If funders can’t find you, they can’t fund you. It’s a simple truth — but one that thousands of nonprofits are unknowingly working against every day. In this session, part of AMCF’s ongoing commitment to free educational programming for Muslim-led and Muslim-serving nonprofits, AMCF welcomed Zahra Bokhari Hassan, Senior Development Manager at Candid, for a practical, step-by-step walkthrough of one of the most powerful — and most underused — free tools in the nonprofit sector.
📥 Download the slides: Make Your Nonprofit Visible to Funders — Slide Deck (PDF)
What Is Candid — and Why Does It Matter?
Candid was formed through the merger of two longtime sector institutions: GuideStar and Foundation Center. Together, they built the most comprehensive nonprofit database in the country — covering 1.9 million organization profiles, 3 million annual grant transactions, and $180 billion in annual grant dollars tracked. When a donor, foundation, or DAF advisor wants to know whether an organization is legitimate, active, and aligned with their values, Candid is where they look.
That data doesn’t just live on Candid’s platform. It flows out to more than 200 partner platforms — including Meta, Google, Apple Pay, PayPal, Fidelity Charitable, Vanguard Charitable, Salesforce, and Foundant (which AMCF uses for grants management). Wherever donors and funders are making decisions, Candid data is feeding the picture they see of your organization.
Here’s the critical point: whether or not you’ve claimed your Candid profile, your organization is almost certainly already in the database. Every 501(c)(3) that has filed a Form 990 is in there — pulled from IRS records. The question is whether that profile reflects who you actually are today, or just a skeleton of outdated information you’ve never touched.
The Four Seals of Transparency
Candid’s Seal of Transparency system is the mechanism that turns a bare-bones IRS record into a compelling organizational story. There are four levels, earned in order, each building on the last. Together they take less than an hour to complete — and the payoff is significant: Candid’s own research shows that Seal holders receive an average of 62% more in contributions than nonprofits without a Seal.
Here’s what each level involves:
Bronze — Make Sure Donors Can Find You (~15 minutes) Share your mission, leadership, population served, and contact details. This is the foundation. It also unlocks Apple Pay donations — meaning anyone browsing your profile can give with a single tap, no credit card required.
Silver — Make the Case for Support (~5 minutes) Add program information: program names, descriptions, geographic area served, and brand elements like your logo. This is where you begin making your case to potential funders before they’ve even reached out.
Gold — Gain Trust and Support (~10 minutes) Provide financial documents and leadership demographics. This is the seal that builds funder confidence — and for nonprofits with annual budgets under $1 million, earning a Gold Seal unlocks free access to Candid Premium (more on that below).
Platinum — Highlight Your Impact (~10 minutes) Share your goals, strategies, and the measurable impact your organization is making. This moves you from reporting activities to demonstrating outcomes — a critical distinction for grant-seeking.
A Special Note for Muslim-Serving Organizations
Zahra shared one tip that applies directly to every organization in AMCF’s network: under “Populations Served,” make sure to include Muslims. Right now, very few Muslim-serving nonprofits have tagged themselves this way in Candid’s system. That means when a donor or foundation searches specifically for Muslim-serving organizations — and increasingly, many are — they can’t find you. Filling in that field is one of the highest-leverage things you can do in under two minutes.
Funders also search by geography. Make sure your geographic area served is accurate and current. Regional foundations, in particular, rely on this field to surface local organizations.
How to Claim Your Profile (Step by Step)
- Go to app.candid.org and create a free personal account. Use your organization email address — it speeds up the approval process significantly.
- Search for your organization by name or EIN. When you find your profile, click “Is this your organization?” to begin the claim.
- Look for a confirmation email from donotreply@candid.org with the subject line “Good news: you’re approved to manage your Candid profile.” If you used a personal email or your organization doesn’t have a website, Candid may ask for an IRS EIN Issuance Letter or IRS Affirmation Letter to verify your connection.
- Once approved, click “View my organization profile” and begin editing. Fields tagged with a Bronze, Silver, Gold, or Platinum label are the ones that count toward your seal — prioritize those first.
A few things to remember: earn the seals in order (you can’t skip ahead), review all fields before submitting, and always hit Publish — otherwise your updates won’t appear publicly.
Update your profile at least once a year to keep your seal active.
Candid Premium: The $2,000 Tool You Can Get for Free
For small nonprofits, the Gold Seal unlocks something remarkable: free access to Candid Premium through the “Go for Gold” offer. Candid Premium is a subscription-based fundraising tool — normally priced at roughly $2,000 per year — that gives nonprofits access to:
- Data on 300,000+ grantmakers and 29 million grants
- Open RFPs (Requests for Proposals) from foundations actively seeking applicants
- A personalized fundraising dashboard to track prospects and saved searches
- Full giving history for foundations — not just what they say they fund, but what their actual grants show they fund
- An AI-powered Letter of Inquiry (LOI) writer that pulls from your Candid profile to generate a first draft
As Zahra put it: the scariest part of writing an LOI is the blank page. This tool puts something on the page for you to edit — and that alone changes everything.
Don’t qualify for the Gold Seal offer, or have a budget over $1 million? Candid Premium is also available free of charge at more than 2,100 community partner locations nationwide — including libraries and nonprofit resource centers.
Beyond the Profile: Other Free Candid Resources
Candid Learning offers free webinars, on-demand videos, and guides on topics including fundraising, proposal writing, starting a nonprofit, and measuring impact. Candid Insights, their blog, provides data-driven analysis and practical tips for grantseekers and nonprofit leaders. Sign up for their newsletters at candid.org/newsletters.
Your First Step
Go to app.candid.org right now. Search for your organization. Does your profile exist? Is the information accurate? Bookmark the page so you can come back to claim and complete it.
AMCF is here to help Muslim-led and Muslim-serving nonprofits access every tool available to strengthen their organizations. To learn more about our capacity-building programs and free educational resources, visit amuslimcf.org.