I was reading this article on effective email messaging, the gist of which was … make it relevant via personalization.

Now there are a variety of ways to personalize, especially in (but not limited to) the online environment — using the donor’s location to tailor content, keying off of actions taken (completed a survey, signed an online petition), using transactions as a trigger, using donor milestones as a trigger (“Congrats on your fifth anniversary as a member”). Messages keyed to any of these items of data would be more relevant to the donor, as well as providing gratifying evidence that you actually recognized and paid attention to him/her.

But perhaps the most important cue around which to build messaging is the declared interest of the donor — “I’m giving you my donation for this purpose, to meet that goal, to support this initiative … and I want especially to hear about our progress on that.” Yet this information seems to be very seldom used.

Mostly, I suspect, because organizations never ask donors the key question when, for example, acknowledging their initial gift — “What is it that we do that is most important to you?” And obviously if you don’t ask such a question, there’s no way to target and tailor subsequent reporting back to the donor.

Even when donors have been acquired via a narrowly cast appeal — e.g., an environmental group’s appeal on, say, biodiversity versus clean air — rarely is follow-on cultivation driven by that initial interest. And even a nonprofit that might segment on that basis for future targeting, will often refrain from making its insight explicit to the individual donor in subsequent appeals, losing the powerful connection … “Here’s why we’re asking you again, Tom …”

Indeed, in the old days, the goal was to move the donor away from a single interest and toward being an institutional supporter. The theory was that the latter donor was more deeply and reliably committed to the core mission of the organization, and not as likely to be fickle or faddish and lose interest when “their issue” faded.

There was a logic to that approach, but I wonder whether it still applies so well.

Today’s donor, arguably, has a more focused sense of why they are giving and what they want to see as results … Report to me!  They are more performance-driven. So why not identify their expectation as specifically as possible from day one and focus on meeting — and communicating about — that expectation. Yes, they can be exposed to other facets of the organization, and if they respond, great.

But don’t lose sight of their original motive and expectation. And weight your communications accordingly.

Tom