Fundraising Copywriter George Crankovic

Tag: donor psychology

  • One of the real lessons from Obama fundraising

    By now the fundraising tips to be gleaned from Obama’s 2012 fundraising strategy have been picked over by just about everyone.

    You know — the casual tone in emails, unconventional subject lines like “hey” and “wow,” the low-dollar asks, the testing, and more. That’s all very interesting. But it’s not the good stuff. This is.

    The Obama fundraising team in 2012 segmented their files based on their donors’ interests. They amassed mountains of data from every conceivable source – donors’ zip codes, surveys, event attendance, Facebook, responses given to canvassers, and more. Even better, this data, after it was compiled and analyzed, was made available in one place for the fundraising team. Even better still, the whole endeavor was imperceptible to the donor. So when a donor interested in, say, climate change got an email about green technologies, she simply thought Obama was singing her song. Not a bad way to engage donors, and it obviously worked.

    This was done through a complex data and analytics methodology, of course — something that would be beyond the reach of many nonprofits.

    But let’s blue-sky just for a moment about what it would be like.

    Instead of using tactics to reach Millennials, Baby Boomers, or whatever the next generational cohort is … and instead of approaching donors based on a numerical score indicating when they gave last and how much, we could go a lot deeper. We could engage donors on their own terms on the basis of what moves them personally and what they’re passionate about.

    Let’s say we have a donor, Sally, who decides to attend a walk-a-thon for heart disease.

    Does it really matter whether she’s 20, 30, or 60 years old? Why should her generational label determine how we communicate with her in subsequent appeals? And really, how important is it to know that she gave $10 five weeks ago?

    Wouldn’t it be far more useful to know that Sally took part in this event because her husband has heart disease and she wants to know about research and treatment for arteriosclerosis?

    When Sally starts getting appeals talking about breakthroughs in unclogging arteries  — an interest that goes right to her core — would she see them as an intrusion? Or would those appeals seem intensely relevant, immediate, and significant? You know the answer. When we can directly address donors’ personal interests and values, that’ll be a song they listen to.

  • Tell me a story — but make it fast

    Storytelling. It’s an essential part of persuasion for fundraising and marketing.

    But your story can’t be a rambling, meandering yarn that goes on without a point. Not in the hyper-paced, information-now world we live in. No, stories have to be focused and most of all succinct.

    How to stay on point? A good place to start is by crystallizing the message … to determine the crux of the story before writing to make sure the point you’re making is right out front.

    That’s where the six-word story comes in.

    What’s a six-word story? It’s kind of like a haiku poem with a dash of narrative thrown in. It gives just enough information for the reader to fill in the blanks. More importantly, it’s a great exercise to get to the heart of your story and keep it front and center as you write the longer version.

    One of the most famous six-word stories is this one from Hemmingway:

    For sale: baby shoes. Never used.

    Just six simple words that start the story playing in the reader’s head.

    For marketing, think of a case history about how someone used the product you’re selling; or for fundraising, how someone benefited from the services they received from the charity. Then pare it down to its essence, to six simple words.

    That’s the key message of your story.

    Try a six-word story when you’re working on your next marketing or fundraising project. It’s a great exercise.

    For inspiration, visit a great website – http://www.sixwordstories.com – and see stories on just about every conceivable topic that capture your imagination while they celebrate brevity. It is the soul of wit, after all.

  • What’s the right pacing for your promotional copy?

    A direct response letter – whether it’s for fundraising or for a consumer or B2B product –tends to take on a life of its own. It has a tone, a voice, an overall feel.

    A big part of creating that feel is pacing – how the letter moves along once the reader starts into it, how it progresses from beginning to end.

    Here are a couple of good examples from the fundraising world.

    The first is from Mercy Home, a well-known charity. The letter comes in a window envelope without any teaser.

    At the top of the letter is a Johnson Box that says, “If you read one letter from me this year, please read this one … because what I’m about to tell you is a limited-time opportunity – and concerns the future of every child at Mercy Home.”

    Then the letter begins:

    Dear Mrs. Joan Sample,

    I met recently with a member of our Board of Directors, a good friend of Mercy Home. And he gave me some of the biggest news I’ve heard in a very long time.

    He told me that if I can raise $52,000 by August 31 for our kids, he will match it with another $52,000!

    Allow me to explain.

    That means if you send a gift of $10 to help our kids right now – you’ll really be offering a total gift of $20 toward giving our kids the second chance they desperately need!

    Okay, it’s a matching grant appeal, a fairly commonplace offer to donors in which each gift is doubled by a charitable grant. But in this letter, it took a Johnson box and four paragraphs to get the reader to that point.

    Now compare that with a completely different way of pacing, this one from Bible League.

    The envelope has the teaser, “Now your gift will go twice as far! See inside …”

    At the top of the letter is a brief and direct overline – “Special grant will double your gift!” – and the letter dives right in.

    Dear Mrs. Joan Sample,

    Great news! Now your gift goes twice as far. You can place twice as many Bibles in the hands of the spiritually hungry who are begging for an opportunity to read God’s Word.

    Imagine – twice as many! And the best part is, there’s no need to add even one extra cent to the amount of your donation. I’m thrilled to tell you this, because demand for scripture is exploding. Here’s how it works …

    Notice the difference between these two approaches. The first mailing sidles up to the reader gingerly, almost tentatively. There’s the plain envelope, the Johnson box that refers somewhat vaguely to need. And even when the letter begins, it takes its time getting around to the matching grant, and then goes on to explain how the grant works.

    All of this is no doubt deliberate. Mercy Homes knows its donors. Maybe the charity rarely offers a matching grant and feels it must allow donors the time to warm up to the idea. Or maybe the slower pacing is simply intended to match the sentiments of its donors base, most of whom are seniors.

    It’s completely different from the second letter, the one from Bible League.

    Right from the get-go, this letter takes aim at the donor’s gift. The teaser on the envelope puts the matching grant squarely in the donor’s sights. The overline on the letter reinforces it, and then the letter immediately presents the benefit to the donor – the fact that her donation will be automatically doubled.

    Where the first letter is relaxed and calm in the way that it brings readers along, the second one is more rushed, more in-your-face, more of an overt push for a donation.

    These are two widely different ways of going about pacing a letter. It’s not that fast pacing is better than slow or that an overt push is better than a more subtle one. It just depends. Just as salesperson will sometimes mirror the gestures and expressions of his prospect, the pacing of a letter has to match up with the temperament of the reader. When it comes to results, getting that right makes all the difference.

  • How NOT to telemarket

    Lots of nonprofits telemarket to persuade donors to give. They can, because the do-not-call laws don’t apply to them. But even so, there’s a right way and a wrong way.

    I received a phone call a few days ago from a nonprofit I support. Without naming names, it’s a well-known civil liberties charity. The guy on the other end of the phone introduced himself politely and explained why he was calling. He went into his rap about what the charity does and why it needs donor support.

    I told him that I was in full support of the charity’s mission but that I preferred to be contacted only by mail. I was expressing a clear preference.

    The caller acknowledged my preference – which is good. But he didn’t honor it – which is very bad. He could have reassured me that future contact would be by mail, politely thanked me for my time, and hung up. Instead, he decided to see this situation as what’s euphemistically called a “service-recovery opportunity.”

    He launched into a lecture about how vital donor support is to keep the work of the charity going. This went on for some minutes. After which, he asked me to make a donation now over the phone and then sign on to become a sustaining member with monthly contributions from my credit card.

    I again reiterated my preference for contact by mail.

    Undaunted, he took a fall-back position. After another dissertation about the need for donors to pony up, he asked for a single donation now over the phone.

    Finally, getting frustrated, I told him that I supported charity’s mission but wanted to be contacted only by mail, and bid him a hasty goodbye. The lasting impression from having been worked over like that for a donations was, “can you believe that guy?”

    Not the impression any nonprofit would want to create. Telemarketing is a fundraising channel that’s supposed to complement other channels like direct mail and email. Telemarketing like this doesn’t compliment other channels – it harms them.

    When I’m contacted by that organization in the future, instead of thinking kindly about them, I’m going to hesitate. That hesitation – even if it’s only for a moment – is deadly for fundraisers. That hesitation could spell the difference between meeting a budget goal and falling short. It’s vital to eliminate it, because as fundraisers, that fleeting moment of decision – or indecision – is all that we get. We have to make the most of it.