Yesterday I complained … only ONE retention superstar had responded from our Agitator audience — Colorado Public Radio. But I shouldn’t complain; it’s quality that counts. A second superb case study has arrived.

Jonathon Grapsas at Flat Earth Direct in Australia has been working on retention amongst clients who do much of their donor acquisition via face-to-face solicitation. He writes:

“Like many developed fundraising countries, face-to-face recruitment of donors is huge in Australia. Generates hundreds of thousands of new monthly donors to the sector each year. No other channel comes close in terms of volume.

Average year 1 attrition of F2F supporters in Oz is around 45%.

We’re working with 10 organisations in Oz and Canada tackling the issue of attrition of supporters recruited on the street. Our clients have managed to reduce the annual attrition by around a quarter on average.

In short by understanding who these supporters are: younger, more transient, mobile enabled/focused individuals. The mantra we live and breathe is when we think F2F: we think mobile.

Rich, regular, mobile driven, triggered content. 100% focused on supporter care/advocacy (no asking). We’ve had clients breakeven in 3-4 months on these programs (remember, no asking – purely donor care). That’s how significant a reduction in attrition levels is on their bottom line, given the volume of RG’s many org’s are recruiting in Australia (some in the 10’s of thousands annually).”

Now, those are good insights and impressive results.

But for a real understanding of how robust a retention effort Jonathon’s clients make, read this detailed case study (sitting for all to see in the SOFII files!) he forwarded describing the retention program of Australia’s Cerebral Palsy Alliance. Videos, podcasts, mobile, email … true multi-channel integration … 2,500 individual communications over the course of a year. Retention bumped up 10 points from 53% to 63%. I was blown away!

The SOFII write-up ends quoting Jonathon:

“We felt like we had nothing to lose because attrition was so poor, things couldn’t get worse – so perhaps there wasn’t that much risk. But as far as we know, right now we’re probably experiencing the lowest attrition rates in Australia.”

Jonathon, to you and the folks at Cerebral Palsy Alliance, big Agitator raise!

Tom

P.S. Tomorrow, big announcement re retention help.