Why bother even thinking about starting over? What’s wrong with what we’re doing? Everyone else is doing about the same thing, so why bother changing?

Failure to ask and correctly answer those key questions is likely to eventually find your organization joining the nonprofit equivalents of Pan Am, Polaroid, Nokia, and Kodak. Once-great organizations that either failed to ask those sorts of questions, or answered them incorrectly.

Of course, extinction of a nonprofit doesn’t occur overnight. Atrophy, decline, then death come slowly and often without highly visible symptoms and loud alarm bells. Ominous but largely silent and easily ignored warning signals appearing first as ‘slow growth’, then ‘no growth’ and finally ‘decline’.

We ignore the signs of change at our peril. But, ours is a pretty smug trade. Lots of conventional wisdom, cheerfully and willingly shared. Strong and certain views usually expressed without a scintilla of doubt. What has been still ‘is’, and what ‘is’ is likely to always be. Or so folks seem to believe.

And so, much of our sector just keeps doing the same thing over and over and over.

Don’t get me wrong, I truly believe that strong views — even those based on conventional wisdom — are important in guiding the work we all do. But the problem is that too many folks in this trade don’t even have strong views. They simply coast through their professional life following the consensus. They truly believe most things ‘fundraising’ have been figured out and are willing to accept others’ word for it.

But just when you think you have things figured out the world changes.  So what do organizations do? In most cases nothing, because most folks in Nonprofit Land, just like everywhere else, hate changing their minds. It’s called confirmation bias.

New facts? Naw, ignore ‘em. After all, we’ve always done it this way. And furthermore, why take the risk that even if we change, things may not not work out.

In a rapidly changing world I believe Marc Andreessen, the internet pioneer (inventor of the Mosaic web browser and co-founder of Netscape) and Silicon Valley venture capitalist probably has the most helpful approach to putting yourself in the best position to deal with change.

He sums up his guiding philosophy as: “Strong opinions, loosely held.”

Plan and execute based on your strongly held points of view, BUT be ready to abandon those view points and adapt as soon as new facts and trends present themselves. As in ‘Convinced’. ‘Convinced’. ‘Convinced’.  ‘New Facts’.  ‘Change’!

As part of this Starting Over series we’re on the lookout for fundraisers who once followed the ‘old’ rules of fundraising, BUT who were able to let go of conventional wisdom and adapt to a changed world. (“Strong opinions, loosely held.”)

Today, I want to focus on Richard Turner, a bright, insightful UK fundraising veteran with a range of experience with older, large organizations (Action Aid) and smaller, young organizations (SolarAid). Richard challenged and defied some of the Old Rules (conventional wisdom) and successfully demonstrated that today’s donor follows a set of New Rules.

In a post on 101 Fundraising titled Wake up to the new rules of fundraising! Richard outlines three New Rules. New rules set by the donor that he claims are “game changers”.

• New Rule #1—Trust is key. Increasingly donors make purchasing decision, including donations, based on peer recommendations, whether it’s from friends or even other donors.  “The best ask comes from someone I trust.”

• New Rule #2—Everyone is now a channel. “In this connected world you just don’t know who I know. Empower me to be your messenger!”

• New Rule #3—Use ‘social capital’. “The social capital I have with my network of friends, family and colleagues will always be greater than the social capital your charity has with my network, friends, family and colleagues. Use it!”

Richard goes on to explain that the rules by which donors engage with a nonprofit have changed mainly for one reason: the internet.

Just stop and think about New Rule #1: Trust, he urges. “How did you last decide on something to buy — that camera you bought, or a place you stayed, or the plumber you chose to use? Chances are it was from a recommendation by asking someone you trust or going online and looking at the customer reviews.”

Richard then looks at the Ice Bucket Challenge through the lens of his New Rules to explain why it worked so well. “An ask (the challenge or nomination) from someone you know and engaging content produced by their supporters to their friends! Supporters as a channel using their social capital.” [ Bingo! New Rules 1, 2 and 3 at work.]

So, asks Richard, if the rules have changed, why do “we doggedly apply the old rules, thinking the recession is to blame for high acquisition costs and falling response rates (when the real reason is the rules have changed)?”

“The ‘old’ rules tell us to:

• Focus on areas of high return on investment (ROI), dropping areas of low ROI.

• Ramp up the volume on the need/pity scale to lift falling response rates.

• Ask more often.”

“As a result the short sighted siloed ROI mentality pervades and is dominated by Finance. Whilst this strategy might briefly check the declining trend it doesn’t provide a cure. If anything this approach exacerbates the problem leading to rising public distrust in fundraising. Worse still it leads you to adopt the opposite tactics you need to!

“[For example…]

• The low areas of ROI are often the very activities you need to spread your story and empower you supporters. [E.g. social media]

• Ramping up the volume [of conventional media like direct mail] might get a better response in the short term but it turns off many more and it rarely inspires people to engage their networks.

• If you ask, ask, ask you never create space to do what you need in between—the relationship building which is critical to why people give again, equip them with your story, or just as importantly, tell their contacts.”

Richard believes that continuing business as usual under the ‘old rules’ will only make matters worse and won’t stop the decline in the nonprofit sector.

So what should we be doing a lot more of? According to Richard the key to unlocking the new rules is twofold:

• Getting as many of your supporters engaging their networks — that includes your staff, volunteers, trustees, beneficiaries and donors — in an inspiring purpose that provides the driver — the “why” for involvement and giving.

• Empowering supporters to be advocates. Giving them a powerful story to tell and the permission to tell it

Do Richard’s New Rules work?

“Last year SolarAid’s income just grew by 100% in one year. We didn’t do this by bombarding people using the old rules (we couldn’t afford to). Examples include a former volunteer who secured a six figure trust grant, a donor who recruited others in her street, a major supporter who engaged government, a supplier who recommended us to a major donor, and another cause who promoted our appeal to their supporters. And this is just the beginning.”

I urge you to also read Richard’s iFundraiser post Welcome to the party! How to apply the new rules of fundraising for details on on his thought process in applying New Rules. An eye-opening treat.

When it comes to switching from Old Rules to New Rules, Richard sums it up this way:

“Using the new rules is transformative. But to make them work you need to invest time, resources and brain capacity to make the switch. The savings you make from not applying the old rules will more than compensate. You will need to work out new measures and you need to stop the old measures as they keep you applying the old rules. You may need to think of new ways of working.”

What New Rules have you developed or are you learning to apply?

Roger