Award Winning Blog - Agitator

DMA Direct Mail Stats

Ethan Boldt at Inside Direct Mail reports these U.S. direct mail stats from the DMA’s new 2010 Statistical Fact Book: Direct mail accounts for 52% of all mail (over half of all mail has been direct mail since 2007). Households receive 24.7 pieces of mail per week (down from a high of 26.2 a few […]

Learn More February 19, 2010

Soup Shopping, With Emotion

How much research does your nonprofit undertake to inform your fundraising strategy and messaging? Probably too little. Either for lack of resources, or because you just don’t believe in it. Take a look at this Wall Street Journal article, The Emotional Quotient of Soup Shopping, if you want a taste of how far commercial marketers […]

Learn More February 18, 2010

Boomers: Bummed, Overcast, Sickly

The Boomer Project recently compiled some studies on the attitudes and outlook of the Boomer generation … you know, the ones you’re counting on for all that money in your fundraising plan. Unfortunately, the data suggest that Boomers aren’t in a very upbeat state of mind. The Boomer Project uses adjectives like bummed, sickly, overcast, […]

Learn More February 17, 2010

Verdict On Annual Reports

Lots of very constructive responses to our question of last week: Are Annual Reports Dinosaurs? And it looks like we have a hung jury! One group leans toward more timely and frequent donor communication, including in lieu of "saving it up" for the annual report. Another group says different strokes for different folks … so […]

Learn More February 15, 2010

Where, Where, Everywhere

As I outlined this “Where” segment of The Agitator’s Who-What-Why-When-Where series, I began by concentrating mostly on the proper selection or integration of fundraising channels –online, offline, mail, email, phone, tv, print. The “Where” to send the message. That was before I took a break and glanced at Charity Navigator. My curiosity was unrelated to […]

Learn More February 12, 2010

Are They Dinosaurs?

No … I’m not talking about prospecting letters that break even. Nor am I talking about telemarketing calls. I’m referring to that most venerated publication of all nonprofits … The Annual Report! Here’s a question from Agitator readers Bob Bland and Matt Wolcott that I can’t resist passing along for your comments: "It is Annual […]

Learn More February 11, 2010