Raising money outside the U.S.: some countries are fertile ground that's never been plowed.(FERTILE GROUND)

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Christianson also recommended that organizations have patience once starting a fundraising program outside of the U.S. "Success doesn't happen overnight so you may have to subsidize the program for awhile before it becomes profitable," he said. "Therefore, this presumes you're in a strong financial position prior to expanding overseas."

Peters agreed that building a fundraising program in another country will usually take some time before it develops. This means if your organization is in the red in the U.S. and thinks the grass will be greener on the other side of the world--forget it. "This is not the kind of investment one makes in desperation. This is an investment that one does as a part of a long-term strategy," he said.

Myths and international intrigue.

Can the appeal go out in English? That's just one of the many questions that make Geoffrey W. Peters, president and CEO of CDR Fundraising Group in Bowie, Md., scratch his head in dismay when talking to clients considering cross-border appeals.

You have to talk the talk if you want to fundraise in another country. If English isn't the country's official language, you will have to send out appeals in the native language.

Even if English is the country's second language, an appeal in English might alienate potential donors who only have a working knowledge of the language. You want to make sure that potential donors read the appeal- and that your mission is fully understood, according to Peters.

And don't limit your organization's growth simply by language. Peters said that some organizations planning to extend to other countries immediately think of Canada and Australia, huge land masses with relatively small populations, and England, which is the "most crowded and most competitive and not necessarily the best choice," just because English is the dominant language.

"If you didn't speak to the donor the way they wanted you to, in their language, you kind of lost them as a fundraising prospect," said Keith Brittingham, strategy director at Merkle, in Columbia, Md. He said that the

biggest complaint organizations would hear back would be that the appeal didn't speak in the correct language.

"A literal translation of an American English letter into another language doesn't work," said Peters. He recalled one client tried using a translation Web site to convert an appeal written in English into another lan guage. The emotions and substance were literally lost in translation and made the copy laughable.

"I don't know that you could be successful in fundraising where you really have to grab at a person's heart strings and make an appeal that resonates. That I don't know that you can do that well translating," he said.

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