Last month, Transform Consulting Group blogged about why snail mail remains a relevant fundraising channel. However, fundraisers can no longer afford to take separate approaches to their direct mail and online appeals and are turning instead to integrated fundraising.
Integrated fundraising extends beyond having a consistent brand and message across channels (although that is an essential first step). Proper integration drives prospects and donors through a strategic engagement process where each action in a given communication channel informs and reinforces what happens next in another channel. It’s not simply a buzzword; integrated fundraising reaches more donors and raises more money.
Sending isolated appeals through direct marketing or email doesn’t work as well as it used to. Sending appeals through multiple channels with the same message brings more substantial results.
Mal Warwick authorizes the just-released third edition of How to Write Successful Fundraising Appeals. He highlighted some important points about integrated fundraising in a recent webchat featured by the Chronicle of Philanthropy:
- The best use of integrated fundraising is in a campaign that stretches over 3-4 months and has a name, a goal, and a deadline.
- The very best time to launch such a campaign is at year-end. One-third to one-half of the money raised online comes in December, and one-third to one-half comes on the last day of the year.
- Consider not one annual appeal but a series of contacts starting early in November and ending on December 31st. For example, start with a long letter without an ask that lays out the case for giving early in November. Follow up with a series of other letters, plus an occasional phone call to your best donors, with the same message appearing on the organization’s website and an email offering an online giving option throughout November and early December. Periodically post invitations to learn about the campaign through Facebook and Twitter. Culminate in a year-end drive from mid-December to December 31st that focuses on email.
- The most important thing about writing an appeal is to think it through: Who are you writing to, why, and what do you want them to do?
- Social media can be used not to ask for donations but to promote visitors to your website.
- People uniformly underestimate the number of appeals they receive. Fundraisers are far more sensitive about frequency than donors, despite the complaints you may receive.
- Research has shown that the response rate and average gift climb with one extra channel, again with a third, again with a fourth, and so on, just as commercial marketers find with multichannel advertising.
- Research shows that, within limits, increasing the number of asks results in more revenue. The standard procedure includes at least three asks in emails and letters.
- Including relationship cultivation and educational messages in a series of asks is vital. You want to build relationships, not just pluck money out of your donors’ wallets.
- Statistics work only in moderation and when reduced to straightforward points.
- Research shows that subject lines are the most crucial element in emails, so the stronger your subject, the more likely the email will succeed.
Need help with an integrated fundraising campaign? To see how your fundraising efforts make a difference for your donors, contact Transform Consulting Group about our fund development services. Our services go well beyond click rates and open rates. Transform Consulting Group helps you make a more significant impact on your cause!
