Grant Writing & Funding

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.

Introducing the G.R.A.N.T.S. Formula – Your Key to Writing Efficient Grants

Are you ready to revolutionize your grant writing process?

Look no further than the G.R.A.N.T.S. Formula, a proven framework designed to enhance your grant writing skills and create a competitive grant structure. Developed to address the challenges faced by grant writers, this formula will guide you from a blank page to a well-structured grant proposal in no time.

Let’s dive into the details of the G.R.A.N.T.S. Formula, starting with the “G” – Get the FOA or RFP and Use it as a Template.

A Funding Opportunity Announcement (FOA), or Request for Proposal (RFP), provides essential information on how funding agencies want grant applications to be written. Each FOA or RFP is unique, with its own set of requirements and guidelines.

By thoroughly reading and understanding the FOA or RFP, you can use its criteria as headers in your grant application, ensuring alignment with the funding agency’s expectations.

This will get you over the ‘blank staring at a screen’ that many beginner grant writers find themselves.

During this initial step, you’ll familiarize yourself with the mission, eligibility criteria, deadlines, technical requirements, and sections to be addressed in the grant application. Additionally, you’ll have access to scoring criteria and contact information for any clarifications.

I’ve received many emails from people saying that they’re struggling with the learning process of writing grants and gaining experience with grant writing. This formula will help you achieve exactly that! It will also help you go from staring at a blank page and being overwhelmed, to having a draft developed in no time at all!

Let’s get into some of those tricks with our “G” from the G.R.A.N.T.S. Formula.

ABOUT HOLLY RUSTICK

Grant Writing & Funding (GWF) has a Global Movement to Secure $1 Billion in Grant Funding for Good and $30 Million in Grant Writing Businesses by 2030.  Holly Rustick, CEO of GWF, is leading the movement; a world-renowned grant writer with 20+ years of experience, bestselling author, and business coach for new and seasoned grant writers to replace their full-time income writing grants part-time from home through her signature programs: the Freelance Grant Writer Academy and the Grant Professional Mentorship.  

Rustick is the host of the top grant writing podcast “Grant Writing & Funding” and the author of the Bestselling book, The Beginner’s Guide to Grant Writing. With an MA in International Political Economy,  past-president of the Guam Women’s Chamber of Commerce, serving on numerous boards of directors, Holly is also an unapologetic feminist. She lives on the island of Guam with her beautiful daughter, Isabella. 

CONNECT WITH HOLLY RUSTICK 

Website: https://grantwritingandfunding.com/ 

RESOURCES:

• Weekly Newsletter: “Write Grants. Get Paid” - Get thought leadership on grant and freelance grant writing strategies every week in your inbox.  https://grantwritingandfunding.com/
• Freelance Grant Writer Academy: Replace your Full-Time Income Writing Grants Part-Time from Home. https://grantwritingandfunding.com/freelance-grant-writer-academy/
• Grant Professional Mentorship: Double your Monthly Revenue with an Income Stream Outside of Grant Writing. https://grantwritingandfunding.com/mentorship 

RATE, REVIEW, & FOLLOW THE PODCAST

Favor, please? If you love this podcast, would you please do me a favor and leave a review on iTunes or your podcast listener?

This helps others find the podcast and I read each and every review!

“Every time I listen to Holly’s show, I learn something” <– If that sounds like you, please consider rating and reviewing my show!

Also, if you haven’t done so already, follow the Grant Writing & Funding podcast to get grant and freelance grant writing proven strategies and conversations in your podcast player every single week.

Thanks for listening!

Warmly,

Holly Rustick

Leading the $1 Billion for Good Movement: By 2030, aspiring and seasoned grant writers inside the Freelance Grant Writer Academy & Grant Professional Mentorship will 1) WIN $1 Billion in Grants, and 2) MAKE $30 Million in their Grant Writing Businesses. We are on our way already.

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.

Learn how to track sources and file them into a stunning bibliography for your grant. We're all about citations and celebrations because it's Holly's Birthday! Head on over to www.grantwritingandfunding.com/80 for your FREE gift! Listen to the podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud, Stitcher or watch on YouTube! To share your thoughts: Send Holly an email at [email protected] To help out the show: Leave an honest review on iTunes. Your ratings and reviews really help, and I read all of them! Subscribe on iTunes or on YouTube. Looking for more? Follow us on Instagram @grantwriting_funding

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.

Gathering data is important when supporting grants, connecting with your beneficiaries, providing credibility for your projects, and even understanding what projects to develop. Data can be gathered in a multitude of different ways and as we discussed last week in our re-broadcast for conducting a Needs & Strengths Assessment (episode 78), I discussed methods for Needs & Strengths Assessments to utilize are online surveys, in-person surveys, and focus groups.

However, there are some other methods (and can be FREE or very affordable) ways to gather research. One, low hanging fruit way, to gather data that we will discuss today is using polls on Facebook and Instagram.

Social media can be a great platform to gather information about the needs and strengths of your beneficiaries or those who you may want to serve. So, let’s look at some main big social media mongrels. This is not extensive at all, but these are some of the larger social media platforms and you will walk away today being able to gather data on these platforms using very simple processes. If you have never utilized social media polls to gather information for your nonprofit or a nonprofit that you work with, after this episode you will be able to do it.

A full disclaimer is that any tactic that I am talking about as of July 2019 may change in the future as social media is always changing strategies, user interfaces, and options. These polls may not always be an option or as we speak they may be getting more and more robust. But the essence behind the strategy is the same. Social media is to create interaction and I am sure that connecting with your supporters, beneficiaries, and advocates utilizing social media will always be possible to some extent. 

Facebook Social Media Polls

As of 2019 Facebook is still the behemoth on social media. Yes, there are shifts and I see more and more people are using other social media platforms as their main sources, but Facebook is still king as has the most users at 2.23 billion users every month. That’s nearly a 1/3 of the world’s population!

Many nonprofits only have a Facebook page for their nonprofit and not even a website. I do not recommend this at all (and you can listen to more about why in episode 12: https://www.grantwritingandfunding.com/12) but the fact is this true. In any case, you should have some sort of social media platform for your nonprofit, or the ones you work with, and because of Facebook’s size, many nonprofits have pages on Facebook.

In order to really utilize Facebook for polls, ads, and other ways you need to have a separate page for your nonprofit or a group and not just your personal page.

For nonprofits, I like Facebook nonprofit pages so they can set up groups, go Live, add updated information, create ads, and form a tribe. So how do you gather information utilizing Facebook polls?

Facebook has the option to easily create a poll in groups or on non-personal pages. All you have to do is click on ‘create a post’ and you have the option for poll. You can even add images to each choice. This is a great way to get your supporters or beneficiaries to answer some questions. I am an administrator of a couple of pages on Facebook and one poll I recently did was to ask people in the group which type of funding they are most focused on securing for their nonprofits in 2019. I gave them the choices of 1) grants, 2) fundraising events, 3) crowdfunding campaign, 4) donor support, 5) create products, or to 6) create services. If you are part of “Fund My Nonprofit” on Facebook, you can scroll down the page and check it out. If you are not yet in the group, please join as this is a free group and has hundreds of members! Just look for “Fund My Nonprofit – Funding Tips and How-To’s”.

The Facebook poll I created took me less than a minute and the feedback was super helpful on a couple of different levels. One level is that I know what type of content to create for this group because I know what most people will find the most valuable. Most people clicked ‘grant funding’ which is perfect for me as that is what I can talk about all day long!

Another level on how it was helpful is that it gives the people a voice and creates a stronger tribe. They get to tell me what they want more of and have a voice to contribute in the group.

How do you get people to take your poll, though?

Well, polls are simple, too, and very quick for people to take. You can use open-ended questions and ask people to reply in the comments, but by providing pre-set answers you will in most cases get a higher amount of responses. This is because when people are on social media, they are getting pings and notifications from a bunch of different sources all at the same time. Polls make a quick and easy way to gather information from a specific group of people.

Guiding people to your poll

The best way you can get an increased number of people replying to your poll is to also email out the list. For example, since I am targeting mainly people who work at nonprofits for my poll I will also email my list and ask people to respond to the poll by providing a link. Once people start responding to the poll, then Facebook does a funny thing of algorithms by notifying more people that like or follow your page and let them know about it. This is pretty cool as Facebook starts to do the work for you. However, you may have this in a private FB group and don’t want any and everyone’s reaction to it and only your targeted audience. That is fine as FB will only let people in your private group know.

Other than email, you can also drive people to your poll by creating ads on Facebook. In this way you can specifically narrow your target to the people with interests in your poll. I can pick a certain city and their interest has to include nonprofits. It is pretty cool, but ads will cost you money. The good thing is you can control how much money you will spend. We won’t go into creating ads as that is its own entire episode or series of episode, but this is an option. One reason you might do a targeted ad is if you do not have a lot of followers or want a larger response rate.

Another simple way to drive people to your poll is by creating more social media posts with the link back to your poll.

Of course polls are...

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.

The Freelance Grant Writer Academy is OPEN for the last time in 2026!

You’re ready to quit your toxic job, retire with meaningful, part-time work, or work from home so you can pick up the kids. But how do you replace your paycheck?

Our 12-month group coaching program helps aspiring and seasoned grant writers replace your full-time income, on flexible hours, writing grants from home. You will build grant writing, marketing, and sales skills to find clients and create recurring income on flexible hours. 
Get weekly coaching, unlimited grant and business reviews, business and grant training, hundreds of templates,Grant Writer & Consultant Certification, a community, and listed on our Grant Hire for Hire Directory.

Our students have earned over $12.6 million in freelance business revenue. You don’t have to figure this out alone.

Join the Academy for $3,500 or 8 monthly payments of $475. Doors close October 23rd at 11:59 PM Eastern.