I firmly believe that any organization investing in grant funding must submit at least 3 grants each month for a total of 36 grants per year. If you are a small organization with a solid grant writer, this should equate to an estimated $100,000+/year in grant funding, which is a great start for a new grant funding budget.
From there, it is time to scale.
When a new client comes to me with little to no grant success and wants to start using my services, I usually start them with 3-4 grants/month.
I maintain 4-5 clients at a time, so, on average, I write 16 grants each month. And I only work 25-30 hours/week.
One of the most common questions I am asked is, “How do you write so many grants in a month?”
Here’s how I do it…
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Over the years, I have developed a well-oiled grant-writing machine. This has enabled me to take on 4-5 small organization clients at a time and maintain a 36-40% grant success rate.
Related: Do you have a “grant niche?”
The important components are:
- Investing in Research– The more thorough your grant vetting, the more successful you will be. I invest more time and money into vetting than any other grant writer I know. The end result is that I find a bunch of hidden gems and don’t write grants unless I have a strong chance of winning them.
- Developing a Process- Once you decide to write a specific grant, follow the same process through to completion. The more consistent your process, the more efficient you will be.
- Documenting- Develop a document library for each client and segment it further into projects. Most grants ask a variety of the same 39 questions, so once you have the responses to those questions, you can reuse them. Never just copy and paste- always tailor the response to the funder, but the document library gives you a big head start.
- Stay Organized- I can’t overstate the importance of having an organizational system. I personally use Instrumentl to track deadlines, house my document library, and alert me to tasks. But, spreadsheets or other software is OK as long as it works for you. (If you want to use Intrumentl, apply promo code EPICGRANTS50 for a discount.)
- Maintain a 12 Month Grant Calendar- Being able to project out months in advance helps me understand when I need to start prepping docs for a grant and when I need to start writing. It also allows me to be more flexible when I need to remove or add a grant opportunity.
Whether you need to scale the number of grants you write for your organization or bring on additional clients, consider adopting a system that works for you and sticking with it.
Until next time,
Write Epic Grants
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