Direct Mail … Gotta Luv It!

July 23, 2008

As reported in the Chron’s online column, Prospecting, the University of Indiana’s Center on Philanthropy says that the 140 fundraisers they surveyed are getting bummed out … confidence in their expected results for the year is falling.

Except for this bright spot …

"With the exception of direct mail, fund raisers say that all types of appeals were doing less well in the past six months than they had expected when the year started."

Of course, this could just mean that fundraisers low-balled their direct mail projections so much that any returns look terrific! But I doubt that’s the explanation.

As Roger has commented, advocacy groups in particular have bucked falling donor acquisition and retention trends. A simple case of passion prevailing in that sector?

But the fundraisers in the Indiana survey presumably cover a wide spectrum of the nonprofit community.

Is your direct mail performing better, worse or the same as you expected back in January? If better, take credit … you deserve a raise! If worse, do you blame it on the economy?

Tom

 

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under You Deserve a Raise, direct mail, fundraising | 1 Comment 

What I Would Do First

July 22, 2008

I’m sure you’ve seen all the gloomy articles and blog posts floating around noting the threat to nonprofit fundraising posed by a sinking economy.

A threat compounded by data indicating further fall-off in new donor acquisition and retention rates throughout much of the charitable community, as fellow Agitator Roger has commented on. Roger concluded his assessment with this recommendation:

"Now’s the time to take another look at next year’s budget and make sure you’re spending more, not less, to achieve on donor satisfaction and loyalty to hold on to your base."

Now, "hold on to your base" can mean a lot of things, from programmatic strategies to emphasize the work and activities you know (because you’ve done the donor research) brought your core donors in; to fine-tuning member/donor communications to report and celebrate results, results, results … and how your donors made those possible; to ensuring that in-bound member/donor inquiries are effectively handled; to tactical adjustments to donor renewal campaigns (the copy, the contact scheme, etc.).

All of these are important and can make a big difference. And because renewals are the most profitable fundraising activity you undertake, from your biggest donor to the rank-and-file, any retention improvements you achieve will yield significant net revenue.

Maybe you don’t control every aspect of the programmatic and marketing mix that can combine to strengthen donor retention. Perhaps as a fundraiser you "merely" control the nuts & bolts of the renewal process. Even so, now’s the time to show folks just how critical smart execution can be to the bottomline.

Start by taking a really careful look at your renewal program … everything from copy to the number, nature and timing of renewal contacts. Larger organizations tend to test each element of their renewal efforts very carefully, as they should … judiciously fine-tuning complex programs on an ongoing basis. Smaller organizations might be quite disorganized and even desultory in their approach, not even having what I’d call a renewal program … instead virtually "cut & pasting" stale year-end or annual appeals.

But the dropping renewal rates in the community — and the reality that donors will husband their charitable resources during stressful economic times — suggest that there should be no higher priority than fresh examination of renewal programs. Nothing should be taken for granted.

When "the boss" asks what should be done to protect revenue over the coming year, were I you, I’d say: "Bust our chops to improve renewal rates!" Then I’d add: "And get the rest of the organization focused on that goal too."

Sound simple, or obvious? Try it!

Tom

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, direct mail, donor retention, fundraising | Leave a Comment 

She Planted Trees So Others Could Enjoy The Shade

July 10, 2008

This morning our friend and long-time colleague Polly Agee, 61, will be buried in the National Memorial Park in Falls Church, Virginia

Personally we mourn her death (and have had quite a good wake telling “Polly stories”), but we most of all want to note her passing because she contributed so much to the small, but critically important and uniquely back-biting branch of American fundraising focused on social and political change. A contribution for which all fundraisers, regardless of politics or discipline, should be grateful

For nearly 10 years in the early days (‘70s) of the liberal advocacy movement through the late 80’s Polly was in the foxhole with us. Developing systems that are still used to this day…developing training systems still used to this day…and developing an intolerance for the mediocre that seem to have been all too recently forgotten.

As the Senior Vice President of Craver, Mathews, Smith & Company, Polly helped us launch and build many of the liberal advocacy organizations that are household names today. The National Organization for Women, National Abortion Rights Action League, Greenpeace, The Cousteau Society, and Common Cause. While at CMS she worked on dozens of United States Senate campaigns for Democratic candidates and the presidential campaigns of Morris Udall, Edward Kennedy and John Anderson. Not to mention the Democratic National Committee, The Democratic Senatorial Committee and the Democratic Congressional Committee.

Never one to suffer fools lightly Polly had a temper, but one tempered by an iron-willed discipline to get the most out of every opportunity and every person she came in contact with. And she succeeded. Today, there is a generation of seasoned direct response fundraisers in the advocacy and political arenas that are tougher and wiser because of Polly.

Polly “retired” ( her own words) in the early ‘90s. AND… then went on to start several new careers. Her energy went toward women’s equality and democracy. As Ellen Malcolm, the founder of Emily’s List puts it:

"She always had infectious enthusiasm for women candidates and so many progressive causes. And if there was ever a set-back or special challenge, Polly was ready to give a helping hand. So many of the elected Democratic women we see in public life benefited from Polly’s generosity and help.”

She trained a generation of fundraisers, but wasn’t one bit willing to stop there.

In her final years she went into life coaching and established New Directions Life Coaching which helped, trained, and mentored many.

When a pioneer dies we all should pay attention — and also pay homage.

Polly, honest to God, we’re paying attention. Don’t get mad. We’re just saying “Thank You!”

Roger and Tom

P. S. A memorial service for Polly will be held in early August. We’ll keep you posted as to dates and times.

 

 

 

Posted by rcraver | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, advocacy, direct mail, direct marketing, fundraising, politics | 7 Comments 

The Latest Wake-up Call

July 7, 2008

At the very time when the stock market is dropping, unemployment is rising and fundraisers are attempting to read the tea leaves in preparation for next year’s budgets, Target Analytics has released their Index of National Fundraising Performance for the 1st Quarter of 2008 … and the picture ain’t pretty.

Not only did the number of direct response donors continue to decline, but, for the first time, the increases in revenue per donor that have compensated for the decline in number of donors failed to prevent an overall revenue drop.

The Index’s authors say the falling donor populations “may be due to a mix of factors including economic changes, a changing generational profile in the United States, changing attitudes of donors about giving, and a change in focus by fundraisers toward higher-dollar donors.

Whatever the reasons the numbers are a bit spooky:

·The number of new donors has declined 7.6 % over the past two years. (However, the rate of decline has slowed from 5.3% in the first quarter last year to 2.3% in this first quarter of 2008.)

·Retention rates continued to fall with first-year donor retention dropping 6.6% in Q1 2008 over the same quarter a year before.
·And reactivation rates declined 5.0% from Q1 2007 to Q1 2008.

Among the 72 organizations included in the Index only those in the environmental and animal welfare sectors escaped the pain. For advocacy groups (what Target Analytics calls the “Societal Benefit Sector) there is sunshine among the clouds. New donor growth rose 6.1% in Q1 2008 with 69% of the organizations in this sector showing positive donor growth.

The news wasn’t as encouraging for groups in the International Relief Sector where new donor acquisition declined 23%–the greatest decrease of any sector –and reactivation rates were down significantly as well, falling 21.6% from Q1 2007 to Q1 2008.

And we shouldn’t be looking for clear skies and a return to growth in the near-term future. As the economy slows, so does giving.

Now’s the time to take another look at next year’s budget and make sure you’re spending more, not less, to achieve on donor satisfaction and loyalty to hold on to your base.

Roger

 

Posted by rcraver | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, Hot Research, Measuring Up, advocacy, charities, demographic trends, direct mail, donor retention, fundraising, loyalty, nonprofit management, nonprofits, research | Leave a Comment 

Thank You For Stealing

July 1, 2008

 

The maxim very successful fundraisers live by was set forth by George Bernard Shaw 80 years ago: "The mediocre borrow, genius steals."

In short, when you see a winning concept, campaign, technique, whatever, just steal it. Adapt it. Run with it.
Which brings me to today’s plea: All of us need to be sending more samples of good and great campaign or one-off efforts to SOFII the marvelous fundraising attic (aka: swipe file) where you can find all kinds of useful, informative and stealable stuff.
SOFFI just posted its June additions yesterday. For example:
§ActionAid’s controversial Bollocks to Poverty campaign.
§ Inspirational direct mail from a seven-year-old schoolgirl.
§ How Giving Scotland turned a crisis into a triumph.
§ A simple but brilliant idea for involving business people in the fight against heart disease.
§ Croatia’s campaign for mobility and independence for blind people.
§ A small organisation’s low-cost solution to recognising donors.
§ Hannah’s make and bake cake and biscuit sale.
§ The launch of a high level monthly giving product designed to upgrade donors in their thousands.
§ How a beautiful flower, the Edelweiss, became an involvement device and a symbol of hope for a hospice in Romania.
§ Make–A-Wish and upgrade your donors.

§ Twenty years before Barack Obama, the tale of an African American’s bid for the White House. Common Cause takes on the excesses of the American legislature. [Hey, this is copy I wrote 20+ years ago, long before "mid-level donor programs" were even a glimmer in whatever consultants’ eyes and it’s still good, he says, in all modesty :) ]

Seriously, so much great thinking, great creative and great innovation occurs every day in our trade, but we need to be far more energetic in sharing it with the rest of our world.

So please, vow to take 15 minutes, find one or two samples and get it up on SOFII’s site.

Thank you for stealing.

Roger

Posted by rcraver | Filed Under Uncategorized, advocacy, cause marketing, charities, communications, copywriting, creativity, direct mail, direct marketing, drtv, email marketing, fun | Leave a Comment 

Postal Mail Lives

June 10, 2008

Agitator aficionado Bob Roth alerted us to a piece in e-Marketer reporting on the just-released “2008 Channel Preference Survey” from email marketing firm ExactTarget.Bottom Line: The preferred personal comunications channels — phone, email, text and instant messaging — are not necessarily the preferred channels for marketing. On a scale of 1 to 5, respondents gave direct mail an average score of 3.9, followed by e-mail at 3.7. All other channels averaged under 3. More than 75% of the 1550+ folks surveyed reported making a purchase in response to direct mail. And nearly two-thirds said they had made a purchase because of a marketing message received through an e-mail.Take a look at the Age and Channel breakdown on this chart prepared by e-Marketer:
 Take a moment to download and study the ExactTarget Channel Preference Survey. Among the points I found worth noting:

  • New marketing channels are being layered on pre-existing ones instead of replacing them.
  • Overall, direct mail has the highest acceptability score of all channels. E-mail received the highest score across digital channels compared to SMS and instant messaging.
  • BUT…there is a quite different attitude between direct mail and e-mail when it comes to unsolicited promotions. Send an unsolicited promotion through direct mail and consumers do not mind. Send the same message through e-mail and it’s SPAM.
  • Be careful about invading personal space. The survey found that the closer you get to the individual, the more likely consumers are to sense that their personal space is being violated. Direct mail and e-mail can feel anonymous if the consumer chooses. However… as Morgan Stewart, Exact Target’s Director of Research and Strategy notes: “phones, text messaging, and social networking sites feel more personal. Let’s face it, regardless of the ‘relationship’ a consumer has with a company, interaction through these channels can feel creepy, pushy, and just generally uncomfortable.”

Finally, if you really dig into this survey you’ll get some fabulous tips on what channels are best for what types of communications and why here at The Agitator we keep harping ad naseum about the importance and benefit of multi-channel integration.RogerP.S. The results of this channel preference survey agree with our just-out-of-the-field DonorTrends Survey of Online and Offline Donors. Our analysts and editors are now at work preparing twelve specialty survey reports dealing with everything from generational and channel differences in giving, to a report on the top-ranked nonprofits in each major fundraising sector from animal rights to human rights, and a range of other findings and actionable recommendations. Stay tuned for release dates.

Posted by rcraver | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, Uncategorized, demographic trends, direct mail, direct marketing, fundraising, marketing metrics, new media | Leave a Comment 

Need Some Creative Inspiration?

June 4, 2008

We’ve talked before about the Showcase of Fundraising Innovation and Inspiration (SOFII).

It’s an international online collection of "best of" fundraising efforts, mostly direct mail, some print.

They have a new feature highlighting the top twenty "Best of the Best" campaigns in their library. It’s well worth a browse if you’re looking for some creative inspiration.

We enjoyed the donor "thank you" example from public radio station WDCN in Nashville … the only station responding to this "mystery shopper" test showing any appreciation that their "donation" had come from an obvious bequest prospect.

The quality of a service like SOFII is totally dependent on the participation of the community it seeks to serve. If you have a fundraising package that performed especially well and can help teach others, we encourage you to share it with SOFII.

Roger & Tom

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Pushing the Creative Envelope, copywriting, creativity, direct mail, fundraising | Leave a Comment 

Is Direct Mail Dead? Craver Responds

March 6, 2008

In case you missed, The Agitator’s own Roger Craver talked about the "death of direct mail" and related fundraising issues yesterday as guest on "Live Discussions," sponsored by the Chronicle of Philanthropy.

Here’s the transcript.

Tom

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, direct mail, nonprofit management, online fundraising | Leave a Comment 

Acquisition Best Practices

February 1, 2008

Recently, in The Baby and the Bathwater, Roger wrote about the disturbing industry-wide decline in new donor acquisition, as documented by Target Analysis Group. He discussed this trend in the context of predictions of the death of direct mail.

We don't want to just leave you wringing your hands!

Here is a very helpful piece on testing acquisition packages, from Peter Schoewe at Mal Warwick Associates.

If you're fretting over your recent acquisition stats, before changing the name of your organization, before changing its mission, before firing your executive director or president, take a look at Peter's recommendations.

Tom

Posted by admin | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, direct mail, fundraising | Leave a Comment 

The Baby and The Bathwater

January 15, 2008

Last week the fundraising, marketing and communications blogs were abuzz over the current state of fundraising and marketing in the non-profit world. The firestorm was mostly centered on the question of whether direct mail is dying, dead or simply changing and what to do about it.

Well, if direct mail is dead it’s one exquisite corpse! Direct mail currently so outdistances online in the amount of money raised that I don’t know whether its downward trend line will cross the upward trend of online in my lifetime.

Most of all when it comes to this debate I’m a realist. I intend to use the most effective direct mail possible for as long as possible even while I invest more and more into online activities.

Here then is some brief background on the current debate.

Holly Hall of the Chronicle of Philanthropy got the ball rolling with a piece titled Direct-Mail Appeals Suffer, New Survey Finds citing the Target Analysis Group’s latest quarterly survey indicating that direct marketing appeals have failed to keep pace with inflation…that the number of people who have made gifts have declined by 1.6%…and, most disturbingly, the 72 organizations in the survey reported a median of 6.2 % fewer new donors in the first three quarters of 2007–this on top of a 10% decline in new donors for the first three quarters of the previous year, 2006.

Next, Mark Rovner, in a post on his Sea Changes Strategies blog noted, and I think correctly, that:

  • The era of cheap direct mail and high response rates in acquisition is over
  • What currently passes for an online funraising model is at best stopgap.
  • The problem is not just about direct response. Not just about non-profits. It’s that everything is changing.

Mark cited Seth Godin’s latest book, Meatball Sundae, in which Seth makes the point that companies (non-profits) are generally built around the modeof marketing available to them. Arguably this means that oganizations started in the past 30 years generally were built around cheap mail and high response rates.

Seth Godin then responded to Mark’s post with one of his own entitled I gave at the office warning that "most big charities are based on direct mail fundraising" … and that "direct mail is dying." He added "I despair for most of the top 50 non-profits in the U.S. These are the big guys, and they’re stuck. …the top charities rarely change…if you’re big, you’re used to being big and you expect to be big."

Seth persuasively makes four important points:

  • Most money that’s collected by non-profits is not the result of smart marketing. It’s mainly technologically advanced donors are simply using a more convenient method to contibute the funds they would have given anyway.
  • Simply asking people for money in the same old way — even if online — "doesn’t scale", according to Seth. "Not one bit. It’s super easy to ignore a direct mail solicitation when all you have to do is hit delete and no one notices."
  • "The big win is turning donors into patrons and activists and participants." And the internet allows non-profits to "flip the funnel" by reorganizing around the idea of engagement online.
  • "Responsible stewardship requires that you find and empower the mavericks and give them the flexibility to build something new, not to try to force the internet to act like direct mail with free stamps."

So, what’s a fundraiser to do? Ater 35 years in direct mail, 30 in telemarketing and 12 on the internet my take is simply this: Don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater. Get some more bathwater. And maybe a few more babies.

 My advice to any non-profit that relies on direct mail, but wants to survive and thrive into the next decade follows below.

Recommendations for the Direct Mail Dependent

  • Read and heed the recommendations and trends outlined in last Monday’s Agitator. Particularly those involving new media.
  • Understand that direct mail isn’t dead, but it sure is changing. It still is the most predictable, and if managed properly, secure part of your fundraising channels. So, do it well and benefit. BUT…make sure you’re using part of that direct mail revenue to open up new channels.
  • Get serious, and I mean serious, about online involvement of donors and volunteers and those prospectively interested in your cause. This means investment. Organizational change. Risk taking. Courage. Guts. Patience.
  • As I noted in last Monday’s piece, there’s a whole new group of donors out there — but they must be engaged, they must be legitmately involved in your mission, and you have to nurture them with solid information and meaningful involvement. It’s instructive that Seth Godin’s post right before his "I gave at the office" post is about the dangers of "dumbing down" customers (donors). Dumb donors are the worst kind, so invest properly providing your donors with the best information you can and the opportunities for involvement.
  • Invest your own time in understanding what’s going on out there. Let your mind wander out and about like a hunting dog on the scent — on the trail for new ideas, new thinking, new ways to advance your cause.
  • Not only should you be reading The Agitator each day, take advantage of the resourses listed in our BlogRoll.

Finally, download Seth Godin’s FREE e-book titled Flip the Funnel, which in his words will help you…

"Turn strangers into friends.
Turn friends into donors
And then… do the most important job:
Turn your donors into fundraisers."

If think you don’t have time to do all this, then you oughta be fired

 

Roger Craver

 

Posted by admin | Filed Under You Oughta Be Fired, direct mail, nonprofit management, online fundraising | Leave a Comment 

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