Award Winning Blog - Agitator

Do Neighbors Always Get the Same Direct Mail?

Bob and Bill are neighbors in Anytown, USA. They’re the same age, race, income and married with 2 kids and a dog. They both give to the same NationalCharity.org and the same localcharity.org and with an identical RFM profile. Do they get the same direct mail piece? 100% of the time. Why? Are demographics destiny? […]

Learn More August 28, 2024

I Feel the Need, the Need for Speed

A line that corny has to be good. Plus, for this writer and many a reader, it was a coming of age movie. But alas, now it’s back to our original, behavioral science fundraising channel. Here are three story attributes for success. Volume is bad. Does your story go from sad to happy but stop […]

Learn More August 26, 2024

Quick, Scan That Dude’s Head

The Oklahoma State college football team is slapping QR codes on the back of player helmets. That could be an Onion article or meme fodder and yet it’s proof, life is stranger than fiction. The head coach is eccentric and eclectic and likely more than a bit frustrated by the new world order in college […]

Learn More August 23, 2024

Hello? Is there anybody in there? Just nod if you can hear me…

Conversation abounds in fundraising whether in-person or over the phone and everybody notes we should be active listeners and strive to make our conversations, well, conversational. That feels thin. Social science has a better answer with implications for humans talking to humans but of equal import for AI bots that are rapidly evolving in ways […]

Learn More August 21, 2024

700 X Match to Aid Widow of The Unknown Soldier

Monday’s opening of the Democratic National Convention in Chicago will do more than boost cable news channel ratings. It’ll open the floodgates even more to the incessant flood of digital appeals filling your donors’ inboxes and likely yours as well. Bobbing up with increasing frequency in that digital flood will be the sewage of the […]

Learn More August 19, 2024

Is the Ask for a What or Who?

There are two mental giving decisions, will I give? (yes/no) and conditional on a yes, how much? Nobody makes the first decision because they’ve got an affinity for blankets over solar lamps. We give to reinforce who we are and it’s easier to see me in another person or story then an inanimate object. But […]

Learn More August 16, 2024