Award Winning Blog - Agitator

Do You Know Your ‘Failure Rate’?

This is a long, but very, very important post. So freshen up your coffee before proceeding. The other day I received an email from an Agitator reader asking: “Why do you think most fundraisers are so resistant to innovation and change?” A good question. An important question. I batted out a kneejerk and facile response […]

Learn More June 20, 2013

Giving USA 2013: GoodNews … And Bad

Giving USA 2013, the annual report on philanthropy, published by the Giving USA foundation and researched and written by the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, was released yesterday. It should please both the ‘glass-half-full’ and ‘glass-half-empty’ folks among us. You can download a summary here. First the ‘good’ news. The $316.23 billion contributed […]

Learn More June 19, 2013

Retention Is The New Acquisition

Lots of folks pay lip service to the importance of donor ‘retention’. Far fewer know much about it, let alone do much of anything about it. As acquisition costs rise and response rates plummet, Tom and I have stepped up our rants on retention. In our view, retention is the new acquisition. And it’s welcome […]

Learn More June 18, 2013

Jeff Gets Upset … Me Too

I love it when creative whiz Jeff Brooks gets upset over the mind-boggling bad judgments nonprofits make — regarding names, logos, taglines, positioning and messaging — in the name of better branding. The examples he comes up with, as in this post — Change your name at your own risk — are usually breathtaking. Virtually […]

Learn More June 17, 2013

The Agitator Wall Update: We Confess!

In the interest of full transparency with our Agitator readers, we have a confession to make. We are watching you! Using technology developed at AOL, we have been studying your facial and emotional reactions to The Agitator’s paywall proposition, as recorded without your knowledge via the webcam on your computer. The technology is described here. […]

Learn More June 15, 2013

What To Do About Fundraising’s Dark Side

Thanks to those who have commented on Roger’s posts this week (here and here) on outrageous fundraising practices. But frankly, we wish we were getting even more concerned and constructive response. Like these thoughtful comments from Jennifer Phillips, chief strategy officer at Avalon Consulting Group … Fundraising’s Dark Side And What To Do About It […]

Learn More June 14, 2013