I Can’t Get Enough Fundraising Emails!
Yesterday I took a pot shot at email fundraising — comparing it to writing jingles versus songs. And, in response to a query from Harry Lynch at Sanky, I stand by my comment: “I don’t think I’ve ever read a ‘moving’ email appeal.
But I’m prepared to be converted … feel free anyone to send me your best shot. I’m wanting to feel moved!
So, you can imagine the joy I felt when I saw today’s headline from Jeff Brooks at Future Fundraising Now — Are you sending too much fundraising email? Go get ’em Jeff, I thought, and eagerly clicked to read.
Shock and dismay!
Turns out Jeff was riffing off of this article from Justin Perkins at Frogloop — How many fundraising emails should you send a year? Justin’s answer was, effectively, there’s never enough. Now, I’m exaggerating, just a bit. Justin seems to regard the upper limit as maybe 80 per year that one of Care2’s clients clients pushes out, with the sweet spot range being maybe 24-48 per year.
I know how to work the ROI math on this sort of thing as well as anyone, so I can believe that online fundraisers do some calculations and conclude they’re still making money on message number 47 or 79.
But there’s got to be some sort of ‘sniff test’ applied here as well. Who wants to receive a weekly fundraising email from any organization, let alone all the multiple organizations that have you on their lists?
Yesterday I also spoke of email fundraising as not ‘crafting’, but instead ‘producing’.
In his article, Justin refers to the “Art of Fundraising” as applied to his email fundraising space. In the interest of equal time, here are the principles Justin says good online fundraising should follow:
- Compelling storytelling tailored to your audience.
- Good timing (riding news cycles, sending urgent appeals tied to a deadline, piggy-backing on related moments of opportunity).
- Optimized email formatting and landing pages.
- Use of integrated CRM platforms (such as Salsa, Engaging Networks, Convio/Blackbaud etc.) rather than email blasting tools (such as MailChimp, Constant Contact and Vertical Response) that don’t enable a seamless, one-to-one user experience optimized specifically for fundraising.
- Engaging “cultivation” emails in between fundraising appeals that help people feel good about making a difference.
- Integration with advocacy campaigns – this is a huge missed opportunity that I see across the sector, especially when research shows that advocates are up to 7x more likely to donate money.
- Sending of personalized emails that seem tailored to one specific person – not generic emails aimed at talking to a large list of people.
- Immediately following up with a compelling welcome series after someone first signs up to your list.
- Ensuring that your whole team – often including the board – is invested in, and fully understanding, the key performance metrics involved.
I’m sooo happy he stuck a few ‘cultivation’ emails in there for good measure (#5)! Just what I want as a ‘break’ from my 48 fundraising appeals.
Tom
5 responses to “I Can’t Get Enough Fundraising Emails!”
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My experience with a nonprofit using Justin’s formula?
I quit giving to Care and will never give to them again.
I received an email ask at least every two weeks. And each one was close to breathless hysteria in it’s statement of need. Crisis was the oft repeated (literally and figuratively) refrain. I think this was the aforementioned “compelling storytelling.”
I felt battered by the frequency and tone of their “email campaign.” It was clear that I was a wallet, and only a wallet. And as a professional fundraiser, I was appalled and offended.
So, what’s the ROI on turning a donor (admittedly a small one) into someone who feels battered and offended? And one who tells others of his experience with your organization?
The bit about the cultivation emails is true! At my previous organization, we used to send fundraising emails once every two weeks, and people often complained that we emailed too often and only ever asked for money. So we tried interspersing cultivation emails but didn’t reduce the number of fundraising appeals, effectively doubling our email volume. The complaints disappeared.
Tom, I’m late reading your column today. I might not have gotten to it until tonight … except for the encouragement of all of the moving emails poring into my inbox from Agitator readers who support of my comment. 😉
My four words for you today are: Prepare to be converted!
Hey Tom – thanks for the reference to my article on frogloop and I appreciate the tongue and cheek of your article.
However, I do want to clarify – my article didn’t really allude to sending unlimited email appeals. Far from it. God forbid anyone send even 80 email appeals a year – I was referencing the max one of my agency partners had seen – not a Care2 client, by the way.
The underlying point was to arm nonprofits with tools and strategy to figure out – with more than a finger in the wind – what it takes to increase online revenue.
Guess what – surprise, surprise – there’s a very direct correlation to the number of emails sent (and probably the number of GOOD emails sent).
There’s a nifty calculator there that puts the predictive tools in the nonprofit’s hands vs. prescribing a certain # of emails per year. It’s interesting, though, that the annual average of fundraising emails sent by some of the most successful online fundraising organizations is 24-48.
And the subtext: a lot of my smaller/ understaffed nonprofit clients barely scrape together 4 appeals a year, or they only bury a “donate now” button in a newsletter and they either give up and say “online fundraising doesn’t work” or they never really grow or invest in online.
So the point was to give a little data-based context that’s hopefully a helpful reference point if folks want to increase online revenue. Most nonprofits I’ve run across actually do need to send more GOOD emails if they want to play the numbers game of email marketing and fundraising.
Thanks!
I’ve been enjoying your posts on donor retention. Great stuff! Speaking of retention tools, have you had any new thoughts on the power (or I suspect you might say lack thereof) of email?
We have. And, in case you missed it, we’ve dedicated our latest blog post to you. (Well, sort of 🙂
http://bit.ly/15Zs9xh