A successful e-appeal is one that works
Notably re-quotable
"Creativity is the magical human act of doing something that might not work." Seth Godin, September 2021
For your consideration (learn, steal, borrow)....
A successful e-appeal
When you copy another charity's comms, make sure you're copying stuff that actually worked, OK?
AHA! moment for me #1: (Though your Mom gave you this same advice, I imagine.) Just because OTHER charities do it ... doesn't mean YOU should.
Where did this early insight come from?
I'd just received scores of nonprofit newsletters all at once, in preparation for a workshop. Here's what I learned that day (to shamelessly quote from my own Making Money With Donor Newsletters; 5 stars on Amazon, with 32 reviews), in which I explained 9 fatal flaws, including "Being boring is never a good thing"
Flaw #4: Your front page is boring. I hope this phenomenon is fading. But last time I did a major survey of charity newsletters, with more than 60 spread out around my office, I was shocked to see that the majority devoted their front pages to a recurring, less-than-inspiring letter “from the desk of” the executive director or board chair, usually without a real headline. ("From the desk of...." is NOT a headline; it's just a label.) Don't fall for this bad convention. Your front page is where first impressions are formed. Reserve it for important news.
AHA! moment for me #2: Before you copy some other's charity's appeal, make sure they got decent results. Always, always, always ask: So, tell me, how did it do?
I began asking this question early in my nonprofit-facing career ... and often heard the following from fundraisers, including my own clients: "I don't really know." You could usually hear head-scratching on the phone call.
Color me gob-smacked.
"Seriously? You don't track results? Fundraising is sales, for Pete's sake. Professional sales programs worship data..." followed by a regrettable rant and cursing. Sometimes they got fired. Sometimes they fired me.
Which brings us to today's e-news topic:
An e-appeal that DID work, sent out by Yellowstone Schools in Houston, TX (and featured here for YOUR learning pleasure, with THEIR kind permission).
This e-appeal opens with a picture (and some understood-at-a-glance typography) that is genuinely worth a thousand words.
> It's an affordable offer (the median gift below $1,000 in the U.S. is now $20, according to Blackbaud; so $40 isn't much of a stretch when a local charity is asking).
> It's an easy-to-understand offer: the donor is asked to buy a day. (Hat tip to Jim and Steven at The Better Fundraising Company, who relentlessly counsel that easy-to-understand offers are vital to your fundraising success.)
> It's an offer coupled with a great photo that takes advantage of eye-contact (get to know Dr. Siegfried Vögele's research), a photo in a school hallway of a typical student served by this particular charity.
Dear Friend,
After bouncing around multiple schools in Houston’s complicated education system, 12-year-old Shayne* needs your help. I’m writing to you today in hopes that you will give $40 to provide this student with one day of life-changing experiences.
Let me tell you more about Shayne and how your gift can make such a huge difference for him.
Shayne was enrolled in a local public school that has struggled to demonstrate student progress for many years. His parents tried to help by enrolling him in a popular charter campus closer to home, but it was shut down after his second year there—only two weeks before the school year was set to begin!
Shayne’s parents scrambled to enroll him in a new school, but their options were very limited by the last-minute timing. He wound up in another school that has consistently failed to help its students grow academically. Exhausted by the mad scramble and the stress of starting at yet another school, Shayne’s parents made the difficult decision to keep him enrolled in this underperforming campus for several years.
Eventually they grew more and more concerned with the quality of Shayne’s education. Shayne lives with dyslexia, and the school was struggling to provide basic services. His teachers grew frustrated and told Shayne (as his mother remembers it) to either get on the train or get left behind. In Shayne’s own words, “they cussed me out.”
Shayne shut down. He began disengaging from school and begged his parents to send him somewhere else.
ETC....
Here's Yellowstone's email in full, if you wish to study it in more depth.
As you'll see, this is a LONG email.
Yet you'll sometimes hear: "Keep emailed appeals blessedly short."
Yes and no.
What's exceptional about this particular emailed appeal is the quality of the storytelling. The reader REALLY gets to know Shayne and his parents and his difficulties with getting a good education.
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So how DID it do?
(Since you and I care about results above all ... when we're about to admire ... umm, borrow ... OK, flagrantly steal?)
Hey Tom,
I just wanted to say thank you one more time! Really grateful for your critical eye earlier this year. I just ran an email campaign last week where I tried to incorporate a lot of your feedback, and it was really successful - we netted several new recurring donors and got a $5k gift out of it too! If we could raise the same amount with every email we send, we'd reach our annual goal in a few short months. It was your feedback and advice that helped us get over our own internal fears and just go for it. That's huge.
All to say — thank you.
Regards,
Tommy Parker, Director of Grants and Communications
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PS:
Tommy P. also recommended this VIDEO (which he watched "on repeat,") from the aforementioned Better Fundraising Company.
# # #
A new fave charity in my own backyard
HERE. X (in my interpretation, anyway) stands for ANYONE/EVERYONE. Full disclosure: I'm professionally biased. I like best (and trust most) those nonprofits who do their donor comms well. And so this group I'd never heard of comes along, checking all my boxes! I ran across them in a local news report. They're going after CVS Pharmacy (headquartered in Rhode Island) for contributing fortunes to far-right, anti-choice, un-liberal politicians. So I visited the WOMXN website. Was instantly wowed. And, bless their hearts, they're here in Little Rhody! ~ where Simone and I made our home together for 37 years. I quickly made a recurring gift in Sim One's plucky honor.
Go, team!
Calling all nerds of brainstorming
HERE. Seth Godin recommended this ... so it must be worthy! Disclosure: I haven't myself yet used this particular software (being a devoted disciple of pen, paper, chats and the rest). BUT I took a peek ... and FigJam looks fas-kin-ate-ing. It calls itself an "online whiteboard." It's got built-in, multi-user brainstorming, designing, voting, get-togethers and "mood-boarding" (most fun EVAH).
My webinar for NO AZ AFP, now on video
HERE. A thousand people signed up. And now you, too, can watch and hear the recording FREE ... at your leisure, as more than 600 already have. This is my ever-evolving baseline show called "Nothing's changed/Everything's different." It covers donor-centricity (and why it raises so much more money). It introduces a bunch of easy tests you'll want to be aware of ... before you send out your next appeal. And it explains offers. Thank you Jim and Alice for a great time!!!
How to become a prolific writer
HERE. From the self-admittedly prolific Nicolas Cole. He shares his very own "Endless Idea Generator." You'll never be without an idea for an article again ... and your readers will love what they read!
Raising funds via your Twitter feed
HERE. Kevin Schulman, founder, DonorVoice and DVCanvass, really rang the bell for me with this particular column ... about how nonprofits currently tweet to their audiences. One thing Kevin said? "The top of the Top [charities] were 3x more likely to use two-way symmetrical." To understand what the heck "two-way symmetrical" means, read his post ... even if you only skim the boldfaced stuff.