Yitzi Bude of Charity Extra On 5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Lead A Nonprofit Organization
There are loads of people that have great ideas but don’t make any effort in trying to implement their great ideas. Of course turning ideas into a reality is hard work and demands risk taking but if you don’t put in the effort you’ll never know if it works or not.
As part of my series about “individuals and organizations making an important social impact”, I had the pleasure of interviewing Yitzi Bude.
Yitzi Bude, is the Founder and CEO of Charity Extra, an online fundraising platform that’s helped raise over $700 million for nonprofits across 14 countries. With their strategic planning and targeted guidance, Yitzi and his team have helped 100s of charities raise up to 5x more and beyond than when they used other fundraising methods. Yitzi has worked with countless charity leaders and seen firsthand what it takes to lead with purpose and inspire real change.
Thank you so much for doing this with us. Before we begin our readers would like to get to know you a bit more. Can you tell us a bit about your “backstory”?
Sure, so I didn’t always work in the non profit sector and it’s a funny story how I got here. I started my career at a telecommunications company earning below minimum wage just to get me started. While doing that, I started a side business buying and selling closeout items like toys and baby products on Amazon and eBay. I juggled both jobs for a few years, but neither one really was working out.
Then I partnered with a friend, whose father-in-law owned a baby brand in South America. We launched it in Europe, starting with car seats and expanding to baby walkers and high chairs. We got into major retailers like Tesco and Argos, and the business grew quickly. Eventually, we outsourced warehousing and logistics as our operation became more serious. And at that point I still wasn’t really thinking about entering the non profit sector.
Can you tell us the story behind why you decided to start or join your non nonprofit?
So here’s how I got into the non profit sector. My business partner at the time was helping one of their children’s schools to fundraise. He decided to try something new — online crowdfunding similar to how entrepreneurs fund new products on Kickstarter.
But nothing like this existed in Europe so he went out to the USA and found a company that built a platform for online crowdfunding for charities. The school’s fundraising campaign did really well and they raised a lot of the money but the software provider took a big chunk of the donations that came in.
I realised then that there’s a huge opportunity in Europe to build a similar platform to help charities run crowdfunding campaigns at a more affordable rate so charities can raise more money and keep more of it.
And I think that what really gave me the push was that my father supported lots of great causes not just by giving donations but by offering his legal services pro-bono to many charities. He was and still is a big inspiration to me and I saw this venture as an opportunity to follow his footsteps in helping charities fundraise through an online crowdfunding platform while building a business.
Can you describe how you or your organization aims to make a significant social impact?
I believe that every charity in the world wants to do more good but they’re being stopped by one thing: budget. Charities are prevented from helping more people simply because they lack resources to do it.
Therefore our mission at Charity Extra is simple. To help charities raise more money so they can do more good in the world.
Not only do we make it ‘easier’ for charities to fundraise their annual budget. We help them to fundraise well beyond their original goal. Now this isn’t a promise or a guarantee. But 25% of the fundraising campaigns we manage through our platform exceed their goal by a good 10–20%. And in some cases we’ve even more than doubled their original target.
Without saying any names, can you share a story about an individual who was helped by your idea so far?
We’ve worked with 100s of charities so I have plenty of stories but I will share a story about a relatively new charity that really benefited from partnering with Charity Extra.
Food Bank Aid is a charity that distributes fresh produce and pantry staples to 32 North London food banks reaching 20,000 people including 5,000 children. The founder Naomi Russell started the charity early on during the Covid crisis when she saw how so many families were suddenly out of work and couldn’t feed their families. Noami went round her neighbourhoods to collect goods to donate and this snowballed into the large organisation it is today.
Since they were a new charity, fundraising was new to them which is why they turned to us to help them raise the funds they urgently needed to meet the increasing demand for their services. Together we set an ambitious goal of £400,000. And when we saw that goal was achievable, we set a bonus goal of £600,000.
The results of their campaign were even better than we could have imagined. They raised £792,081 in just 36 hours receiving 4682 donations. They raised an amazing 132% of their goal. These extra funds ensured that every family that came to Food Bank Aid would get food to put on their table.
This is a fantastic case study on the power of the Charity Extra platform and we’re privileged to be in the position to help many charities just like Food Bank Aid fundraise extra funds to make a real impact to society and to people that need support.
Are there three things the community/society/politicians can do to help you address the root of the problem you are trying to solve?
- In my opinion if more charities were run like businesses they would find it easier to fundraise in general. Too many charities don’t bother with proper round the year marketing and keeping in touch with their fundraisers, donors, and volunteers. The most successful charities we work with are those that consistently communicate their impact and cultivate a deeply engaged, loyal community.
- This is a harsh truth but a lot of charities simply shouldn’t exist because the government should be doing more to help. To use Food Bank Aid as an example, it’s simply outrageous that there are 10,000s of people in London alone that if not for Food Bank Aid existing they wouldn’t have any food at home. The government should be stepping in to support these families, they shouldn’t have to rely on the goodwill of their community for their basic survival needs.
- The best fundraisers are ones who feel personally connected and have a sense of responsibility to the charity’s mission. Charities, society, and communities should run more initiatives to get people involved with charity work. We work with a fantastic UK charity called GIFT that does an amazing job at inspiring the next generation to adopt a lifetime mindset of giving.
How do you define “Leadership”? Can you explain what you mean or give an example?
Leadership is enabling your workforce or volunteers, or whoever there may be, to be empowered, to feel confident, to be able to do that job independently without you micromanaging them.
But at the same time strong leadership also means having the courage to take difficult and necessary decisions such as when to cut costs and lay off people if that’s what the situation requires.
Based on your experience, what are the “5 Things A Person Should Know Before They Decide To Start A Non Profit”. Please share a story or example for each.
1. Start small. You’re going to be a one person band to start with and you don’t have to do something big, just do something good. To use Food Bank Aid again as an example, Noami the founder started off by herself asking her friends if they can donate any leftover food. And she put a sign outside the front door of her house saying, if anyone has food, leave it here and I’ll distribute it.” And literally, that’s how it started out and today they feed 20,000+ people in London.
2. The cause has to mean something personal both to you and to the people that you help. It shouldn’t just be something you fancy doing. The charity should be solving a problem that either you or people that you know were personally affected by. Don’t just think that you want to do something good and then Google “Which non profits should I start?”. If the cause isn’t personal your motivation will fizzle out very quickly. A good example from one of the charities we work with is The Follicular Lymphoma Foundation who provide services to help people living with Follicular Lymphoma to live well and get well. The charity was started by Nicola Mendelsohn who was diagnosed with Follicular Lymphoma and decided to found a charity dedicated to advance research on treatments, find a cure and provide hope to people just like her.
3. Charity leaders should know that there is a cost to fundraising and that’s perfectly normal. Zero overheads are great at the beginning, but once your charity starts to grow it’s perfectly okay to start having costs and that part of your fundraising will go towards those running costs and for fundraising itself. There’s a lot of stigma around people earning a wage when working for a charity but I think this is wrong and the best run charities have great employees on the payroll and set aside a good budget for marketing, PR, and fundraising.
4. Don’t try to grow too fast. Never over promise and underperform. So, for example, if you’re deciding to collect food and give it out to the needy, don’t tell 50 families you can help them and then manage one week, and then only have enough resources to feed ten families the next week. Make sure you stay in control and grow sustainably. which is why, coming back to the first point, it’s better to start small. See if you can help some people on a consistent basis, and only then look to secure more resources to grow your charity and help more people.
5. This is a boring one but it’s an important one. Make sure you have all the correct legal policies in place. For example, you need safeguarding policies in place to protect the people the charity supports. Don’t ignore this and don’t rely on online help. Speak to a legal expert who can help you draft all the necessary documentation and implement the necessary protocols.
We are very blessed that very prominent leaders read this column. Is there a person in the world who you would like to talk to, to share the idea behind your non profit? He or she might just see this, especially if we tag them. 🙂
There are lots of non profit leaders that I’d like to speak to but there’s one that comes to my mind immediately — Michelle Mitchell OBE. Michelle is the Chief Executive Officer of Cancer Research UK (CRUK). Cancer is unfortunately something that’s affected my life very much as my father sadly passed away at a relatively early age from cancer. So it would be a privilege for me to be able to speak to Michelle and demonstrate how our platform can help CRUK fundraise more money to help fund new cancer research and treatments to help people live longer.
There are many non profit leaders I’d love to speak with, but one person stands out immediately — Michelle Mitchell OBE, CEO of Cancer Research UK (CRUK). Cancer has personally impacted my life, as I sadly lost my father to it. Therefore, it would be an honour to connect with Michelle and share how our platform can help CRUK raise even more funds to support groundbreaking research and treatments, ultimately helping more people battling cancer to live longer and healthier lives.
Can you share your favorite “Life Lesson” Quote? How is that relevant to you in your life?
My favourite “Life Lesson” quote is:
If you don’t try, you’re never going to succeed.
There are loads of people that have great ideas but don’t make any effort in trying to implement their great ideas. Of course turning ideas into a reality is hard work and demands risk taking but if you don’t put in the effort you’ll never know if it works or not.
When I started building Charity Extra and I was calling up charities if they’d be willing to give our platform a go many of them told me this is a crazy idea. They told me it’s a terrible idea and it’s never going to work. And once we took off and became successful, you’d laugh if you knew how many people came up to me to say “I had the same idea as you but I just never got round to building it.” This goes to show that if you don’t try you’re never going to succeed.
How can our readers follow you online?
You can find me on LinkedIn, just search for my name “Yitzi Bude”. I post twice a week on LinkedIn where I share fundraising insights and recent fundraising campaigns we successfully managed. We also have a Charity Extra company LinkedIn page that you can follow.
You can follow me on LinkedIn by searching for ‘Yitzi Bude.’ I post twice a week, where I share valuable fundraising insights and highlight recent campaigns we successfully managed. You can also stay updated by following our Charity Extra Company LinkedIn page.
This was very meaningful, thank you so much. We wish you only continued success in your mission.
Yitzi Bude of Charity Extra On 5 Things You Need To Know To Successfully Lead A Nonprofit… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.