The Agitator

Something possessed an Agitator reader to share this amazing goof with us. We’ll keep this person anonymous to protect the guilty, as well as the organization, to spare it (you’d all recognize it) the embarrassment. Here it is: "While with the [organization], I screwed up a ...  Read more

Last week, talking about FaceBook’s cave-in (as some pundits see it) to two million of its users, I raised the issue of when should nonprofits listen to their donors. I don’t want to put words in his mouth, but Jeff Brooks over at donor-centric Donor Power Blog would probably say ...  Read more

So, you go do this fancy survey of your donors and they say: 1) Scrap the newsletter, and 2) by the way, we don’t understand why you’re spending 80% of "our" money on program X … cut it in half. Do you listen to your donors (i.e., customers) and do what they say? If ...  Read more

Here’s a story from DM News that focuses on integrated fundraising campaigns using multiple reinforcing media. The story includes concrete examples provided by Debbi Barber at agency Grizzard. Her examples, which demonstrate the lift in response from integrated campaigns, are drawn from ...  Read more

Isn’t it ironic? The last 2-3 years have seen a surge in heavy reflection on the part of donors on the matter of evaluating the credibility and performance of would-be nonprofit recipients of their largesse. Are the donations really getting through to the ultimate beneficiaries who need ...  Read more

Return Path, an email marketing consultancy, offers some excellent recommendations about managing your email marketing (donor and activist) files. Their report, based on studying 61 leading commercial email marketers, is called: Keeping the Subscriber Experience Positive After "Unsubscribe ...  Read more

Here in the United States today we celebrate our annual blessings and give thanks. The Canadians got the jump on us a month ago. And we’re celebrating not a moment too soon. With jobs shrinking, money and savings drying up, and with global economic horrors rising, it’s frankly a ...  Read more

Earlier this month we published an article on how to lessen the environmental impact of direct mail programs. We invited further suggestions from fundraisers. Fundraising agency Mal Warwick Associates pointed us to their firm’s environmental practices statement, which describes the steps the ...  Read more

In 1995 Clayton Christensen coined the terms “disruptive technology” and “disruptive innovations” to describe technological innovations, products or services that use a “disruptive” strategy rather than “revolutionary” or “sustaining&rdquo ...  Read more

From DMNews, here are tips from four experts on reducing the environmental footprint of your direct mail campaigns. What I learned is that there’s paper embedded with seeds that will grow if you put it in the ground. Does this reveal that I’m not on the cutting edge of production?! If ...  Read more