Do You Use Personalized Matching In Your Fundraising?

Did either or both of these test ads beat the control?  No peeking. Neither test beat the control.  Or at least that’s the case if you assume everyone is the same and do a random nth test, which is 99% of all tests. How about this one, did either or both beat the control?  Go […]

Can You Persuade Donors?

Jack Trout was a TV ad man who helped pioneer the concept of brand positioning .  He famously quipped, “If your assignment is to change people’s minds, don’t accept the assignment.” Seems he knew what he was talking about.  A huge study of TV effectiveness on changing people’s attitudes and beliefs about social issues found […]

Do You Process Dots or Look for Patterns?

We report average gift as gospel.   And if the giving by your donors looks like the normal, bell curve on the left then average and standard deviation  (how tall or wide is the middle part) will have told you all you need to know.  This world view assumes the outliers are distraction.  How many times […]

Merry Christmas

Celebrate This Agitator Tradition With Us

Whether you’re still celebrating the results of the mid-term elections or figuring out how to avoid the return of the in-office Christmas party that was mercifully cancelled in the Covid Years, we hope you’ll find time, once again, to l fall on your knees and sing along to The Agitator’s favorite carol. Once  again, for […]

If You Ain’t First You’re Last?

One of the greatest movies of all time for those of us who enjoy parody, slapstick and juvenile humor is Will Ferrell’s Talladega Nights. He spends most of his life measuring it against an impossible standard of “if you ain’t first you’re last”, a motto from his father who was high on peyote at the […]