1. Find alignment between what you do and a company's core products or services. In the case of an energy company, building your case around economic development and retention, environment, safety or emergency preparedness provides greater natural alignment than, say, medical research, youth sports or fitness programs.
   
   
2. Look for a connection between what you do and a company’s core values. With Sempra Energy, for instance, if your grant proposal furthers diversity, leadership development or environmental stewardship, it will automatically trigger more interest than a proposal that doesn’t highlight what you have in common with one another.
   
   
3. Uncover parallels between the issues you address and the issues faced by a company. Many companies have workforce-attraction and retention issues, like affordable housing for their workers or concerns with transportation gridlock. Others promote supplier diversity, have major needs in business advocacy or have shown concerns with the high cost of healthcare. See if you can find these areas of alignment between a company’s concerns and the work you do.
   
   
4. Find a connection with a company employee and what you do. If a company has an executive whose job is emergency planning and your group provides relief in emergency situations, make the case for a relationship on that level. Maybe a partnership will blossom from there.
   
   
5. Look for overlaps between the audience you serve and the audience a company is trying to reach. A utility company might try to reach lower-income customers with special services or rates. A company working in a complex regulatory or political environment might need to strengthen relations with community, business and opinion leaders. A company that’s just gone public might need to reach investors or potential investors. Look to see if your group offers a unique way to reach an audience of interest.

The best grant proposals
The best grant proposals are those where you find connections or alignment with a company in one or more of these areas. While it doesn’t mean you’ll automatically get a grant, you will prove that you’ve done your homework and worked hard to show why a relationship might work. Groups that work to show this natural connection between what they do and what the company is trying to achieve show creativity and savvy, making a grant-maker’s job easy.