
foundationcenter.org or guidestar.org some of these resources do
cost a membership fee in order to be able to access their database of
foundations but there are also some ways that if you are savvy at doing some
internet searches you can get a lot of this information for free too
for example here is one way i might try to find
some family foundations in my city using guidestar.org
first you have to create a free login at guidestar so you go ahead and do that
you log in and then you go to their search tool and you
narrow it down you filter by the state that you're located in
and then your city and then what i do is i type the search
keywords family foundation in the search bar
which tends to narrow down the list of non-profits in my city
to the family foundations keep in mind that the word foundation is
not a legal term other types of charities can put the
word foundation in their name too so you really just kind of have to uh
observe the list that results from from this search and guide star with a
keen eye to look for which ones are actually family foundations that give
out grants to other non-profits another cool thing you can do is once
you find some foundations in guidestar you can look at their 990s or
their tax forms from year to year and kind of look at
what other nonprofits they have funded what types of patterns you're seeing in
terms of the types of causes they seem to be interested in
so that'll give you some good clues as to whether that family foundation might
be a good fit for you as well so pros of trying to get a grant from a
family foundation once you establish a trusting
relationship with a family foundation you might be
able to get support in larger amounts and you might be able to get ongoing
support if you become one of their favorite causes they might choose to
support you year after year it's never guaranteed
but it might be able to help the major con of
trying to get grant support from a family foundation is that it can be
quite difficult sometimes to get on the radar for these foundations
they're often very private many of them don't even have websites
so it can take a while to find and build a relationship
with one of these foundations thinking through whether this could be a good fit
for you this type of grant funding just like
every other type of grant funding i've discussed so far
it's always about the priorities of the individual
or in this case the family giving out the funding
so what are their priorities what are the causes that they care about and i
talked earlier about how you can kind of get a clue about
the things that they care about based on what they funded in the past looking at
their tax records that you can find on guidestar or other
places for example a family that's very
interested in the arts might be interested in funding arts-related
non-profits but nothing else you've just got to take a look at what
they have funded and if they do have a website see what
they describe as their priorities there and that's one of the ways you'll know
if you're a good fit for them then of course like all of
the grant makers that i am talking about there
will be some kind of process to actually request a grant i could be a formal
letter like you might see in a corporate foundation it might be
that you simply get to know the family in this case with a family foundation
and they decide they're going to make a grant to you
you really have to learn the different ways that different types of grant
makers ask you to request funds and follow
those instructions in order to be able to
access that support
the fourth type of grant maker i'm going to talk about is
a community foundation and i might also actually include some united ways
in this as well but these are public charities
that pool together funds from usually multiple sources around the community it
could be multiple individual donors could be many companies all working
together putting their funds together and then that entity makes decisions
about where to invest the funds in non-profits in the community based on
the region or communities needs or their
giving priorities for that year how do you find community foundations
you can do an online search for community foundations in your city just
to add your city's name to your search with community foundation you can also
go to the website of council of foundations they have a whole
map across the united states showing where all of the community
foundations are located so for example here's one i found in
philadelphia you can check out their site they talk about
the different types of grants that they offer as a community foundation
and they have instructions here on how you would go about
applying for some of this grant support so one of the major pros
of community foundations is it's often easier to start a conversation with
community foundations they're more open so they will invite non-profits
from around the community to come share what they do tell their story to
their staff they want to know about all of the
non-profits in the community as much as possible because
it helps inform their giving priorities and their giving decisions
that said a major con is that you have to understand
that a community foundation is likely to choose its giving priorities based on
the biggest gap or the biggest need in the region at that time
so for example in my area
childhood literacy and education was a major topic for a couple of years and
they primarily just wanted to fund organizations that did work around that
topic so it might end up that they are only
looking at a very narrow list of causes at that time it really
depends so you might just need to look at what
they're doing what issues they're prioritizing and see
if your cause aligns with what they're trying to do
in that period of time and thinking through if a community foundation is a
good fit for you just have a conversation with them they
will tell you straight out if you are a good fit for them
or if you'd be wasting your time trying to apply for a grant through their
processes at that time have a good conversation with them send
them an email these are open organizations that want to hear from you
so just ask the fifth type of grantmaker i'm going to talk about
is the federal government
now the federal government offers a variety of types of economic aid such as
to small businesses but in this case i'm specifically
talking about grants made to nonprofits through
federally available dollars how do you find federal government
grants you go to grants.gov it's as simple as that there you can
search for what grants or requests for proposals they have out
a request for proposal is what it sounds like it's when a
grant-making entity wants to hear from you for you to make a
proposal a pitch for what they should spend their money
on so they're asking for you to send them your pitch
essentially by a certain deadline the pro of getting a federal
grant is that it can be a significant amount of money and it's often
multi-year grants so you'd be getting that support for
several years in a row presumably the big con
of a federal grant is there's so much paperwork to qualify for a federal
grant first you have to have a lot of things
in place like you have to have had a recent
audit and it has to have come out as a clean audit for your nonprofit so this
is probably not something you would be able to get
as a very small non-profit who hasn't even had an
audit yet or a track record of success the reporting required and the
record-keeping required for federal grants
is so intense that i know of many non-profits who when they get a
federal grant they have to hire a new staff person whose sole job it is
to just report and keep records for that grant
that's how much there is to do in terms of the reporting and record keeping
for a federal grant you can kind of see why this would make sense
they are using taxpayer dollars to fund the organization so they really
need to make sure that the organization is proving itself that
it is meeting the goals that it said it would
otherwise they could get in trouble with the public and rightly so for spending
the money in a way that the public might deem inappropriate is a
federal grant a good fit for you so here's how
it works consider that usually the federal
government is giving out a grant because the non-profit receiving the grant is
fulfilling some kind of need or service that the government
itself might have needed to fulfill if it weren't for that nonprofit
so for example developing affordable housing solutions in this
case the government has determined that it is more cost
effective and efficient to just pay a non-profit who specializes in that
because they are the experts in that topic
than it would be to try to do it themselves so think about whether your
nonprofit is offering some kind of service to the
community the state or the whole country that could typically fall under the
domain of something the government would need to
do and there might be a grant out there that aligns with your work
and the sixth and final type of grant maker i'm going to talk about
is the local government or municipal grant maker
these grants are grants made to non-profits by the local government the
city or the county usually from dollars that are part of the city
or county's annual approved budget these are not to be
confused with city or county contracts which might be a
situation similar to what i described previously
about the federal government where a city or county has basically
hired a non-profit to fulfill some kind of service for the city this
is not what i'm talking about here i'm talking about
the city or county's decision to actually make charitable grants to
nonprofits in the community the contracts might also be a good fit
for you and you should check that out you can find nonprofit grants available
through your city or county by doing a simple internet search
do city name plus non-profit grants or county name plus non-profit grants
i'm showing an example here of my my own city raleigh has grants that they
offer non-profits you can see how they describe the different types of
grants available here so a lot of city or county pages will
have something that looks probably similar to this
so pros of city or county grants some of them can be in the tens or even
hundreds of thousands of dollars so the size of the grant is a
pro also getting a grant from your city or county government really raises
your nonprofit's visibility and reputation
which could then in turn lead to even more funding opportunities
this is because it shows a lot of trust usually
city and county governments will only fund non-profits with
some really solid program model or proven success
so it adds a lot of credibility to your name if you can get a grant of this
nature cons similar to all these other types of
grants these types of grants can be hard to get
and once again your nonprofit and its work must align with the giving
priorities of the city or county government at the time
also similar to federal grants some of these
uh grant opportunities from the city or county might require
things that smaller non-profits or newer nonprofits typically don't have in place
yet like their annual audit done of their tax
records there's also likely a bit of paperwork
and reporting and record keeping related to getting a local government
grant but not nearly as much as a federal grant i can promise you that is
it a good fit for you i have found that these municipal grants
their priorities their giving priorities might change every couple of years based
on what the city and county's needs are at that time
so i would say it's always a good idea to keep your eye on them and see what
their funding interests are at that time and maybe it
will just align with what you've got going on so which of these
are the best or the easiest grants to go after so keep in mind
all grants can be somewhat competitive to go after if you're looking for
an easier or fast way to raise money i always recommend
working on building up your individual donor base having a fundraising event
or this one is very important checking out an earned
income or fee for service model grants are great
when you are trying to start up a new program or expand or build on something
that has had a track record of success but you can't necessarily count on them
for all the support you're going to need to grow your nonprofit and keep it
sustained in terms of the grant opportunities i
discussed here in this video it's less about ease and more about what
is the best fit some are a better fit for smaller
organizations or newer organizations and some are
great for larger and more well-established organizations
it also depends on what cause that you are working on and what the funding
priorities are of those grant makers there's really no
one-size-fits-all solution for all organizations so you really have
to think about what is going to be the best model for you
and act accordingly so i want to hear from you have you applied for
any grants in these categories what have your experiences been share with us tell
us about your challenges or if you've had success getting a grant in one of
these categories tell us about that too i really hope this video was helpful
don't forget my name is amber melanie smith and i really hope that you
enjoyed this and the other videos on my channel please don't forget
to subscribe and hit that little bell so you can get alerts
next time i launch my next video also if you are on facebook
check out my group change the world or bust where myself and other change
makers are having amazing conversations around
social change non-profits making a difference and more
thank you so much for watching i hope to see you next time
Voir Plus de Vidéos Connexes
8/3 Grants : $60k Buy Home, $15k Home Repair, $20k To Move, $5k Rent, $3k Seniors
PRIVATE VIDEO**
Top 5 Grant Types | Best Grants List
Applying for Students with Permanent Disabilities Grant Funding
AP Gov | 1.7 Relationship Between the States and National Government | NEW!
Financial Resources Quiz Solution - How to Build a Startup
5.0 / 5 (0 votes)