Follow some of these accounts of how Komen is responding (or should):

From Holly Hall at the Chronicle of Philanthropy

From the Washington Post

From social media commentator Erik Sass

From blogger Kivi Leroux Miller, a play-by-play

I’m sure there will be more. This affair will become a classic  in the annals of nonprofit crisis management, in part because it’s the first such major meltdown to occur in the social media era. Forgive me for being clinical, but focus on what Komen did wrong (from a communications perspective) and what PPFA did right (from a communications and fundraising perspective).

What if a crisis of confidence and trust in your organization arose? How prepared would you be to acknowledge the facts, respond with alacrity and truthfulness, describe and implement with full transparency the needed changes, and get back to the mission of communicating the positive work of your organization to your donors, other key constituencies and the media?

Tom

P.S. Don’t forget the webinar Roger is moderating this week that will present a new approach and tool for pre-testing packages, developed by DonorVoice. Register here FREE for your seat at the February 9^th  (11:30 EST) Direct Mail Testing Webinar.

So I’m recommending you read Getting Attention’s Nancy Schwartz’s excellent analysis of the Komen vs. Planned Parenthood debacle from the perspective of what makes for effective (and ineffective communications) and smart fundraising (on Planned Parenthood’s part) in response to threat.

Tom

P.S. Stuff ‘em Planned Parenthood!

There’s an underlying phenomenon here that’s highly relevant, I think, to nonprofit fundraising.

Pew reports that more than half of adult cell phone owners used their cell phones while they were in a store to seek help with their purchase decision:

• 38% of cell owners used their phone to call a friend while they were in a store for advice about a purchase they were considering making;
• 24% of cell owners used their phone to look up reviews of a product online while they were in a store; and,
• 25% of adult cell owners used their phones to look up the price of a product online while they were in a store, to see if they could get a better price somewhere else.

What’s really going on here? Consumers are looking for reassurance … and they’re looking for it from the source they trust most — other consumers who are friends or who have written reviews based on their own experience. And they’re looking for comparison information, specifically with respect to price … seeking value for money.

In short, they’re realizing … “I don’t need to be on my own making this decision. Advice is just  a few taps away.” They are being trained to consult with others because it’s so easy and immediate.

So, now they’re home, having purchased a new iPhone or iPad, and your prospect mailing shows up. What might they do?

I wouldn’t necessarily say that they’ll pick up the phone and ask a friend … “Should I give to Worldvision or Save the Children?” Although indeed some might inquire of a friend if they support either. Or they might recall reassuringly that a friend has ‘liked’ one of the organizations on their Facebook page.

What I do think many (most even?) will do is go online for some form of validation. They’ll go to the organization’s website and poke around.

And, given the consumer shopping experience described above, where peer referrals are hugely important, what should they readily find?

I would suggest — above all — TESTIMONIALS!

Testimonials both from very satisfied beneficiaries of the organization’s work and from real donors who appreciate the organization’s accomplishments. Testimonials in a variety of formats, from short quotes to short videos.

Secondarily, but definitely not with the same weight as the testimonials, strong ratings from the charity raters (or some other straightforward reassurance/evidence about financial accountability and transparency). Price comparison isn’t really a relevant concept in the fundraising setting. But reassurance about money being properly managed and delivering big bang for the buck clearly is.

Few offers (or solicitations) are considered in isolation anymore. The best thing you can do to address that reality is make sure your online presence is your prospect’s reassuring friend.

Tom

Yet the Agitator hardly ever sees any fundraising mention of the Hispanic audience.

So we were gratified to see this article regarding a charity that has built a Hispanic donor base of some 226,000 individuals. I’ll bet you think it’s a huge charity — maybe one of those health/disease or child sponsor behemoths.

Wrong … guess again. A religious organization? Now you’re getting hot.

It’s Priests of the Sacred Heart.

What this group does successfully is not brain surgery; nor does it require a blockbuster budget. They simply focus on relevance and appropriately nuanced communication. If they can do it … you can too.

Here is their approach. (from Dimensions, National Catholic Development Conference).

Tom

P.S. Thanks to ListenUpEspanol for the heads-up.

This article from The Guardian reports that 10% of prime time TV ads have been developed using neuromarketing techniques … reading the brain’s reactions to creative stimulus in real time.

So, I’m wondering … who will be first in the nonprofit sector to don the EEG headset?

My predictions …

1. It will happen.

2. The first will be a major health-related charity (because they have the money to experiment) or maybe even more likely, a child sponsor agency (because they have the money and they already use direct response TV to prospect for high lifetime value donors).

3. If this tool is akin presently to the mainframe of the ’60s and ’70s, soon there will be the iPad version … with one in every development office!

Other predictions?

Tom

What Rainie says, much of it related to the explosion of social media and mobile communications, applies to all messaging and communications, which makes these observations pertinent to fundraisers, and especially those in advocacy groups.

Some key thoughts:

• With hugely expanded networking capacities, there are many more — and new — civic actors, many operating independently.
• Four messaging opportunities — to traditional ‘paid media’ and ‘earned media’ now add ‘owned media’ (e.g., websites, customer service) and ‘shared media’ (e.g., social sites, YouTube) … all requiring communications strategies.
• Six stages of engagement — observing (Lurkers matter, he says), following, endorsing, contributing, owning, leading.
• Migration of authority away from organizations (like your nonprofit) to — traditional experts with new platforms (e.g., blogs), amateur experts who are avid contributors (some with tribes), new algorithmic authorities (e.g., Google, Bing).
• Different ‘attention zones’ — continuous partial attention to media streams, immersion in ‘deep dives’, info-snacking in free moments.
• All organizations under more scrutiny, where trust depends upon transparency — surveillance (powerful watch the ordinary), sousveillance (ordinary watch the powerful), coveillance (peers stalk peers).
• Age of big data is upon us, giving new power to analytics.

This is a powerpoint presentation, so you will need to fill in the blanks yourself. But it’s well worth the mental effort … a very stimulating presentation.

Lee Rainie, you deserve a raise!

Tom

I playfully asked “Why 23?” SOFII’s Ken Burnett responded with a Comment that I wanted to share, in part, more broadly:

“And why 23?  Well, we started with 21 (seemed like the key to the door or something, a nice handy number), and privilege of course decreases when shared. So we’ll probably keep it under 50, but we’d love to be able to showcase a small number of truly brilliant campaigns that by common consent are judged the best in the world.

This was our first attempt and isn’t definitive. The first 21 were not selected very scientifically (by regularity of use and popular request). Since then we’ve added only two, by recommendation. We’d love to have more great stuff coming forward but getting fundraisers to share their exhibits is like pulling teeth. [Emphasis added by The Agitator] Surprises me, of course, as I originally assumed fundraisers would want to show off their brilliance.

But no, collectively it seems we’re surprisingly shy. Or perhaps too busy. Or  people assume it’s harder to do than it is.

To any Agitator readers out there, if you have a campaign or a promotion that you think could join or even unseat any of SOFII’s current Best of the Best, do please send it in. We’ve made the process real easy – see www.sofii.org.”

So, one more time, we urge you to share your best work. There’s a lot of need out there … we all need to raise heaps of money to meet it. And SOFII is a great place to do your sharing.

Tom

Each comes with a link describing or illustrating the campaign.

I have two favorites on this list …

The UNICEF card that launched that’s organization’s fundraising in 1946 — just because it’s so iconic. [A little tricky to navigate ... but the card drawing is there!]

The Station WDCN, Nashville “thank you” to a donor — because it exemplifies the best of donor stewardship.

But also read the disheartening results of legendary fundraiser Ken Burnett’s ‘mystery shopper’ test for America’s PBS stations, from which the WDCN response was extracted — nearly half the stations tested didn’t acknowledge the donation at all! That was in 1994 … hopefully things have improved!

Have they?

Tom

P.S. My only question … Who ever heard of a “Top 23″ list?!

What struck me was that 76% of the Haiti text givers said their text contributions are “usually a spur-of-the-moment decision”, whereas 45% say that about their online contributions. The surprise is not that text giving is quintessentially impulse giving … to me it’s that such a large percentage, 50%, say that they “usually do  lot of research before donating” online. I would have expected online donations to also be more spontaneous.

This report has tons of valuable information …

• Haiti was the door-opener to text giving for fully 74% of donors who gave via that channel.
• However, nearly all of the 73% of Haiti text donors in this survey who belong to a group or organization, have made a monetary contribution to their group(s) in the past. In other words, most are established donors trying a new channel.
• Many of the Haiti text donors have given again via texting (56% to one of three specified disasters, and 29% to other causes).
• Mobile givers are more racially and ethnically diverse than the overall population of charitable givers. Whites comprise three-quarters (75%) of all charitable givers, but make up two-thirds (63%) of this sample of Haiti donors and just half (51%) of all text donors.
• 43% of text donors encouraged others to give, but 75% who did so encouraged others by talking face-to-face.
• After making their Haiti contribution, six in ten say they haven’t followed the ongoing reconstruction efforts (43% “not too closely” and 15% “not at all”). Here today, gone tomorrow.

There’s just too much in this ‘must read’ report to summarize here, including an interesting profile of text givers versus other givers, and a look at how text givers prefer to communicate with groups in which they are involved (surprises here).

Well done, Pew!

Tom

But of course the core message — you must re-inspire your donor — doesn’t just apply to new donors … it applies each and every time a donor makes a gift.

Most nonprofits have banked their biggest chunk of annual contributions in the last few weeks. How effectively have you thanked those donors? Would your ‘thank you’ have given your donor a thrill?

Jeff Brooks at Future Fundraising Now excerpts what you should NOT do in a thank you from an excellent ‘must read’ post — How to Craft a Killer Thank You Letter by Gail Perry at Fired-Up Fundraising.

I do agree with Jeff (who disputes Gail) … you should always keep selling. That’s not inconsistent with the first purpose of the ‘thank you’, which is to express genuine gratitude and rekindle the emotional charge that inspired the donation in the first place. It’s a matter of having the right touch.

Tom

P.S. Keep those responses to our 2012 Agitator reader survey coming in. Takes only five minutes. The better we know you, the more relevant we can make our content.