Although The Agitator harps incessantly on the importance of donor retention (after all our job is to alert readers to where the real money is), the challenge of acquisition continually simmers on the back burners of our minds.

It jumped to the front burner of my brain on Friday while I was decompressing in preparation for the Fourth of July weekend by perusing Tom Ahern’s eclectic blog Luggage is My Life.

Tom’s entry for July 3rd comprises this single graphic:

Why is heavy frequency so important?

Because as the graphic notes, “The Golden Rule of Marketing is to get the right offer in front of the right person at the right time.”

One of the principal weaknesses of direct response, particularly direct mail, is that although we can usually identify ‘who’ the most likely prospects are, ‘what’ they are likely to be interested in, and perhaps even ‘why’ they give, the medium doesn’t do very well with the ‘when’ dimension of giving.

This is particularly true when it comes to the use of direct response, especially direct mail, for acquisition purposes. We’re far more capable of dealing with the ‘who’, ‘what’, ‘why’ and even ‘when’ questions with our own donors rather than with strangers yet to become our donors.

Thus the admonition to resort to heavy frequency of mailings/impressions in direct response acquisition.

According to Penelope Burk, whose firm Cygnus publishes the annual Burk Donor Survey, “consumer research on the number of impressions it takes to convert a prospect into a customer (or into a donor in the case of fundraising) has remained relatively consistent since the 1970’s. It takes anywhere from five to twelve contacts to get someone to buy (give) for the first time.”

AND … according to Penelope, the variety of impressions is just as important as frequency.

Penelope explains all this in a post titled, Selling Alone Can’t Close the First Sale, where she notes:

• The same message delivered in the same way all the time causes potential donors to just stop paying attention.

• But surrounding appeals with marketing messages delivered though a variety of communications media, offers the best hope for maximizing the acquisition of new donors.

• This mix is particularly important where younger donors (under the age of 35) are concerned.

To see what Penelope’s 2014 Burk Donor survey of 23,000 donors in the U.S. and Canada revealed about what factors persuade donors to give the first gift, click here.

As for those of us most interested in attracting the older crowd of donors (again, The Agitator’s job is to lead you to the real money) and still relying heavily on direct mail, it’s important to take advantage of merge-purge techniques and other list optimization techniques that can help you reach the best prospects as frequently as possible.

And equally important to disabuse your boss and board of the notion that, because their friend Mrs. Got Rocks received two similar mailings in a month, it’s the end of the world.

What’s your recipe for frequency?

Roger

P.S. Please don’t get the ‘heavy frequency’ in acquisition confused with what can be far too heavy frequency where your house file is concerned. Although you can sure be in touch with your donors more than with most prospects, there is a limit. The Agitator’s four-part series Raise More. Ask Less starts here.