Award Winning Blog - Agitator

Learning From Competitors

Competitors?! That's a nasty word in nonprofitland. We're all one big happy family, aren't we? Our boards want us to cooperate with other groups in our field. Our major donors urge us to collaborate, even while investing in us as “the best.” By nature we tend to be huggers and team players. But it's a […]

Learn More April 23, 2007

Direct Mail Fundraising As It Should Be

Here's how a 73-year-old nonprofit brand, Easter Seals, keeps itself fresh and successful in the mail … Testing, testing, and more testing. This review from Inside Direct Mail of the current control package used by Easter Seals for prospecting describes the careful testing that yields an acquisition package delivering 3.8% response. Are you testing enough? […]

Learn More April 20, 2007

We’re Watching You

Nonprofit fundraisers seeking to raise money online will need to master a blossoming art called “behavioral targeting” (BT). In a nutshell BT involves tracking netizens as they browse the web (that's their online “behavior”), using the electronic cookies they accumulate in that process. This information is combined with aggregate demographic information about the sites visited. […]

Learn More April 19, 2007

Online Fundraising Ain’t A World Apart

There's a lot of buzz already about the online fundraising success of the presidential contenders, with Obama, Clinton, Edwards and Romney leading the pack so far. The buzz treats “online fundraising” as something independent of and a world apart from “traditional” fundraising. But that ain't true. I've launched the small gift fundraising programs for a […]

Learn More April 18, 2007

A Nation Of Public Affairs Dummies?

Pew Research Center wouldn't put it so harshly. But the verdict appears to be YES! Nonprofit fundraisers and communicators be aware of these findings as you craft cause-oriented appeals and messages. Don't aim too high! Pew has just released a study indicating that most Americans cannot pass a basic test of our knowledge of public […]

Learn More April 17, 2007

Here Is Great Marketing

Attention nonprofit fundraisers: LunaMetrics gets it! Lunametrics focuses on improving clients' online conversion efforts. I just subscribed to their e-newsletter, and here's the confirmation message I received … from their CEO, not some anonymous or “admin” address. Did the CEO personally send it? Maybe, maybe not … but the takeaway is still that the top […]

Learn More April 16, 2007