Award Winning Blog - Agitator

Segmenting By Lifetime Value

Different people are different. Wow. That was a quick blog post. Seth Godin, eat your heart out. “What’s that, Roger?” You think we should talk through the implications of that pity declaration a bit more? OK… Different people are different. Likewise, different donors. Donors vary by preference, channels, identities, and more. Thus, Lifetime Values vary […]

Learn More January 30, 2019

Becoming a Lifetime Value Hedgehog

Isaiah Berlin grouped thinkers into: Hedgehogs: like the hedgehog that has one strategy – curl up into a ball – these thinkers have a single defining idea Foxes: those who go wide and employ a variety of strategies. Sixty-six years of debate later, there’s no definitive argument for which style is better. What I’ll argue, […]

Learn More January 28, 2019

4 Tips When Using Cognitive Biases

In the previous posts, we busted some myths and explained the risks of having a simplified view of biases. Taking both into account, I’ll close the week with 4 short recommendations. 1. Avoid “all or nothing” thinking. Don’t believe in the universal application of biases – don’t assume that an effect observed in one context will […]

Learn More January 25, 2019

4 Risks With the Simplified View of Biases

There seems to be an obsession with biases lately – everyone talks about them, tries to explain behavior with them and sees them everywhere around us. While acknowledging their contribution is important, considering biases as the one and only answer is dangerous. When examined solely through distinct biases, human behavior appears to be concrete and […]

Learn More January 23, 2019

Monthly Donors and Mystery Shopping

Over the past 10 days we’ve focused on what is generally thought to be diminished returns in 2018 year-end giving. Some reasons why… Issues around year-end email deliverability and the content of those emails…plus the problems caused by too much volume and too many reminder appeals. One area that deserves more attention than it’s usually given […]

Learn More January 18, 2019

Poor Year-End Giving and Email Volume

Year-end giving was down (on average and especially online). M+R has said it; PMX has said it; you may have seen it yourself. The 2018 year-end giving macroenvironment cocktail was something like: Government shutdown + Tax bill shifting donations from 2019 to 2018 + Democratic House balancing out some policies + Continued mail deliverability challenges […]

Learn More January 16, 2019