The Agitator

On Tuesday Tom alerted us to Convio’s Benchmark Report on Online Fundraising for 2009. Today Blackbaud is out with another new Index –The Blackbaud Index of Online Giving. This fundraising index reports revenue trends on a monthly basis for 1,787 nonprofits representing $399 million in 12 ...  Read more

Pew Internet Research has released survey results indicating that 40% of adult American cell phone owners now use their cell phones to access the internet, email, or instant messaging. 34% (up from 25% in 2009) use their cellphones to access email. With outbound email appeals still the workhorse ...  Read more

The Harris Poll released some data recently on use of social media to criticize or compliment brands. They found that one-third of US adults use social media to air their feelings, positive or negative, about a company, brand or product. Within that group the percentage of complainers and ...  Read more

Consumer Reports publishes a series of monthly indices on consumer’s economic well-being … all based on survey research. The latest report is not a source of much optimism that consumers are feeling better about their financial prospects or might be more inclined to spend (or donate) ...  Read more

We’ve talked about word-of-mouth (WOM) as the top driver of today’s consumer decisions. Here’s a report from Online Media Daily on an interesting Yahoo study that has attempted to drill into WOM behavior. It notes that 76% of all WOM still occurs face-to-face … however ...  Read more

If your data indicates that most of your small gift income still comes from direct mail, and you think most of your donors are over fifty years old, but you sense more and more online interaction with your donors is happening (and more is possible), then whose online practices might you pay special ...  Read more

This report from Pew Research on managing personal online profiles is timely as a follow-up to our posts regarding donor privacy last week (here and here). As Pew reports, individuals are becoming increasingly aware of and sensitive about their online profiles, with many restricting access to ...  Read more

comScore, a leading measurer of the digital world, reports that 64% of US internet users now pay at least some of their bills online. This is up a sharp 19 points since one year ago. And 52% use automatic bill pay, up 10 points. This is good news for US fundraisers, especially use of ...  Read more

Let’s stick with Boomers another day. OK, a little broader … this is about “middle-aged” brains (ages 40-65). Marketer Anne Mai Bertelsen writes in Engage: Boomers about an interview she heard based on The Secret Life of the Grown-Up Brain, by Barbara Strauch (I’ve ...  Read more

Awhile back Karin Kirchoff at Defenders of Wildlife sent us an email commenting on Boomers in relation to an apparently shrinking donor universe. She mused: "I remember many years ago (like 15 years ago) sitting in on a session at a conference led by an expert in psychographic marketing who ...  Read more