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 

Measuring Your Marketing

July 21, 2008

As reported in the Chronicle’s online column Prospecting, the American Marketing Association and marketing agency Lipman Hearne recently surveyed 1012 nonprofits on their marketing practices.

Their report, available here if you register, is an interesting read … and lots of response data to benchmark your noprofit against.

What struck me was te relatively low scores nonprofits give to their own effort to measure marketing success.

Here are the mean scores for some basic marketing activities/metrics:
(where 4 = Very Effective represents the highest score, and the percentage indicates the percent who don’t measure that activity/metric)

  • Revenue - 3.0, 4% (who could NOT measure their revenue?!)
  • Increase in number of members - 2.8, 8%
  • Unique visitors to website - 2.7, 19% (another Wow!)
  • Repeat visitors to website - 2.6, 23%
  • Member loyalty/satisfaction - 2.6, 12%
  • Earned media - 2.5, 26%
  • PR effectiveness - 2.4, 23%
  • Specific marketing campaign effectiveness - 2.4, 20% (if not measuring, then why bother?)
  • Brand awareness - 2.3, 26%
  • Print advertising - 2.2, 28%
  • Search engine optimization - 2.2, 28%

All in all, not exactly a rousing set of ratings!

Tom

 

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, Measuring Up, marketing metrics, nonprofit management | Leave a Comment 

Zaproot - Online Enviro Video News

July 17, 2008

By now, you know I’m trying to push nonprofits toward more use of online video.

To follow what’s happening with online video in the commercial marketing world, and get plenty of stimulating food for thought, make sure you sign up to get Ad Age’s regular new web video report. Great stuff!

Like Zaproot, styled as "Green Reports, With Bite" — a sassy online video news service covering environmental issues. Love it! Betcha can’t stop watching … if you’re an enviro.

Tom

 

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, communications, new media, online video | 2 Comments 

SEO Isn’t For Dummies

July 16, 2008

Direct marketing guru Denny Hatch writes here on search engine optimization.

Even the term scares me! But in essence … how does Google (most importantly) find your website’s most precious content? Another way of putting it … if Google can’t find you (your web content, that is), do you exist?!

Denny’s advice: don’t leave SEO to amateurs … it’s too complex, too fast-changing, and too critical to your online success.

If you get professional advice on mailing list selection, then you’re probably operating at a level where you should get expert help on SEO … in both direct mail and online media, it all starts with understanding your audience. But executing against that knowledge is considerably more technically complex in the internet universe.

Frankly, I’m counting on Roger to "get" this for The Agitator!

Tom

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Denny Hatch, Don't Miss these Posts, online fundraising, online publishing | Leave a Comment 

How To Make An Online Video

July 15, 2008

On a day when ComScore is reporting Americans watched 12 billion online videos in May, up 45% over the previous year, Marketing Sherpa offers this superb post on how to make low-budget online videos. Everything from planning and creative issues to equipment to editing software. I printed it out myself!

But you must read by July 15!

142 million American internet users watched on average 85 videos in the month … that’s 74% of all US internet users. The average video was 2.7 miinutes. YouTube accounted for 34% of all views.

Is your nonprofit there yet?!

Tom

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, communications, online advocacy, online fundraising, online video | 1 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 

Email Marketing - Top 10 Mistakes

July 9, 2008

From Loren McDonald at Silverpop, an email service provider, here are ten big email design & marketing mistakes to avoid:

  1. Making it difficult to unsubscribe.
  2. No "welcome" message and/or waiting weeks to send the first message.
  3. Overmailing.
  4. Using a large single image as the core of your email.
  5. Not using alt tags.
  6. Relying on graphical links.
  7. Not having a preference center.
  8. Not designing for the preview pane.
  9. Using a person’s name in the "from" line.
  10. Hiding email registration.

Loren’s straightforward explanations are worth reading if you’re an email marketer.

Tom

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, email marketing, online advocacy, online fundraising | 1 Comment 

Buy Dove

July 8, 2008

I’m an unabashed shill for Dove’s Campaign for Real Beauty, which aims to improve the self-esteem of teen girls.

The Campaign plans to reach 5 million girls by 2010, with most outreach through the Girl Scouts. Dove’s Self-Esteem Fund will spend $1.5-2 million this year.

Are they doing enough? Dove will rake in $2.5 billion in sales this year. Is anyone ever doing enough? Is anyone "clean" enough. I think this Real Beauty effort is for real.

The Campaign’s latest turn is described here by the NY Times, and here is "Under Pressure," the latest in their series of attention-getting videos.

Tom

 

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, cause marketing, creativity | 1 Comment 

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 

Bringing Donors Closer To The Cause

July 3, 2008

Mal Warwick’s e-newsletter is always full of excellent practical direct marketing advice for fundraisers.

Mal has been running a series featuring online fundraising and engagement "best practices" as seen by Tom Gaffny, EVP at Epsilon.

You should tune into this series, where Tom is walking through his top twelve techniques for bringing donors closer to the cause. We’ll cheat and show you the list here:

  • Be relevant—be local
  • Highlight the video
  • Engage constituents
  • Leverage techniques that work in the mail
  • Send information in bite-size chunks
  • Work at channel integration
  • Personalize your organization
  • Be visual—be provocative
  • Say “thank you” in different ways
  • Ask friends to “get the word out”
  • Be timely—be there
  • Highlight your partners

But if you don’t read the series, you’ll be cheating yourself!

Tom

 

Posted by tbelford | Filed Under Don't Miss these Posts, direct marketing, online activism, online fundraising | 1 Comment 

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