Award Winning Blog - Agitator

Is Your Charity Delivering the Goods?

Donor’s need to feel like their donation will do some good because we all crave a sense of competence. The question is, what’s the best way to signal and communicate this? Here are three: Outputs: Immediate, tangible results examples of what the charity directly provides – meals delivered, blankets distributed, or books supplied. Outcomes: These […]

Learn More September 18, 2024

We Grow Too Soon Old and Too Late Smart: Lessons from Botton Village

I grew up in the Pennsylvania Dutch part of the Keystone state, and there’s a saying from the folks around there. Perfect for this post: “We grow too soon old and too late smart.” This simple truth rings especially loud when I think of one of the best fundraising cases I’ve seen in my lifetime—a […]

Learn More September 16, 2024

Is Your Fundraising All Dots, No Pattern?

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 how tall or wide the middle part is will give you much of what you need. This world view assumes outliers are distraction. How many times have you or your […]

Learn More September 13, 2024

Jiu-Jitsu Fundraising

An enemy is crystallizing. It’s motivating. “Rally the mostly satisfied, even-keeled moderates to storm the bastille.”, said nobody ever. Does your organization have an enemy? The rich, the establishment, the pro-this or con-that, the anti-whatever you stand for? Or maybe there’s just a big, prevailing message that has lots of air time, exposure or […]

Learn More September 11, 2024

Beware of Junk Science

The Myers-Briggs Type Indicator is the most popular personality test in the world. Fortune 100 love it. Government agencies love it. More than 1.5 million people take it every year. Our only issue with it as social scientists is this: It’s garbage. Otherwise, the behavioral scientists at DonorVoice love it. It fails two fundamental requirements. […]

Learn More September 9, 2024

What’s cul-de-sac fundraising look like?

The echo chamber is getting louder, we tune out damn near everything not matching what we already believe and we’re much more likely to distrust people who aren’t like us. Partisan agreement between spouses was 60% in the mid 60’s, it’s now closer to 85%. Pew research shows partisans have few friends from the opposing […]

Learn More September 6, 2024