We think and worry a lot about copy (here, here, here and here). And so does Tom Ahern,  Kathy Swayze, Jeff Brooks and many other proven fundraising copywriters.

Are we wasting our time?

Let me explain the reason behind this question.

A well-crafted piece of fundraising copy is far more than words on paper or digital bits and bytes. It’s a carefully thought through construction designed to inform and motivate the donor while reflecting the organization’s brand and testing or advancing the strategy behind the copy.

In short, it’s a piece of psychological chemistry –lots of different elements combined to produce a desired result. Perhaps the piece is designed to reflect the donor’s identity or psychological profile.  Or, perhaps, it includes some behavioral science applications.

Whatever the strategic goal of a particular piece,  a good copywriter will have included whatever elements are required to meet the strategic objective of the piece as briefed by the client or the consultant.

Of course,  the more we learn about elements like donor identity and psychological  personality types and craft the copy to include those elements along with effective story telling the better the piece will work.

BUT THEN… and far too frequently  all this careful thought and painstaking work falls apart.  Rather, I should say, it’s “torn apart.”  Wrecked and ruined by an inexperienced reviewer,  or ego-stuffed CEO or some self-absorbed review committee.

Every copywriter and strategist worth the title has heard the reasons for the desecration:

• “It’s too long.”
• “It doesn’t sound like me.”
• “This doesn’t reflect our values.”
• “I don’t like it.”
• “It’s not on brand.”
• The list goes on and on…and on.

Consequently, far too many organizations end up with a one-size-fits-all piece that fails to do the job intended.  And those who’ve wrecked the copy wonder why the organization’s  income isn’t growing.

We needn’t burn anyone at the stake, but we all sure as hell should be asking  some questions.  Like:

• What qualifies someone to opine on copy? Their title?  Their expertise in grammar?  Their deep, sophisticated knowledge of their donors and prospects?  Their having been in ‘fundraising’ for 5, 10, 20 years?

Oh wait, maybe it’s the founder and she will tell us the copy doesn’t match the vision of the organization.    This critique would be reasonable and fair.  But that person is rarely the one doing the reviewing.

• Is someone truly qualified reviewing the copy and the strategy/reasoning behind it? Or is the reviewer one of those inexperienced or untrained staffers who float in and out of organizations like oxygen. Over the years the copy review process seems to have gone from the top of the organization down to one of the siloes.

Perhaps it does make its way to the top. But that CEO or other non-marketing, non-founder, non-qualified, but very senior person is the wrong choice.

Unless those at the top truly know fundraising or marketing you’re better off avoiding them.  Does anyone think that the CEO of a Fortune 5000 (extra zero intentional) reads the copy of the Facebook ads for product X or widget Y or service Z?  Hell no.  It ain’t their job.  Opportunity cost alone dictates they put time elsewhere.

• What, exactly, are the benefits of a copywriting review committees?  Most yield only personal opinions.  The worst kind are those whose members find any message that they themselves don’t like to be off-putting, even offensive.  This is often the case in organizations that deal with controversial issues.

 When did a piece of copy that doesn’t appeal to you rise to the level of offensive?  I’m not suggesting a pro-life group run pro-choice ads or vice versa.  I am pointing out that people are different and every organization has different people supporting it. There’s a real danger in ignoring differences.

Take for example, a group like the ACLU.  It has social justice supporters and also die-hard free speech civil libertarians.  If, for illustration purposes, that organization has a copywriting review committee made up of social justice proponents they may tank a message aimed at free speech donors because they have personal issues around defense of the First Amendment when invoked to defend the free speech rights of racists and other deplorable types.

The result, of course, is this group of reviewers has just deprived some of the organization’s best donors of important information and greater involvement because the group has personal issues.

• Are you aware of the dangers of subjective personal opinion. Copywriting review by unskilled, uninformed reviewers who rely on their own personal opinion does greater damage than simply watering down copy.  For copywriters charged with communicating to different segments based on the identity of those donors a reviewer relying on subjective personal opinion prevents the organization from ever rising above the one-size-fits-all plateau.

No doubt there are many reasons why the copywriting and review process as practiced by many organizations is a disaster.  I suspect a major reason lies in the fact that too many organizations treat copy as just another commodity or task to be dealt with as quickly and easily as possible. ( “Just email it to me, we’re on a tight schedule.”)

The disaster is compounded by failure to think about the strategy underlying an appeal, acquisition, or call-to-action piece. In turn, this failure compounds into the failure to provide the copywriter a proper brief about key elements like donor identity or any other elements that will improve results. So when the copy arrives (as an email attachment) the reviewer really has no objective way to measure it.

The result?  All too often the reviewers don’t just poorly rewrite the work, they 86 it, preventing it from seeing the light of day–- all because the copy didn’t match the reviewer’s personal values.  Values which, by the way, rarely coincide with the organization’s values or brand. ( In the reviewers’ defense few are given any brand or values guidance on what the brand is/isn’t.  “Brand” work for most organizations is limited to a color palette and an approved font type.

Because the hard work of audience definition, donor identity, and strategic brand positioning has not been done or is studiously avoided, the copywriter and the copy is left with only personal values and opinions, not organizational values and strategy.

Almost always these personal values will be offended by anything that doesn’t match them, made worse by fear of anything that appears outside the norm – all of which results in one-size-fits nobody fundraising and lowest common denominator thinking.

Wise and successful fundraisers pay serious attention to the copywriting and copy reviewing process.

Roger