Award Winning Blog - Agitator

Pondering Direct Mail

Here’s a thoughtful essay from fundraiser Ken Burnett on the "death" of direct mail. Actually, Ken emphasizes (and The Agitator agrees) that what really matters is the message and how well it’s crafted … whatever the medium used to deliver it. Here’s an excerpt: "At its heart direct mail fundraising is not about direct mail. […]

Learn More December 28, 2009

A Special Christmas Song

The Agitator has few traditions at this point. But here is one of them. For our third Christmas, we urge you to get into a mirthful holiday mood by listening to this unforgettable rendition of O Holy Night. The Agitator Guarantee: This performance will leave you smiling well into the New Year, or we’ll refund […]

Learn More December 23, 2009

Online Giving Peaks Next Week

I hope you’re not giving your online fundraising team time off next week.* As Stephanie Strom reported recently in the NYT, citing data from Convio, a phenomenal spike in online giving occurs at year-end … literally December 31st. Here’s what she says … "New data from Convio, a software company, shows that charitable donors that […]

Learn More December 22, 2009

More On Cheque-less Fundraising

My post last week on Britain’s plans to go "cheque-less" by 2018 generated a lot of comment (some publicly posted, some private emails), so I thought I’d summarize some of the key points made. First of all, it’s true. The Payments Council, a banking industry group in the UK, has announced its intention to phase […]

Learn More December 20, 2009

Fundraising Without Checks

In a comment on The Agitator, Jim Toscano of the Minneapolis Heart Foundation says that checks will no longer be used in Britain in nine years. And he asks: "What effect would it have on our fund-raising process if donors didn’t have a check to use to convey funds?" Fascinating question. But first of all, […]

Learn More December 18, 2009

The Right Way To Cultivate

Here is a terrific comment on yesterday’s Agitator post from Andrew Kramer describing how his organization, Prison Entrepreneurship Program (PEP) in Houston, builds cultivation into the guts of their program … and the enormous benefits reaped. He was taking me to task for treating cultivation merely as a monetary cost. Actually, The Agitator has been […]

Learn More December 17, 2009