Expert Fundraiser is offering 10 telephone seminars during the last week of May, 2012.Each session is 90 minutes and includes time for questions. You canparticipate from anywhere in the world that has a phone.The presenter is Alan Sharpe, CFRE, direct mail fundraising consultant, author and coach. The cost of each tele-seminar is CDN$49. These tele-seminars will NOT be recorded. [Read more...]
Who Writes a Better Fundraising Letter, the Doctor or the Patient?
March 16, 2012 By Leave a Comment
You have a dramatic, interesting, compelling story to tell about someone who has been helped by your non-profit organization. You are sure that this story will stir your donors’ emotions and boost your response rates and revenue.
So how should you tell the story? You have two options.
You can either (A) tell it from your point of view, or (B) you can let the person who experienced your organization tell their story in their own words. I recommend you go with Option B whenever possible, although this style of letter has its disadvantages.
In a first-person letter, the person that the story is about writes and signs the letter. For example, if you are a hospital, and you have an amazing story to tell about a patient who was dead on arrival but is alive today because of the intervention of your hospital staff, this type of story would be told in the patient’s own words.
The letter might begin like this: “On a sunny afternoon last September, I arrived at the Metro Health Hospital dead. I had no pulse, no blood pressure, and I wasn’t breathing. Not good, you’ll agree. But here I am a year later, telling you my story, and all because of the amazing staff of the hospital, who saved my life.” The letter would continue with the patient telling his story, and conclude by asking the reader to make a donation.
Advantages:
1. A story told in the first-person is invariably more dramatic and interesting than when the same story is related second-hand by a staff member. The writer of Amazing Grace wrote: “I once was blind, but now I see,” not, “John Newton once was blind but now he sees.”
2. They make your claims more believable because they get the people you serve to make them for you. An ex-patient who suffered a heart-attack, but whose life was saved by hospital staff, can say that the cardiology department is among the best in the world, and be believed, but if his surgeon says the same thing in a letter, donors will think he is just bragging.
3. Letters written by people who have been helped by your organization prove in a personal way that you are making a difference in the world. That’s because stories of lives changed, told by the people whose lives were changed, are more persuasive than stories told about them.
Disadvantages:
1. Letters written in the first-person by the people your organization helps or the people you serve have no institutional authority. A letter written by your CEO obviously speaks on behalf of your organization. But a letter written by someone who has used your services speaks about their experience, and nothing more. Only a letter written by a staff member or board member can tell donors about your strategic direction, describe your programs, and show how past support from donors is making a difference at your organization today.
2. Letters written by your clients are also unable to talk to donors about confidential matters. They cannot thank your new donor for her first gift, cannot ask your lapsed donor to renew his support, and cannot ask your monthly donor to make a one-time gift to a special appeal, since doing so would breach your privacy policy. (The way around this shortcoming is to include a note, written by your CEO or executive director, that describes all of the things that the writer of the letter could not write about.
Fundraising letters written in the first-person by the people your non-profit helps are likely the strongest letters you will mail, but not all of your letters can be written this way. Your clients cannot tell your story as well as you can, and you can’t tell their stories as well as they can. At least half of your letters need to come from your organization, written by and signed by a person in senior leadership.
——————————–
Learn more about how to write better fundraising letters. Read Breakthrough Fundraising Letters, Pushing the Envelope, or one of Alan Sharpe’s many handbooks about direct mail fundraising.
How to Create Compelling Direct Mail Fundraising Envelopes
February 13, 2012 By 1 Comment
By Billy Sharma
One of the hardest things to do in direct marketing is to get the recipient to open your direct mail package, therefore, the outer envelope is of prime importance. Its function is more than just holding the contents securely; it must entice the respondent to I open it.
Siegfried Vogele, a research professor of direct marketing, observed that the average person spends between five and fifteen seconds scanning their mail, screening and rejecting what to open, what to discard or what to save for later, all in the proximity of their wastebasket.
If your direct mail piece never gets opened, your message never gets read. So how do you ensure that your piece survives? Here are some simple yet effective ways to ensure that your direct mail piece is opened:
The first thing that goes through a recipient’s mind is WIIFM. What’s-in-it-for-me” Why is this company writing to me? What do they want from me? Remember, you are intruding on someone’s time, so make sure the piece has some relevance to the recipient. Otherwise you are just producing junk mail.
Provide a hint of what’s inside. Partially revealing the contents through a window can be exceedingly effective. Many books have suggested this, but the most conclusive evidence is a piece of research that tested two envelopes.
One had simply the words ‘Free Book Inside’. The other had a large window that partially revealed an actual book with the same words, ‘Free Book Inside’. The envelope that revealed the book out pulled the other by 30%.
Clear polybags display the entire contents. Polybags are great for mailing unique offers, posters or several booklets or multiple pieces. Publishers and catalogues use polybags extensively.
Capture the reader’s imagination. Remember that if the reader can decipher what you are selling without even opening the envelope, then it is a bad envelope. The bad envelopes do not reveal everyt5hing-they only tantalize you to look inside.
Use teaser copy. Teaser copy can arouse curiosity and interest, either by using a provocative statement or by asking a question. The teaser can be a partial one to lead the recipient inside or it can be split on the front and back of the envelope. If it is enticing, the recipient will flip it over to get the complete message.
When targeting a very select group, the message should be meaningful to the audience. For example, “Your copy of a report on osteoporosis” is more likely to be opened by someone concerned with osteoporosis.
————————————————————–
Excerpted from The Handbook of Direct Marketing for Non-Profit Organizations, by Billy Sharma. Available in paperback from www.expertfundraiser.org
The Art and Science of Keeping a Direct Mail Donor
February 1, 2012 By 2 Comments
By Billy Sharma
The art lies in building and fostering a strong bond with your supporters. This is best achieved through compelling communications and quick responses to their generosity.
- Your appeal must give a persuasive reason for giving and should identify the financial goals essential to your charity
- Work to understand your donors and offer them an appropriate plan of action
- When a gift comes in, send a thank you promptly
The science is how you use the data, research and testing methods available to you.
- Segment your donor files. Remember the RFM (Recency, Frequency and Monetary Value) rules of direct marketing
- Spend more time, effort and money on people who have given more recently, more frequently and more generously. They are the most likely to give again and could very well keep increasing their donation amounts. They are also the ones who need to be constantly reminded about your organization and should receive more communication pieces annually
- Research and test what works best for which group of donors
- Use data mining to determine affinity for giving. Some donors have a higher propensity to give than others. You could determine this by researching their lifestyle behavior and or just by noting their postal or area codes
- Track your donors’ giving history in terms of size and frequency of giving
Know your Donors
New Donors are first time givers.
Transition Donors are those who give sporadically. They have a history of giving once in a while in a 16-24 month period.
Core Donors are those who have given a gift to the charity regularly either each year or within sixteen months.
High Value Donors are those who give big gifts.
Lapsed Donors are those who have stopped giving. They fall into two categories:
- Recently Lapsed donors who have not given in the last 13-24 months;
- Deeply Lapsed donors who have not given in the past 25 months.
———————————————————————
Excerpted from The Handbook of Direct Marketing for Non-Profit Organizations, by Billy Sharma. Available in paperback from www.expertfundraiser.org
Direct Mail Fundraising Still More Effective than Email
November 4, 2011 By Leave a Comment
Yes, grandma tweets daily about her arthritis and buys her cat food on eBay, but how does she prefer to donate, online or offline?
Yes, mailing a fundraising letter costs more than sending an email appeal. But which method brings in the most net revenue for most non-profits? [Read more...]
Penelope Burk Versus Donor Behaviour: Direct Mail Fundraising is Not in Decline
October 21, 2011 By 4 Comments
By Alan Sharpe, CFREFundraising consultant and researcher Penelope Burk of Cygnus Applied Research says direct mail is declining in popularity. She is wrong. [Read more...]
When to Ignore Your Direct Mail Fundraising Test Results
August 26, 2011 By 1 Comment
By Alan Sharpe, CFREDirect mail fundraising is a soccer game where the opposing team keeps moving the goal posts.
A premium that worked last year doesn’t work today. A package design that worked at your last charity doesn’t work at your new one. A proven way to acquiring new donors gradually fails.
How can a tested, proven tactic stop working?
When you test one thing against another in the mail and Thing A outperforms Thing B, you know what works, right? The key to knowing what works in direct mail fundraising is testing, right?
Well, sort of.
There are at least three times when you should ignore your test results. [Read more...]
Boost Your Fundraising Letter Response Rates and Revenue with Five Simple Segmentations
August 12, 2011 By 6 Comments
By Alan Sharpe, CFREI was 44 years old, about to adopt my second child, and was sitting in my lawyer’s office, looking over his updated draft of my will.
Everything looked fine except for one small mistake. Throughout the document, he referred to me as Neil Sharpe. “I, Neil Sharpe, being of sound mind and body, do declare this to be my last will and testament.”
Well, it certainly was my last will and testament using that lawyer, because my name is not Neil. The will he drafted was invalid. It would never have worked after my death, or Neil’s death, for that matter. [Read more...]
