Award Winning Blog - Agitator

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

Excellent Direct Response Advice

Direct marketing pro (and publisher of Target Marketing) Denny Hatch, who’s seen it all, distilled a ton of experience into this article on direct response copywriting. I’ll summarize some of his takeaways here, but you’re doing yourself a disservice if you don’t taste the full flavor of Denny’s entire piece (our ".edu" readers will be […]

Learn More February 10, 2010