Communicate!

Helping you win loyal friends through your communications

Fundraising Tuesday: Your Donors Need Watering

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watering plants

Tend your donors all year round

I put a plant into the ground.  Then I forgot about it.

The sun baked it.  It drooped.  It withered.

Oops!  Well, no problem.  I’ll just water it now.

Wait, why isn’t it coming back to life?

When your organization ignores a donor for months at a time, you are scorching and burning your relationship.

You may get lucky.  Their feelings for you may be so hardy that you can bring the relationship back to life with a really good appeal.  Most often, though, you’ll be watering a dead plant and wondering why it isn’t growing.

Real communications are the water of life.  Give your donors some water every week, and watch your relationships flower.

TY Thursday: Thank Your Most Loyal Supporters

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loyalty

Who is your organization’s best friend?

Every nonprofit organization has one: the most loyal supporter.  The person who gives as often as she can, or as often as you ask.  The one who volunteers for all your events and brings her friends.

You’d like a thousand like that.  You’d like to clone her.  What if you could?

Businesses have time-tested strategies that create loyal customers.  Some of these strategies work especially well on social media. Nonprofits can adapt and adopt these strategies to thank our donors, volunteers, and supporters.

Danny Maloney, CEO of the social media firm Tailwind, lists “4 Ways to Turn Social-Media Fans Into Raving, Loyal Customers”:

  1. Use a targeted approach.  Find the people who are already talking about you on Facebook, Twitter, and the web at large.
  2. Let your fans know you’re listening.  “If they took the time to share a blog post you wrote or to give you a positive review, be listening for it and thank them.”
  3. Target your special offers.  Businesses give loyalty discounts.  What can you give your most loyal supporters that they would enjoy: a chance to write for your blog? lunch with a celebrity who also supports you? an award?
  4. Curate compelling content.  That’s jargon for finding and sharing information that interests your supporters.  It could be an insider analysis of where their favorite legislation stands in Congress. It could be a video that explains the issue you and they both care about.

Sharing this content with your most loyal supporters makes them feel smarter and happier because they’re associated with you.  It shows them your gratitude. It keeps them coming back to your social media.

And it keeps them advocating for your organization, increasing awareness of you among their friends…who may become your next most loyal supporters.

 

 

Fundraising Tuesday: The Key to Your Donor’s Heart

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IWJ appeal letterA good appeal letter is not about the nonprofit organization.  It’s not even about the impact of its work.  It’s about the donor.

This appeal letter I received from Interfaith Worker Justice is not the ideal appeal letter–but it has one strong point.

The graphic says to the donor, “You are the key.”

The graphic stands out from the text.  It’s even more visible because the envelope bore the same graphic in the same color scheme.  My eye was trained to look for it before I opened the envelope.

“You are the key.”  That’s the message that made me, the donor, want to read the appeal letter, even though it could have been written much more effectively.  It’s also the message that makes a donor want to give.

How are you sending that message to your donors?

 

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