Library launches successful donor newsletter
File under: Small .org succeeds with print donor newsletter
"We can't do that!"
With a bit o' advice and reasonable expectations? Yes, you CAN. (pinky swear)
Welcome to Katonah.
Katonah is a hamlet located in the town of Bedford, NY. Three hamlets make up the town, altogether; each has its own library.
"Katonah Village Library is chartered to serve a population of 6,261, but serves well beyond this as the busiest of the three," explains Ellen Waltimyer. She's the library's development manager (i.e., fundraiser) and now its newsletter editor.
Location, location, location: although Katonah Village has a census-verified (2020) population of just 1,603 (including Martha Stewart and a long list of other famous names), the hamlet is a mere 41 miles from Manhattan (there's a train).
Locals can reach the "2nd most influential city on earth" (as Forbes ranked it, 2014) by paying a fare and — if they give to the Katonah Village Library — passing their time onboard reading the latest issue of a fascinating donor newsletter carefully built atop the well-tested Domain Formula.
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Here's the latest issue, all 4 pages. Ellen W. asked for my comments. She also kindly gave me permission to share those comments with you.
Why donors might pay attention to this newsletter? Because the entire thing is about them! Look at that masthead: YOUR LIBRARY / YOUR IMPACT.
Also: let's start with great photo, great shirt slogan. Excellent eye candy: big smile, cool glasses, welcoming, round photo-crop (in a world of rectangular photos, round is surprising and warmer).
Why did this particular article catch my particular eye? On May 2nd, 2021, Simone Joyaux died; her brain exploded, thanks to CAA. (It's a build-up of amyloid plaque, weakening the brain's blood vessels. CAA is not uncommon over a certain age. Get a scan?)
Simone was my partner, wife, mentor, best friend, tease and moral compass for 37 years.
I soon plunged into grief therapy. It goes slowly; entering now its 3rd year. I have my deeply credentialed psychotherapist. I have my beloved family member who's been through hell ... and perseveres with wisdom, counselling me in his wake. And most recently I've added a helpful witch. A psychologist recommended the self-proclaimed witch, because her life-won insights had helped him navigate a couple of severe crises. I concur: witch Kat is helpful.
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Bottom line: If it's about grief, I'll read it.
Why? You need all the "attitude help" you can lay your hands on ... whether, as the Katonah article says, it's the loss of "a job, friendship, divorce, fertility, pets, climate change...."
Or the loss of a hard-driving feminist activist who shared my bed for 37 years and calmly, without judgement ... taught me over those wonder decades ... to reach higher, more often.
Therefore, in my personal view: Katonah's is an incredible cover story for a donor newsletter. It showcases what makes Katonah Village Library special.
There are 8+ billion human souls on our planet. Grief stalks us all. No amount of money saves us. Grief is a great topic for a community library ... a topic made possible by donors to this library.
Editorial comment for ALL: In a news publication, reserve your front page for your most interesting stuff (as opposed to stuff like a yawn-athon column from boss or board chair).
Dear other libraries: Your front page is not JUST about new books added to the collection ... or new services. Your front page is about WHY these new additions MATTER to the commonweal, the community, to some household (in the case of grief) struggling to recover.
Did you, for instance, deliberately just add 10 audio books to your library's collection, all of them now banned from Florida schools by a far-right governor? Celebrate that act of resistance! Invite comment! Explain why the board approved! "Because book-banning had no good precedents we could find. What's next? Book burning? Freedom of speech can't be informed without freedom of reading."
In fundraising, you're not trying to please everyone. You're trying to inspire the few who will act.
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Page 2
Editorial comment: Why donors might love this? The headline is SO current: global warming. The opening paragraph/sentence does a great job of setting the stage for something BIG that even "little old you" can do ... think globally, act locally! Framed by two inviting photos: hands full of gorgeous fresh produce and dirty hands planting seeds. The article's just the right length for skimming, too. And the sidebar has personality: "That's a lot of yummy!"
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Page 3
Editorial comment: "Hi, Pilchers!" Great looking family. Confident. Competent. Ready. The smiles of all kinds say a lot.
Donor spotlights are one of the 4 standard types of content recommended for donor newsletters. (Curious what the other 3 are? Flash me a note at a2bmail@aol.com; always desperately seeking new topics to chime in on.)
Psychologists call content like this "social proof" ~ I.e., what do others more or less like me (i.e., my neighbors) do. Or, at least on our best days, when we're living up to our own expectations ... what SHOULD we do?!?!?!
If the Pilchers are typical for this community (which they are; I checked local demographics), they are a great example of what this community is doing to keep its local library healthy, vibrant, relevant, furiously active!
My favorite part of this page is the sidebar (the white type on dark blue).
You have to wonder: What's Nora making on the library's 3-D printer? And then there's Lilly talking about how easy "Libby" is for online checkout. "Libby" was new to me ... and I'm probably not alone. Remember: newsletters are about "news" ... and you'd be surprised how many people STILL don't know about all the features a good, high-tech library has introduced.
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Back page
As the headline and subhead make clear, Katonah Village Library can ONLY make this offer — "you don't have to wait 21 weeks for the popular stuff" — thanks to donors.
So is anything missing? Need, maybe? Katonah is NOT loudly and clearly asking for more donations. The headline of this article says the job's been done. Case closed. Problem's already been solved.
Write this on the whiteboard in your conference room: Without need, new and next-time donors have nothing to do.
Don't expect readers to read between the lines. Yes, a newsletter is a "soft" ask compared to the "hard" ask of a year-end gift appeal. But even a soft ask has to ASK! Asking builds the "habit of philanthropy" in your community.
This is especially true if you hope to raise "legacy" gifts.
Might you, lovely recipient of this newsletter, consider putting a gift in your will for a beloved charity such as (we hope) Katonah Village Library? Here's someone who's already done it! You'll be shocked by how much impact one thoughtful call to your lawyer can mean for the future of our important community asset. Please phone or email if you have ANY questions!
You want a bequest? You NEED a bequest? ASK for the darn bequest!
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How do you know if your print donor newsletter is doing OK?
Because there's a benchmark. It's a benchmark established across professionally-competent print newsletters for all sorts of charities published in various English-speaking countries.
Katonah's Ellen Waltimyer wondered if she could "increase the giving response." My opinion to her:
"Increasing the giving response" is a function of several things. (An algorithm beckons?)
1. How many are you sending out? Only a small percentage of recipients ever respond ... to even the best-written donor newsletter. Baseline: if you're getting a 2% response (2 gifts for every 100 mailed) you have the makings of a winner.
One aspect of fundraising is always "the numbers game." If you have 100 donors on your list, your printed newsletters won't make much. If you have 1,000 donors ... well, that's different. What about 10,000 donors on your house list? VERY different.
Here's your goal: one of the most productive donor newsletters I'm aware of got (and likely still gets) a steady 6%+ response. It was developed by the best charity-newsletter creative team I know on earth. Told great, real-life stories of the addicted and homeless ... in recovery. Is devotedly donor-focused. During big church holidays, when the mood's ripe, (the charity's in the Republic of Ireland), this print newsletter did/does even better. ("Did/does"? I'm hedging a bit, because it's been a couple of years since I checked in re: their results.)
Katonah Village Library's last donor newsletter attracted a 6.5% response, by the way. Woo hoo!
2. How are your offers? Offers, as you know, are response triggers. Weak (i.e., easy to miss, non-urgent) offers produce weak response. Strong (i.e., un-ignorable, urgent) offers produce stronger response.
One of my favorite offers is the seasonal offer. If you're doing quarterly newsletters, they are especially appropriate. The East Texas Food Bank taught me this idea many years ago. They had their urgent fall appeal, urgent winter appeal, urgent spring appeal and urgent summer appeal ... and they'd place a coupon highlighting that same seasonal offer at the bottom of page 4 of their print newsletter, taking up a third of the page. That coupon served as a billboard and a reminder. Not many donors cut those coupons out, I'm told. They didn't need to. After all, there was a reply device included with the newsletter, per the Domain Formula. But still: THAT coupon SHOUTED loud and clear >>> ACT NOW, if you're in the caring mood!
3. How clear (and urgent) is your library's TRUE NEED for philanthropy? Many charities breeze past this all-important theme; institutions especially: universities and nonprofit hospitals. Community libraries know they need money (by the way: just revisited your website ... YOU are doing amazing work in your community!!!!! Bravo!). But, like many charities, they don't emphasize their NEED; they want to talk about achievements instead!!
Anecdote: With other tax-payers, Simone and I dutifully attended town budget meetings in the early 2000s where one persistent question was: "Given the rise of the internet, do we really need to fund all these little libraries?"
I live in a rural town with about 4,000 residents; an uncomfortable number of pro-Trump flags; and 3 small libraries, each housed in a former one-room school house. "Given the rise of the internet...." That persistent question got a great answer with the 2008 financial meltdown (as the unemployed flocked to libraries for FREE internet access) ... and other good answers later, climaxing with the pandemic and its gutting of socialization. Libraries, once again, to the rescue!
You might want to talk about that economic life- and timeline, Ellen. In a nice way, of course. In a donor-grateful way, of course (as you know). Establishing that community libraries are not just a take-for-granted INSTITUTION (books, discs on shelves; a dusty place).
Instead, community libraries are a living, breathing, evolving response to the learning, emotional, family and economic needs of the communities you serve so intimately. Who has the finger on the community pulse more than its local libraries?
Final comment: The Katonah Village Library print newsletter is well-designed in-house by the "the amazing Maura Rosenthal," Ellen said. "She works with me at the Library and is just wonderful. We laugh a lot. The newsletter is an InDesign document [a top pro software from Adobe; complicated]. BUT, for the next one, Maura is going to see about setting it up as a Canva template, so that it can easily be worked on by others."
Maura is an experienced freelance designer who joined the Katonah staff 15 years ago, initially as a circulation clerk. Lucky Katonah! Maura's designs are lively and instantly appealing ... without allowing the graphic costuming to overwhelm core messages. Maura's designs are effective at making points fast with both "skimmers" (most of your audience) and deeper readers (a much smaller percentage). To Maura: bow and a bravo.
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FYI, for those of you who want fab tips fast(er)
Fundraising Writing now has a YouTube channel called Win It In A Minute, where Julie Cooper interviews Tom Ahern ... and more! These are very short videos, each focused on a single donor-communications challenge.
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Dear Reader: This is an excerpt from Tom Ahern’s e-newsletter. Did you miss crucial back issues of this how-to e-news? Immediately available! Just GO here. (And scroll down just a bit to sign up for Tom’s revenue-boosting tips and insights. In your inbox regularly. It’s free.)