By Wayne Gurley
President & Creative Director

Myth # 9: Your donors are loyal to your organization and aren’t giving to other organizations, so you don’t want to over-solicit them.

Most donors who give to your organization also give to as many as 7-10 other organizations.

If you’re afraid of over-soliciting them, and stop asking for a while, guess what? Another organization is probably asking, and that organization will get the gift instead of you.

One reason you may have a lot of lapsed donors on your file - a.k.a. high donor attrition - is that you may not be asking your donors for their support often enough.

Remember, your lapsed donors are some other organization’s active donors.

© 2020 Allegiant Direct, Inc.

By Wayne Gurley
President & Creative Director

Myth # 8: Ask everyone in your office for input on your letter copy.

Limit the people involved in copy approval to no more than three people. Those three should be...

1. You (the person responsible for getting the mailing out)...

2. The person signing the letter...

3. And, if needed, someone to look at the letter from a technical perspective to ensure accuracy. (But don’t let them make changes to the letter itself.)

AND DON’T LET YOUR MARKETING DEPARTMENT GET INVOLVED!

Most marketing people know nothing about direct mail fundraising. I guarantee they’ll want to make changes that will probably depress response.

So don’t ever allow a committee to write your copy. It’s never a good idea.

The more people involved in the process, the more time it will take for approval. Then everyone will want to make a change to justify the fact that you asked them for their input.

An elephant is a horse put together by a committee.

© 2020 Allegiant Direct, Inc.

By Wayne Gurley
President & Creative Director

Myth # 7: Always use big words that are difficult to spell and pronounce so your donors and prospects will be impressed with your intelligence.

Your direct mail appeals should be written so a 6th grader can understand them.

This isn’t “talking down” to your donors, but rather making it easy for them to understand and respond to your message.

People are busy. They have hundreds of messages coming at them simultaneously at an astonishing rate. Why make it difficult for them to understand what you are trying to say?

If you use jargon or a big word they don’t understand, they will stop reading.

Do your donors a big favor and remember, “KEEP IT SIMPLE.”

Save those big words for your doctoral dissertation.

© 2020 Allegiant Direct, Inc.

By Wayne Gurley
President & Creative Director

Myth # 6: Donors and prospects will read and remember every word of every direct mail letter you send them.

People who receive your direct mail appeals do what’s known as “scanning.”

Though some read every word of a letter, most won’t.

Instead, they will scan it quickly, looking for key words in an attempt to determine what you are asking them to do.

If they can ascertain your request in 3-7 seconds, they will make a decision as to whether or not to give.

That’s why using short sentences and underlining words is desirable to help donors focus on the main points of your message.

© 2020 Allegiant Direct, Inc.

By Wayne Gurley
President & Creative Director

Myth # 5: Donors who make a gift to your organization should not be asked for another gift for at least 12 months.

This is called “deciding for your donors how many times a year they’re going to give.”

But is this really a decision you should be making?

Absolutely not.

Why not let your donors decide how many times they want to give instead of just assuming they won’t want to make multiple gifts annually?

Are you embarrassed to ask them again so soon for their support? If so, you may be in the wrong profession.

If you believe passionately in your organization’s mission, then don’t be afraid to ask people for their support.

If you don’t, then step aside and let someone else do it.

It’s your job to ask. It is the donor’s job to give. And if they don’t give, it’s their decision.

But don’t make that decision for them.

© 2020 Allegiant Direct, Inc.

By Wayne Gurley
President & Creative Director

Myth # 4: You will offend your donors if you ask for more than one gift a year.

This is known as the “Curse of the Annual Giving Program.”

Annual giving programs are built on “one-gift wonders” - donors who only make one gift annually to an organization.

It is perpetuated by those who only ask for one gift per year and only expect one gift per year.

These people are involved in what I call “fundraising malpractice.”

These days, you want an environment whereby multiple gifts over the course of a year can be cultivated. If you do this, your donor attrition rate will be lower and you’ll have many more planned gift prospects.

Don’t assume you’ll offend donors by asking more than once a year. If they’re that easily offended, they’re not a true donor anyway. So code them in your system to receive only one appeal.

And go ahead and ditch the “Annual Giving” concept. Instead, call it something like “Current Giving.”

Current giving is “today…now…in the moment.” Not “once a year.”

© 2020 Allegiant Direct, Inc.

By Wayne Gurley
President & Creative Director

Myth #3: Too many complaints from your mail program means you’re doing something wrong.

First, define “too many.” Some take that to mean more than one.

Fact is, if you send anything to a large group of people, you will get complaints. You should be willing to accept a certain number of complaints as a "cost of doing business."

How many is too many? If you have hundreds of complaints, maybe you were insensitive. But 10, 15 or 20 complaints isn’t a lot. That’s generally a number you should be willing to tolerate.

It also depends on how many pieces you mailed. If you mailed 1,000 pieces and got 100 complaints (10%), that’s probably too many. But 100 complaints out of 20,000 or 30,000 pieces isn’t a lot (.03% - .05%.)

Some people will complain about anything. They may complain about the frequency of your mailing program...or that you sent a letter to their deceased husband or wife. (But did you know they were dead?) Look closely at the nature of the complaints you are receiving and respond accordingly.

Strive to answer all complaints. And code complainers “no mail” so they won’t get any more letters from you.

But don’t run your program based on complaints.

© 2020 Allegiant Direct, Inc.

By Wayne Gurley
President & Creative Director

Myth #2: Always ask a prospect to give at least $100.

Even though people may be able to give more than $15, $25, $50 or $75 to an initial direct mail appeal, they usually don’t, mainly because they’re “auditioning” your organization and want to know how you’re going to treat them after they make their gift.

If you pass this test, they’re likely to make a second gift to your organization.

It’s like that old saying - “You never get a second chance to make a first impression.”

Here are the most important things a new donor wants to know after sending his or her first gift...

1. Was I thanked and my gift properly acknowledged?

2. Was my gift acknowledged quickly (within 24-48 hrs) with a letter and preferably a phone call?

3. Was my gift put to good use as I intended, and is it having the desired effect?

Answer these three questions properly, and you’re likely well on your way to a long-term relationship.

Answer them poorly - or not at all - and your new donor may ignore you the next time you ask.

© 2020 Allegiant Direct, Inc.

By Wayne Gurley
President & Creative Director

Myth #1: People who live in wealthy zip codes are your best direct mail prospects.

People who are wealthy are NOT your best direct mail fundraising prospects. And a wealthy zip code is never a good indication of giving propensity.

I can almost 100% guarantee if you send a direct mail letter into a wealthy zip code, your response will be terrible. In fact, it won’t come anywhere near what you will get by mailing to donors with similar characteristics as your current donors.

The most important criteria for a successful appeal are…

1. A person who’s the right age (generally, around 65+).

2. A person who previously has demonstrated a willingness to make a philanthropic gift.

3. A person who is direct mail responsive - i.e., has given through the mail, and preferably in response to a similar appeal.

Bottom line - avoid using zip codes as a primary criteria for your direct mail fundraising efforts.

© 2020 Allegiant Direct, Inc.

By Guest Blogger, Steven Shattuck
Chief Engagement Officer at Bloomerang

Key Performance Indicators, or KPIs, are used by nonprofits to track the progress of your highest priority tasks and goals. By tracking KPIs, your nonprofit can track important information that will help your organization better build relationships, raise more money, and accomplish more in your community.

However, you need to know what data to track and what KPIs are the most accessible and important for your nonprofit’s mission.

In this article, we’ll cover seven of the most commonly valued KPIs by nonprofits. These important goals generally revolve around these metrics:

1. Existing Donor Retention Rate

2. New Donor Acquisition Rate

3. Donor Engagement

4. Donor Generosity

5. Marketing/Communication Metrics

6. Average Gift Sizes

7. Face-To-Face Meetings

8. In-Kind Gifts

9. Donor Pyramids

Ready to learn more about important nonprofit KPIs? Let’s get started.

1. Existing Donor Retention Rate

Donor retention is one of the top KPIs that nonprofits pay attention to. It takes a lot of money to acquire a new donor.

Think about it: You need to reach out to a lot of potential donors in order to acquire just a small percentage of them. However, once donors are in your donor database, you already know they’re interested in your nonprofit. Therefore, it’s much easier (and cheaper) to convince them to donate again.

According to research from the Fundraising Effectiveness Project, the average donor retention rate is around 43%. However, most donors still only give once. The new donor retention rate is generally in the low 20%s, but after they’ve repeating their gift once, they’re more likely to do so again. The repeat retention rate is around 64%.

Why is this important? It provides an indication about where organizations can most dramatically improve their strategies to increase that overall retention rate: with brand new donors.

While following the fundraise, reflect, respond, repeat method of raising money, be sure to focus specifically on the “reflect and respond” steps and consider how they can help you retain more supporters. For instance, we’ve got a couple of strategies for you to consider:

Prioritize fast and personal follow-up messages after a supporter contributes to your nonprofit. Include personal details (such as a supporter’s preferred name) and specific donation details in your thank-you emails. Or you might send a hand-written letter or personally call supporters to show your appreciation.

Provide additional (and varying) engagement opportunities to supporters in order to keep them involved with your organization. For instance, you may decide to host an event, invite donors to participate in advocacy opportunities, or invite supporters to perchance branded merchandise.

The important thing to keep in mind with any of these strategies is that your nonprofit should track each and every interaction in your CRM. Bloomerang’s donor database guide can help your nonprofit find software to track all interactions and really hone in on retention strategies.

2. New Donor Acquisition Rate

While donor retention rate is incredibly important, there is still some natural donor lapsing that occurs for every organization. It’s impossible to keep a 100% retention rate forever. Therefore, acquisition rates shouldn’t be thrown entirely to the wayside.

Your donor acquisition rate should always be slightly higher than your rate of attrition in order to ensure your nonprofit support base is continuously growing.

Therefore, track your donor acquisition rate. Remember that these donors are generally finding your organization through resources like your social media presence, website, and community events. Then, they generally give using your online donation tool.

Therefore, to boost your donor acquisition, you should work to optimize these resources and make them as accessible as possible. For instance, make sure your website is easily navigable and you’re using the best tools to collect donations (a list of top recommended donation tools can be found here).

3. Donor Engagement

Once your donors have donated or shown interest in your nonprofit, you need to maintain their engagement over time to build a relationship with them and to encourage them to become a lasting contributor.

Therefore, it’s important to measure the engagement levels of each of your supporters. Plus, knowing their engagement levels will help your nonprofit better know who to reach out to for major gifts, in-kind gifts, and for specific campaigns.

Look to buy fundraising software with donor engagement measurement features built right in. For instance, Bloomerang features an engagement meter designed by fundraising expert Dr. Adrian Sargeant, whose algorithm measures the engagement of supporters by “cold,” “warm,” “hot,” and “on fire!”

4. Donor Generosity

Alongside your organization’s engagement score for each of your donors should be a generosity score. The engagement information can provide insight as to a donor’s affinity to give to your organization. Meanwhile, their generosity scores can provide insight as to a donor’s ability to give.

Generosity scores are created by compiling wealth data. According to DonorSearch’s wealth data guide, this term refers to the publicly accessible data points that your nonprofit can access to determine a donor’s financial ability to give.

Your nonprofit can (and should) invest in a prospect research tool that can help find these all-important data points.

This is especially important when it comes to soliciting major gifts or launching a major campaign. When you’re soliciting major gifts, you want to make sure you reach out to supporters who are highly engaged and financially able to donate the amount of money you ask for. In a capital campaign, you’ll need to fill out your gift range chart with viable prospects.

As you can see, the donor generosity score is vital for your major fundraising initiatives. So measure the generosity scores of your individual donors and make sure your nonprofit has enough high-generosity supporters to fulfill your goals.

5. Marketing/Communication Metrics

Marketing is key to spread the word about your organization, acquire new donors, and to let your existing supporters know what’s going on at the nonprofit. Therefore, collecting indicators about the success of your outreach ensures you have the best strategy to do these things effectively.

When it comes to email, collect data such as open rates, click-through rates, and number of responses. When it comes to direct mail, see how many people respond to letters. Make sure to also ask people how they heard about your organization in surveys. This way which aspects of your outreach are working better than others.

When you know this type of information, you can better point out (and fix) the strengths and weaknesses of your marketing campaign.

6. Average Gift Sizes

The average gift sizes, paired with information about donor retention, acquisition, and lapsing rates, can give your nonprofit a very good indication of annual budgetary expectations.

Plus, when you identify your average gift size, you can reach into your donor database and learn more about those supporters’ averages that are significantly lower or higher than the average. This can help you increase the lower donations and further engage those who give more.

Remember, when you increase your donor retention rate, your average gift size may also increase. Just make sure you’re doing your part to reach out to the best audiences, optimize your content as best as possible, and identify the opportunities to boost your fundraising strategies.

You don’t have to just calculate this for individual gifts. Be sure you know what your average monthly gift size as well.

7. Face-to-Face Meetings

Face-to-face meetings are incredibly important to build a personal connection with your nonprofit’s donors, especially major or planned gift prospects.

When your donor database displays the number of face-to-face conversations you’ve had to date, you’ll feel more motivated to have even more of these discussions.

Make sure that this number of meetings is always growing year over year. For instance, Bloomerang’s Sustainability Scorecard allows your organization to see how many face-to-face meetings you’ve had and compare it directly to last year’s so that you can be sure your conversations are always growing in number.

8. In-Kind Gifts

Nonprofits have a bad habit of ignoring in-kind gifts from their supporters or of prioritizing financial donations over these helpful contributions. Instead of a donor giving an unrestricted donation to the organization, then the organization purchasing something they need, donors (or companies) directly give nonprofits the item they need. It takes out the middleman.

In-kind giving is an important datapoint to show the sustainability of your nonprofit. Just as your retention rate and average gift amount should increase from year to year, so should your number of in-kind gifts.

Receiving fewer in-kind donations this year than last must be factored into your budget. It means your nonprofit will likely be spending more and sometimes doing so with fewer resources, which is the last thing you want for your organization.

9. Donor Pyramids

A donor pyramid shows the number of major donors, mid-tier donors, and individual donors who contribute to your nonprofit. It looks something like this:

The pyramid depicts the number of major, mid-level, and small donors for the fiscal year to date in comparison to the last year for both individual and corporate gifts.

Remember that the number of donors you have in each level will look different depending on where your nonprofit is in your journey. For instance, younger nonprofits may not have any major donors yet.

Key performance indicators are vital for your organization’s continued success and growth. Without measuring where you are now, and what your goals are for the future, it will be incredibly difficult to reach your ultimate goals.

Make sure, when you take any of the above metrics and create your goals regarding them, that you ensure these KPIs are specific, measurable, and reasonable.

By implementing these strategies, your nonprofit is well on its way to growing and making an even larger impact on the community. Good luck!

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Steven Shattuck is Chief Engagement Officer at Bloomerang and Executive Director of Launch Cause. A prolific writer and speaker, Steven is a contributor to "Fundraising Principles and Practice: Second Edition" and volunteers his time on the Project Work Group of the Fundraising Effectiveness Project and is an AFP Center for Fundraising Innovation (CFI) committee member.