All Nonprofit Marketing and Fundraising Articles
Episode 007 – My Executive Director Keeps Editing Out Fundraising Best Practices
Do you have someone who edits out fundraising best practice from your appeals? Someone who doesn’t like the urgency, postscripts, hyphens, folksy language, or handwritten notes? Is your fundraising suffering because of it? In episode 7, Jeremy answers a question from Julia about how to handle an Executive Director who doesn’t understand fundraising and is undermining her efforts.
Telemarketing – Dave the Development Director
“Hey Dave, we had one complaint about your telemarketing campaign. Can you cancel that?” said Nixon, the Customer Service Manager. Dave replies, “That’s $200,000 of our annual revenue.” “It’s bothering our donors, Dave. Just ask a major donor to give $200,000.” Nixon responds. Nixon walks away thinking “I’m good at this fundraising thing.”
Why Donors Give: In Exchange for a Premium
When it comes time to ask for donations, remember that everyone has different reasons for giving (or not giving). By understanding the concept of “the premium,” you’ll be better equipped to appeal to potential donors’ individual needs and motivations—which will ultimately lead to more successful fundraising campaigns.
Episode 006 – Why Don’t My Emails Perform As Well As My Direct Mail?
Direct mail is not dead. Far from it, direct mail still performs well if you have a good strategy behind it. Many nonprofits are transitioning more investment into digital but aren’t seeing the return in email that they’ve seen in direct mail. Today, we’re going to talk through the five Cs of successful email appeals, then we have a question from Marcy about why her emails don’t perform as well as her direct mail does.
Rewrite Fundraising Letter – Dave the Development Director
“Dave, I need you to rewrite this fundraising letter and remove all of the language that makes us look like we need the donor’s money,” said Wendy, the Executive Director. Dave replies, “We’ll lose donations doing that.” “I also need you to raise 10% more than your goal, thanks.” Wendy responds.
Nonprofit Thank You Video Script
Videos are a powerful relationship building tool. A technique that can help your nonprofit quickly begin building a relationship with your donor is to create a personalized thank you video. This creative way of expressing gratitude to your donor communicates how much you care. There are a number of platforms that help facilitate the personalized … Read more
Episode 005 – What to Do With 25,000 Email Addresses a Partner Offered Us?
Karen’s organization has a partner who offered them a list of 25,000 email addresses. Her boss wants to just add them to their email service provider, but Karen doesn’t agree. In episode 5, Jeremy gives Karen advice as to how to answer her boss and what to do with the opportunity.
How to Create a Sense of Urgency in Your Nonprofit Appeal
Creating a sense of urgency in your appeal messaging will help move readers to become donors. Think this is a trick that no longer applies? Consider the case of two nonprofits reaching the same potential donor. If the first nonprofit conveys a sense of urgency in the fundraising appeal and the second does not, in … Read more
Episode 004 – How Does Email Design Impact Response?
How does email design impact response in your emails? Often there are conflicting answers on blogs as different organizations experience different results when they change factors in their email marketing. In episode 4, Jeremy explores a question about graphics vs text emails and how you can test to determine the right factors to improve response for your nonprofit emails.
Major Gifts Officer – Dave the Development Director
“I’m so glad you came in for this interview to be a major gifts officer, what is one of your weaknesses?” asked Dave. The job candidate replies, “I don’t like to ask people for money.”
Why Donors Give: Tax Deduction
Fundraising hinges on appealing to the recipient’s reasons for giving. Consider all the ways you can leverage storytelling, imagery, and emotion in your emails. The motivation for giving is as diverse as your recipients, but research suggests most people fall into one of several categories. One of your primary goals as a fundraiser is to … Read more
Episode 003 – How Do We Segment Our Emails?
Have you ever hired a consultant to help you with a project, but when it comes time to execute, they disappear? This happened to Holly when she brought in a consultant to look at her email fundraising program. The consultant told Holly she should improve her segmentation and then disappeared before sharing with her a direction to go. In episode 3 of the Nonprofit Answers Podcast, Jeremy teaches Holly about different ways to segment her email file to maximize response.
Episode 002 – How Do We Improve Our Turnaround Time for Sending Disaster Fundraising Appeals?
In episode two of the Nonprofit Answers Podcast, Jeremy Reis takes a question from Ryan who’s frustrated with their turnaround time on disaster response fundraising appeals. This is a topic that really hits home: how do we decide if we’re going to respond to a disaster and then get our appeals out the door quickly in email and direct mail? Jeremy shares how Food for the Hungry decides when to respond and how they send out emergency response fundraising appeals quickly.
Episode 001 – Facebook Algorithm Changes – Nonprofit Answers
In episode 1 of the Nonprofit Answers Podcast, Jeremy Reis answers a question from Helen, a nonprofit marketing manager in Nashville. Helen is concerned about the recent algorithm changes with Facebook and wants to know what she should do. Should she continue to invest time and resources into Facebook? What changes should she make to her social media strategy?
The Story of the One
Nonprofit fundraising, at its core, is storytelling. Telling a story of how your organization has helped one beneficiary be transformed is the building block of telling the story of your organization. In nonprofit development, the story we use in fundraising is called the story of the one. It’s called the story of the one because you’re … Read more
5 Cs of Effective Fundraising Appeals
Raising funds for needed items, foods, and services is the lifeblood of any nonprofit organization. Yet many organizations struggle with the staple of a successful fundraiser – the appeal. Your fundraising appeal needs to hit home with your audience, cutting through the clutter in their inboxes to make a real impact. Your appeal needs to … Read more
HVAC – Dave the Development Director
“Dave, the air conditioning in the building went out. Can you find a major donor that has a passion for HVAC and raise $50,000?” asked Wendy, the Executive Director. Dave replies, “Next, can we find a donor with a passion for office furniture to buy me a chair that’s not broken?”
100 Email Appeal Subject Lines
When you’re writing email appeals, the subject and preview text are two key factors to increase your open rate. You want to create a subject line that grabs the reader’s attention and entices her to open the email without being disingenuous. There isn’t a specific template or formula you should use for your subject line, … Read more
25 More Job Interview Questions for Development Directors
You may be applying for a job as a development director or you may be hiring a fundraising professional, either way, here’s 25 more job interview questions. This is a follow up to my first post with 25 job interview questions for development directors. Use these interview questions as a basis for discovering the right … Read more
Sample Phrases You Can Use to Thank Your Donors
Donors love it when you show appreciation for their support. So much so that 80% of donors say they would be motivated to make a second gift if the nonprofit thanked them. Unfortunately, many of us aren’t properly thanking nonprofit donors and this is negatively affecting our fundraising. It’s expensive to acquire a new donor. … Read more
Raise More Money by Giving Donors Choices
What is a donation gift matrix? A donation gift matrix is a tool that allows donors to choose how they want their donation to be used. Learn how to implement a gift matrix on your landing page.
5 Tips to Prepare for a Development Director Interview
You’ve polished your resume, perfected your cover letter, and the phone call you’ve been waiting for finally comes – they want to interview you for the development director position! This is amazing news, and while it may feel like the hard part is over, the real challenge is just beginning. Now it’s time to prepare for the interview so that you can make the best impression possible.
8 Best Nonprofit Digital Annual Reports
Creating a specific digital annual report gives nonprofits a number of options to showcase the great work their donors have enabled them to do. Digital annual reports give you an expanded set of capabilities that a PDF or Issuu (flip book style) annual report can’t match such as video, animation, interactive elements, expanded information for … Read more
25 Interview Questions to Hire Your Development Director
Looking to hire a development director or fundraising manager for your nonprofit? These 25 interview questions will help you through the HR hiring process and find the right fundraising executive for your organization.