I have buckets on my mind today. Two kinds of buckets.

First up is the Ice Bucket Challenge, which by now has seen more analysis, praise and detraction, and ‘Monday morning quarterbacking’ than any fundraising gimmick to date.

Arguably the numbers speak for themselves as far as up front success is concerned … 3 million donors. Personally, I’m much more impressed by the number of donors than the number of dollars.

Because the most important analysis has to do with ‘what next?’ … how effectively does ALSA capitalize on its tsunami of new donors? And what can the rest of us learn as we enviously watch on?

Roger and I raised this in our post on U.S. Labor Day Monday: The Remarkable “Wet Blanket Challenge”. Please read if you overlooked. And here are two other post-analyses to note.

The first is by Angie Moore writing in Fundraising Success: Yes, There Is a Challenge with the ALS Ice Bucket Challenge. I especially liked her concluding comments about her son’s engagement with the challenge:

“One thing is for sure — this is going to be written up in marketing textbooks one day and tracked by all of us over the next year to find out 1) what did ALSA do with all the money 2) what did it do with all those new donors and 3) how does the dust settle in the long run for ALSA.

But I’ll say this — my 9-year-old was challenged by at least five of his friends, and he did it. He understood what it was about. He tells people he donated. He asked to look at Facebook daily so he could see all the videos. He watched me (in my video) relate my ability to pick up that ice bucket to those suffering with ALS and the weakness they get in their limbs and the ultimate paralysis. So all the questions I have are important, but if even half of the parents who let their kids “take the challenge” explained to them what they were really doing, this viral challenge has planted some very important seeds for the future. All the haters need to just be quiet (and go to their therapists and have a special session on “jealousy”).”

And in this Forbes article — Has the Ice Bucket Challenge Changed Healthcare Fundraising Forever? — Jon Fortenbury, along with the rest of us, asks why the challenge was so successful:

“Was it the fact that the Ice Bucket Challenge was big, simple and selfless? Or personal, social and feel-good? Or just flat-out, it’s hot outside and we’re sick of negative news? Everyone’s throwing around theories and many are plugging away at what they think the formula of its success is by creating new challenges. But it doesn’t seem like anyone has definitively figured it out yet.”

What I like about Fortenbury article (of course it hasn’t changed healthcare fundraising — or any fundraising — forever, Jon) are the two citations he provided above. Both are worth a read. The first, looking at the ‘science’ (I would say pseudo-science) of the Challenge’s success, compares Ice Bucket to Live Aid and boils both down to, well: big, selfless and simple. The second focuses on attributes like personal, the ‘warm glow’ effect, and small/concrete.

Now from over-flowing bucket (the stuff of ecstatic dreams) to the mundane and dreary leaky bucket!

Let me suggest that for every minute you devote to fantasizing about your organization’s future Ice Bucket Challenge clone, you should devote at least one day to figuring out how to plug your leaky bucket. Daydreaming about your ‘challenge’ is a pleasant narcotic; whereas fixing your leaking bucket — your stream of defecting donors — is a harsh, nagging reality.

However, time spent on fixing the leaks is far more likely to yield income!

You might start by reading Roger’s book: Retention Fundraising: The New Art and Science of Keeping Your Donors For Life (order here).

Tom

P.S. Need encouragement? Here’s what I and others more notable have to say about Roger’s book.