Award Winning Blog - Agitator

Beware of Junk Science

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator is the most popular personality test in the world. Fortune 100 love it. Government agencies love it. More than 1.5 million people take it every year. Our only issue with it as social scientists is this: It’s absolute garbage. Otherwise, we too love it. It fails on two fundamental requirements. Not […]

Learn More March 17, 2021

Subjective or Objective Knowledge?

Donors will only give and keep giving if they feel competent. In short, “If I don’t understand your cause or how you fix problems I won’t give.” But what matters more? The donor’s objective knowledge of your cause and how you fix problems, or the donor’s subjective knowledge? Charities often try to explain and give […]

Learn More March 15, 2021

Does Giving Beget More Giving?

“Your best future donors are your best past donors.” Circular logic if there ever was. Let’s dig in a bit deeper. If you donated at 2pm today and got another solicitation at 1 minute past 2pm, would you give again? What about 2pm tomorrow? A week later, a month? Probably all of us have some […]

Learn More March 12, 2021

Stick It To Them

Folks love stickers. And buttons. And decals. And bumper stickers. Seems like every movement moment has a symbol. From voting to vaccination, seals to save the manatee, the badges of civic pride and involvement are worn proudly, as are the more ideological varieties proclaiming their owner’s commitment to this cause or that movement. With “I’ve […]

Learn More March 10, 2021

Removing and Adding Words to Make Copy Better

Jeff Brooks wrote a post way back in 2011, which is a millenia ago in Covid years. He gave prescient advice on removing words to make copy better. Among his list, Removing the first one to three paragraphs. He describes these as mostly “warm up” and extraneous. We’d agree. Most copy is not good and […]

Learn More March 8, 2021

Transactional Segmentation is NOT Strategic Segmentation

“Wait!”, I hear you cry. “You preach on cause and effect and past behavior does predict future behavior. How is that not strategic?” We’ll stipulate: A person will tend to give the amounts that they have given in the past A current donor is more likely to give than a lapsed donor A donor who […]

Learn More March 5, 2021