6 stages to build a winning grant pipeline in a competitive funding landscape

With federal funding cuts pushing more nonprofits toward private and corporate funders than ever before, 2026 is shaping up to be the most competitive grant landscape yet. The organizations still winning aren't just finding the right opportunities — they're building a pipeline that connects discovery to stewardship, so every grant they win lays the groundwork for the next one.

Today, the top development teams are thinking about grants the way sales teams think about revenue: as a pipeline with stages, from prospecting through long-term relationship management. And AI is making each stage faster and smarter.

Watch Patrick Schmitt, co-CEO of FreeWill, share how to build an end-to-end grant pipeline — from finding the right funders to turning first-time awards into multi-year partnerships.

In this webinar, we covered:

• Strategies to build a shortlist of high-fit opportunities (and stop wasting time on grants you were never going to win)
• Post-award stewardship workflows you can set up immediately after an award, before the first report is even due
• How to build a diversified funding portfolio so changes in one funding stream doesn’t derail your budget

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