When your nonprofit is brand new, finding your first donors can feel overwhelming. But your first supporters probably aren’t strangers. They’re people who already know you, trust you, and believe in what you’re building. Here’s a practical way to identify those people and start your first fundraising conversations.

Your nonprofit can be raising money and still struggle to pay its bills. The problem may be that too much of your funding is restricted to specific programs or projects. Here’s how restricted giving can create financial strain, why operations deserve to be funded, and how to have better conversations with donors about what their generosity really makes possible.