Will your direct mail package ever produce a standing ovation? It might. When you mail an effective invitation to a seminar, workshop, awards show or special event, you literally move people-out of their seats and into yours. That’s one of the hardest jobs in direct mail. Here are 11 ways to boost the success of your direct mail invitations.

SEMINARS
1. If you are offering a free seminar as a way to find planned giving prospects, sell the event, not your charity. Promote the valuable, exclusive information that the prospect will learn at the event.

2. Prove there is no risk to attending by giving away something of value. One software company tested its seminar mailings by offering free software (a $20 value) to half their list. The freebie doubled response.

FUNDRAISING BANQUETS
3. Attract donors to your banquet by giving them what Bob Bly calls a “carry card.” A simple card, mailed with your invitation, offers donors a free gift or chance to win something by redeeming the card at your event.

4. Tease. Indicate that your event will be wacky, fun or entertaining so that your readers can’t possibly stay away.

AWARDS SHOWS
5. Create a memorable theme. The John Caples International Awards show recently mailed me an invitation with the theme: “Why covet a Caples when you can have one?” Good question.

6. Show the view beyond the event. Help readers see themselves not just at the show, but after the show, with an award in their hands.

BEST PRACTICES
7. Create urgency by showing your deadline in prominent places throughout your invitation.

8. Capture the names and addresses of those who cannot attend by offering them something of value (hot prospects shouldn’t be penalized simply because they have a full day timer).

9. Mail more than once, preferably three times in the four weeks leading up to your event. Consider sending an email to your house list, telling invited guests to watch their mailboxes for your invitation.

10. Give guests more than one way to respond (BRE, web, email, phone, fax).

11. Use a checklist to make sure you cover everything in every invitation (such as event name, venue name, location, date, time, directions, early bird deadlines, cost, who to make the check payable to).

I had a client who wanted to drive prospective customers to his online store using a postcard. Great idea, I thought, and cost effective.

He had a terrific product, a compelling offer, and a sound business model. He had just one problem. He wanted to make all website visitors register before they could browse his product catalog. Big mistake.

So I, along with his business partner, managed to talk him out of the idea. And he was glad that we did.

That’s because one of the fundamental requirements of direct mail is that you make it easy for your prospects, customers and donors to respond. The word to remember is “convenience.” You must make responding as convenient as possible. Here are some ways to do that with your donors.

REPLY DEVICE

• Print your donor’s name and address on it so the donor doesn’t have to.
• If your donors must complete part of the card, give them enough space (most direct mail donors are over 60 and can’t read or write without glasses).

REPLY ENVELOPE

• Pay for return postage so your donors don’t have to hunt for a stamp.
• Print your return address on the return envelope.

TEAR-OUT COUPONS

• Place coupons at the outside corners of the page (not in the gutter or the middle of the page), where they are easy to tear out.
• Perforate the edges of tear-out coupons with a fine perf, not a coarse one, so they are easy to tear out.

PAYMENT

• Offer as many payment options as possible without paralyzing your reader.
• Accept all the major credit cards.
• Accept cheques.
• Accept recurring monthly donations.
• Accept donations by telephone (toll-free, of course).
• Accept donations by mail.
• Accept donations on your website.

One of the beautiful things about donating by mail is the convenience. But that is only true if the direct mail donating experience is convenient. Use some of these methods to improve your convenience quotient and your donors will thank you for it—with their gifts.

Learn more

Handbook Number 12
How to Write
and Design Effective Direct Mail Fundraising Reply Devices.
Attract the gifts you need by making the donation process quick and painless for your donors (and you).

Handbook Number 13
How to Increase the Size and Frequency of Donor Gifts with Fundraising Letters.
Tested, proven tactics for raising more money from your current direct mail donors (with their cheerful participation).

The easiest way to encourage a donor to mail you another donation is to thank her properly for her last gift. There are right ways and wrong ways to thank your donor. Avoid these mistakes when mailing your donation thank-you letters, notes and cards.

Mistake #1: Be impersonal
Rather than address your thank-you letter to your donor by name, write, “Dear Friend.”

Mistake #2: Don’t say thank you
Rather than saying that you are thankful for your donor’s gift, say something clear and sincere, such as: “Feelings of gratitude are felt by us regarding the financial contribution made by yourself.”

Mistake #3: Be general rather than specific
Don’t mention the size of the gift ($20, for example). Omit the date that you received the gift. Don’t even call it a gift. I prefer “remittance,” myself. Avoid any mention of the campaign your donor responded to with his gift. Donors are not busy people who need to be reminded that they responded to your appeal.

Mistake #4: Don’t show how the donor’s gift is making a difference
Don’t bother reinforcing in your donor’s mind that sending a gift was a wise investment in the work of your organization. Rather than describe a recent success that was made possible by the donor’s generosity, simply say: “Your gift has been deposited in our general fund.” Or, even better, “Thanks for helping us chip away at our $3.2 million deficit.” You could show in specific, tangible ways, how or where the donors gift is making a difference in the lives of the people that your non-profit serves, but that takes time and mental effort, right? Plus, your board wants you to save money on paper and postage.

Mistake #5: Be thankful for the donation, not the donor
Treat every donor like an automated banking machine. Don’t acknowledge that you value your reader as an individual, a person, someone who supports your organization and believes in your mission. Instead, make no mention of them, and simply say you are thankful for their money.

Mistake #6: Make your thank-you letter a memo from head office
Make your communication one way. You write, they read. Don’t invite your donor to write you, or phone you, or visit your website, or drop by your mission, or in any other way strengthen your relationship.

Mistake #7: Always ask for another gift
Of course your thank-you letter should say thanks. But it should also contain an aggressive appeal for more funds. So what if you cheapen your thanks and offend your supporter? You need their money. So be bold, and hard-sell the request for another gift.

Mistake #8: Strive for banality
Don’t be fresh. Make your letter commonplace. Recycle phrases from all your other thank-you letters. Read your letter out loud to make sure it sounds like it was churned out by a bureaucracy.

If, on the other hand, you want to thank your donors well, do the opposite of this advice.

Handbook Number 3
51 Ways to Write Original Donation Thank-You Letters.
Profit by crafting original gift acknowledgement letters.

To generate more donations from your website, think like Wal-Mart.

If you visit a Wal-Mart looking for a spare tire, you don’t walk in the doors looking for a sign that says “Spare Tires.” You look for a sign that says “Automotive.”

You don’t want “Housewares,” “Fashions,” or “Electronics.” You walk towards the sign that says “Automotive,” and when you get there, you look for a wall of tires. When you see those, you know you’ve arrived. Shoppers who can’t find what they want in one store leave for another. That’s why retailers spend millions of dollars each year on improving their wayfinding, store layout and signage. Walk into a Wal-Mart today and you’ll notice two things about the store layout: 1. Wal-Mart has clearly delineated grocery from general merchandise, and 2. they’ve established strong sightlines into key departments.

Do the same for your donors.

When donors and potential donors land at your website ready to make a donation, they hunt for a button that says Donate. They don’t come looking for a button that says “Support Our Cause,” or “Foundation” or “Donor Links” or “Giving.” They come looking for a button that says “Donate.” Not “Donations” the noun, but “Donate,” the imperative. Put that button where your donors will find it quickly.

And make sure that when someone clicks your Donate button, they’re taken immediately to the Donate page. Don’t take them to one of those pages that says “Why you should donate” or “Our foundation needs your support” or “23 reasons to consider giving to your local hospital.” If they’ve clicked your Donate button, they’re ready to donate. Take them directly to the form where they put in their first name, last name, address, credit card.

And don’t give donors a detour. Don’t take them to Housewares when they want Automotive. Don’t have a distracting pop-up that asks them to take a survey. Take them right to the page where they give you their credit card information.

So put your donors one click away from a donation, since they are already one click away from your competitors. 

Online Fundraising Secrets

Learn the latest tactics for attracting website visitors and raising money online with compelling webpages, irresistible email appeals and engaging email newsletters.

Which would you read first (and right to the end): a typed, generic fundraising letter from the Red Cross or a hand-written letter from your grandma Hostetler in Muleshoe, TX? I’d choose the personal letter over the impersonal every time. And so would your donors.

The secret to making your impersonal fundraising letter personal is personalization. Which is hard when you don’t know your direct mail donor personally. So here are some ways to make an otherwise form letter friendlier when all you know about your donor is their name, address and giving history.

1. Address your donor by name. Only strangers call me “friend.” Friends call me Alan, or Al, or Canuck. I’m more likely to pay attention to your letter when it begins, “Dear Alan.”

2. Avoid formality. While we’re on the subject of appeal letter salutations, use a personal salutation rather than a formal one. Call me Alan and not Mr. Alan Sharpe. If you refer to me by my full name, I’ll think I’m reading a court summons.

3. Thank your donor for their last gift. As Mal Warwick says, every fundraising letter should thank your donor for her last gift. So say something like, “Thank you for your recent donation.” Let your donor know that you know she is a donor.

4. Name the gift month, not the date. Your fundraising software will tell you that Jack Stutzman gave you a gift on 05/23/2010. You shouldn’t. Instead, thank Jack by the month. say something like, “Thank you for your recent gift, which you sent us this past May.”

5. Name their region, not their city. Referring to the city where your donor lives is easy. It’s in your database. You know that. Your donor knows that. So instead of saying, “Living in Saskatoon as you do, I imagine . . .” say “Living on the Prairies as you do, I imagine . . .”

6. Refer to your last letter. A quick way to establish rapport with a direct mail donor is to mention something you said in a recent letter. For example, “When I last wrote to you, back in April, you’ll remember that I described the great need for affordable retrovirals to combat AIDS in Lesotho.”

Learn More

Handbook Number 23
53 Creative Ways to Personalize Your Fundraising Letters.
Build rapport, sound conversational, show interest and strengthen relationships with donors.

A few years ago I sat down with my lawyer to sign my Last Will and Testament. I had never had a Will before, so I hired a lawyer to draft a Will that was clear, expressed my wishes, and would not likely be contested in court. He pushed the completed document across the table for me to review and sign. Everything about the document seemed fine except for one nagging detail. Throughout the document, the lawyer had referred to me as Paul Sharpe. I don’t know anyone by that name. And neither does my lawyer. Once he had corrected his mistake and made the document about me, I was satisfied.

As a direct mail fundraiser, you face the same challenge with every fundraising letter you craft. You must write an appeal that speaks to each reader individually, not to everyone in general. Getting their name right is the easy part. But how do you write one letter to thousands of donors in such a way that each donor reading your letter feels it was written to them in particular?

With a donor picture.

The key to writing one-on-one is to picture the donor you are writing to. Whenever you pen a note to grandma, you picture her in your mind’s eye, and imagine her reading your words. Do the same with your donor. Picture her in your mind.

Mine your database to discover what your typical direct mail donor looks like. Male or female? 25-40? 40-60? 60-80? Presbyterian or Agnostic? Plumber or Lawyer? Hillsburg High or Harvard? Married or single? Republican or Democrat? $25 or $2,500 annually?

Now that you have an idea of what your typical direct mail donor looks like, hunt through some suitable magazines for a photo of that donor. Cut it out. Paste it at the top of a sheet of paper.

Give the donor a name. Write beneath the photo all that you know about her (most DM donors are hers) from your database mining (age, marital status and so on). Beneath that write a brief bio of Emelia Carruthers, or whatever you’ve called your donor.

To get yourself started, ask your imaginary donor these questions:

• Why do you support our charity?
• What prompted you to give your first gift?
• What would make you stop?
• What problem do you want your gift to solve?
• What person do you want your donation to help?

Now write your answers out in the form of a mini biography. Pin this donor profile next to your computer. Next time you sit down to pen an appeal, talk to Paul, I mean Emelia, in a personal, friendly way that inspires her to respond with her heart, and a donation.

Learn More

Handbook Number 23
53 Creative Ways to Personalize Your Fundraising Letters.
Build rapport, sound conversational, show interest and strengthen relationships with donors.

The secret to raising funds online is not Facebook or Twitter or texting or even your website. It’s email. To raise money on the Internet you need the email addresses of folks who believe in your cause and want to see you in their inbox. Here are nine principles to follow in acquiring those addresses.

1. Only add subscribers to your list who have given you permission to email them.

2. Attract new subscribers by offering them regular, valuable content. Before anybody gives you their email address, they’ll want to know what’s in it for them. Tell them. They’ll get a weekly email newsletter, bulletins, alerts, updates or tips on how to manage their health. Offer valuable content in exchange for their email address.

3. Offer a tangible incentive, such as discount coupons or free admission to a special event.

4. Aim to get the email addresses of donors and non-donors, activists and non-activists, members and non-members. Advocates, volunteers, anonymous website visitors and any other non-donors who sign up for your newsletters are prime prospects for donations.

Don’t just concentrate on getting the email addresses for your donors. Try for anybody who could turn into an advocate, volunteer or future donor. The thing to remember is to just be patient. The nice thing about email is it doesn’t cost a lot of money to write to those people over time and encourage them to give a gift. So start off by trying to get the address rather than the donation.

5. Ask for as little information as possible to get their email address. You could simply ask for their email address alone – most of us would be horrified to do that. We’d at least like to know the name of the person. But when you start asking for their name, address, phone number, date of birth and social insurance number, you’re asking for trouble. Ask for as little as possible in order to get their address.

6. Make sure every single message you send to your list is helpful and relevant. Quality, relevant content is the easiest way to keep your subscribers subscribed and encourage them to refer you to others.

7. Don’t rent or borrow email addresses from anyone except the most reputable organizations and list companies in the industry. And, even then, exercise great caution because you don’t want to be branded as a spammer. It’ll put you on the blacklist for a long time and once you’re on, it’s hard to get off. If you’re on a blacklist, obviously you can’t do any email fundraising.

8. When you ask for someone’s email address, describe what you’ll send them and how often you’ll send it. You could even say, “You’ll be hearing from us every Friday,” or “You’ll get our Monday morning bulletin.” Let them know either how often or when they’ll be hearing from you so they’re not surprised.

9. Give your subscribers an easy way to opt out. Make it really simple for them to tell you they don’t want to hear from you anymore. There’s no point building a huge list of subscribers if they simply delete your messages or flag them as spam. I subscribe to a newsletter right here in Canada sent by one of Canada’s largest fundraising newsletter publishers and there’s no way to unsubscribe from it. I have to phone them or visit their website. Nowhere in the emails does it tell you how you can stop hearing from these people. You don’t want to be in that position. People will think you’re trying to make it hard for them to unsubscribe and you’ll spread ill will that way.

Excerpted from Online Fundraising Secrets by Alan Sharpe.

In New York City, publishing capital of the world, lives an unorthodox book editor. He does not read manuscripts from aspiring authors. Instead, he asks the author to summarize the plot in five words. If the author can capture the book editor’s attention with the five-word plot synopsis, the editor reads the manuscript. Otherwise the aspiring author walks home with the manuscript.

You need to do the same with your direct mail fundraising letters. You need to be able to state in five words why a donor should support your cause with a donation, now.

Don’t think it can’t be done. A frustrated potential-bestselling-novelist challenged our unorthodox book editor. “No author can possibly summarize the plot of a 400-page manuscript in five words,” he argued. “I challenge you to summarize Homer’s Odyssey in five words. “OK, replied the book editor. ‘Man returns home from work.’”

Every appeal letter you write has to have a case for support. And that case for support must be clear, compelling, and concise. Clear, not vague or confusing. Compelling, not cliché or predictable. Concise, not wordy. When you can state your case for support in five words (in other words, when you can describe why your cause deserves a donation now), you are ready to write your fundraising package.

Essentially, you are crafting a one-sentence fundraising letter. One that describes your challenge and the reason the donor’s gift is needed right now to solve it. Here are some examples:

• Stand Up for a Child — CASA of Southwest Missouri
• Preserve the Places You Cherish — LandChoices
• Transform Lives Today for Eternity — The Gideons

You can lose a direct mail donation quicker than you think. So your primary goal at the start of your fundraising letter is to demonstrate relevance. You must prove, and quickly, that what you have to say is relevant to your reader. That’s why I recommend you write your copy as though it’s appearing on page one of a Google search results page.

Your donors think in terms of problems, not products. That’s why a teenager doesn’t boot up Google and type “Accutane.” She types “acne” or “acne medication” or “acne treatment.” So think of the keywords that a donor types into Google when looking for information about the problem that your charity solves.

Your fundraising letter needs to have those keyword phrases, not the name of your organization or program, at the top of your letter. You don’t demonstrate relevance by promoting yourself or your brand. You demonstrate relevance by showing donors that you understand their problem. And you do that by talking about their problem in the same language that they use.

How do you know which keywords to us in your fundraising letter to hook your readers? Visit Google. Type in the top keywords associated with your cause or service. Click the Search button. Now pay attention to the hits that appear on page one. These websites are ranked in order of relevance. The most relevant sites appear on page one, starting from the top.

Let me give you an example. My Dad had Alzheimer’s Disease. When I wanted to find information about the disease, its symptoms, its causes and (especially) its prognosis, I typed “Alzheimer’s disease” into Google. The first link on the first page of results was for the Alzheimer’s Association. Highly relevant, you’ll agree, and just what I was searching for. Then followed the pages on Wikipedia that discuss the disease in detail, and the page for the US Government site that does the same.

Here are some of the keywords that appear in the page titles and descriptions for the first two pages of Google hits:

• Alzheimer’s disease
• treatment
• symptoms
• tests/diagnosis
• causes/risk factors
• support and advocacy
• dementia

If you want to earn a donation from me to fight Alzheimer’s, put these keywords throughout your direct mail fundraising package, particularly in your outer envelope teaser copy, letter overline and opening line of your letter. I might not donate, but you can be sure I’ll read every word of your letter, just so long as you prove that you’re relevant in my life, and do so quickly.

Learn More
Breakthrough Fundraising Letters.
How to write direct mail donation request appeals that attract more donors, raise more money, and build stronger relationships. Available in paperback and as an e-book.

A good photograph in a donor newsletter arouses curiosity. If you have a photo of your Executive Director receiving an oversized check from the local Rotary President, that photo will not arouse curiosity. It will stimulate a yawn in many of your readers.

The same goes for the shot of your Campaign Chair cutting the inaugural ribbon outside the new building. Donors have seen that, they’ve done that, they’ve worn the flip-flops.

You need to give your donors something interesting to look at followed by something compelling to read. And when you do that, they will give you their donations. You have to arouse their curiosity.

In the photo above, you’re looking at an example of an ideal photo. This man is Mike Weaver. First of all, who is Mike Weaver? We don’t know. You have to read the article to find out. And I’m curious about Mike Weaver.

The article says “Big Man, Big Heart.” I can see that he’s a big man, but in what way does he have a big heart? I don’t know. My curiosity is aroused. The subhead says “Mike Weaver Proves God is Taking Résumés.” What does that mean: God is taking résumés? That’s an interesting way to put that.

Mike is high-fiving some children, and one of the boys on the left hand side is wearing a kind of cap, the kind of hat that they wear in Peru. There’s also a man in the background, on the left hand side, wearing one of those hats too and one of the ponchos they wear in Peru. So I’m thinking “Oh, this photo looks like it was
taken in Peru.

These children are all happy. Mike is from North America and he’s visiting. But why are they smiling? Why are they giving him high-fives?” It arouses my curiosity in a really positive way.

Arouse curiosity with your donor newsletter photos and your donors will read your articles, be inspired by your mission, and continue supporting your cause.

Learn more

Read Lucrative Donor Newsletters.
Learn how to create, write, design and distribute donor newsletters that recruit supporters, renew donors, retain members, inspire action, build community and raise funds. Learn more at http://tinyurl.com/ygx67e6

Your donor newsletter doesn’t have to be something that you mail to people after they give you a donation. If your newsletter, business model and board of directors allow it, you can use your newsletter as a way to acquire donors. An excellent example is a magazine called Vim & Vigor. It’s 8.5′ x 11”, full color, and actually looks like a magazine. It’s perfectly bound and looks like it could be sitting on the shelf right next to Cosmopolitan at the cash out in a supermarket.

If you look at a recent issue, in the top right hand corner, the subhead says “Touching the Hearts and Health of Our Community, St. Joseph’s Healthcare Foundation.” This is a hospital in the city of London, Ontario. This is a magazine
that gets mailed to people in the community who are donors, and also to those who have shown interest in supporting the organization but have not given a gift yet. You can see a sample of this newsletter/magazine at http://tinyurl.com/ygx67e6. Click the link for Chapter 1.

How long do you leave a contact on a mailing list before removing them? For example, if someone’s been on the mailing list since the inception of the ministry but they’ve never had any contact with monetary support. That’s up to
you. You have to decide if you’re using your newsletter to minister to people.

Some organizations will send a newsletter to people as long as they ask to receive it. Other organizations might be more fiscally responsible and decide they’re not in the business of just giving away information. They need to be responsible with the money they have and so they’ll keep a person on for a year or so and then send them a letter asking “Do you wish to continue receiving our newsletter? Yes or No.” And if they either don’t hear from them or get an answer in the negative, then they take them off the list. But you can do that every year. You can mail a letter to your newsletter subscribers, asking them “Do you wish to continue receiving this newsletter?” And you can clean up your list that way.

Learn more
Read Lucrative Donor Newsletters. Learn how to create, write, design and distribute donor newsletters that recruit supporters, renew donors, retain members, inspire action, build community and raise funds. See Lucrative Donor Newsletters.

Successful direct mail donation letters contain three things: a compelling case for support, a request for funds (the “ask”), and a response device. The case is the Incentive. The ask is the Imperative. And the response device is the Instrument.

The most popular reply device is the reply coupon, that slip of paper the size of a dollar bill that’s found in most direct mail fundraising packages. But today it could also be a landing page on a website. To make sure your mailing generates the kind of response you want—and the number of donations you want—you must have a reply device that is clear, complete, compelling and convenient.

Clear

• stands out in the package and is easy to find
• gives explicit instructions on what the reader must do to make a donation
• has sufficient space for handwriting
• keeps decisions to a minimum (the fewer checkboxes the better)

Complete

• features an ask ladder, such as $50 $75 $100 Other $___________
• offers the two most popular payment methods, cheque and credit card
• includes the complete address and phone number of your organization
• contains an unobtrusive key code so that you can track response
• tells the donor what to do with the reply device (eg. “Return this completed reply device with your donation in the enclosed postage-paid envelope”) 

Compelling

• repeats the case for support and the ask in summary form, usually a sentence
• where possible, shows what the donor’s gift “buys” (eg. $50 Feeds a family for a week  $75 Gives a family a goat $100 Provides enough seed to feed 12 families)
•  includes other incentives to donating, such as a free premium or membership benefits

Convenient

• features the donor’s name and address pre-printed on the form
• has check-off boxes wherever possible
• is postage-paid or features a toll-free number
• comes with a postage-paid business reply envelope

Learn more . . .

Handbook Number 12
How to Write and Design Effective Direct Mail Fundraising Reply Devices.
Attract the gifts you need by making the donation process quick and painless for your donors (and your organization).

I know a man who spent 21 years in maximum security prisons. A product of rape born in an abandoned building, he was incarcerated at age eight into Canada’s most violent and brutal reform school. He became a chronic runaway, then a gang leader, then a drug king-pin. He was addicted to drugs for 20 years. Was investigated for prison murders. And was classified as one of Canada’s most dangerous convicts.

Today, Serge LeClerc is a member of parliament and a sought-after speaker across North America. His story of how he went from lawbreaker to lawmaker is gripping and moving. People listen to Serge because he’s the real article. He has a moral authority that can’t be duplicated or faked. He commands respect and admiration.

Next time you sit down to craft a fundraising letter for your organization, ask yourself if you have someone like Serge who can write it instead. If you are a homeless shelter, do you have a client who can tell her story in her own words and sign her name at the bottom? If you are a university, do you have an alumnus who left skid row with the help of scholarships and graduated suma cum laude and is now a CEO? If you are a hospital, do you have a cardiac patient whose life was saved by your staff?

If your charity has transformed someone’s life, invite that person to write your donors on your letterhead, describing what life was like before you intervened, how you helped, and what life is like now. That letter is sure to touch hearts and move your donors to give.

The main advantage of fundraising letters written by your clients is that they are authentic and gripping. They don’t sound institutional or NGO-ish. The main disadvantage is that your client cannot speak with any authority or credibility about your case for support. Your client can describe how donations helped her leave the streets, get sober and pursue a career in interior design, but she cannot describe your institutional need or what you will do with a donor’s gift. That has to come from the pen of your executive director or board chair.

Another disadvantage of letters written by clients is that they can’t acknowledge a donor’s giving history. A client cannot write, “Thank you for your last donation of $500, which we receive on May 13th.” That would be a breach of confidentiality. And it would sound affected, because it is.

The secret to using first-person stories recounted by your clients is to supplement them with another letter or note from the person who usually signs your fundraising letters. In this piece, the staffer can introduce the client who penned the letter, thank them for doing so, and describe why the donor’s renewed support is needed. This is the letter that makes the ask.

If you’d like to read some letters that are written by clients, buy Over 130 Sample Fundraising Letters.

Over 130 Sample Fundraising Letters.International, national and local charities share examples of their direct mail fundraising expertise.

Your success at online fundraising depends on four words. If you want to acquire members and donors, raise funds and encourage others to advocate for your cause, these four words must appear on your website.

Subscribe
The secret to Internet fundraising is not your website, but email. Your donors won’t return to your website repeatedly anymore than they will read your fundraising letters repeatedly or return to your banquet hall repeatedly. You must give them a reason to return. A compelling reason. And you do that with emails. Emails sent to website visitors who gave you their email addresses voluntarily. The most important job you have as an online fundraiser is capturing email addresses.

Volunteer
I heard of a father who was having a chat with his four-year-old son. “Son,” asked dad, “how come you don’t watch much television? When I was your age I watched TV all day.” The boy didn’t have to hunt for his answer. “Television is so yesterday. It doesn’t do anything.” Your website visitors arrive at your fundraising website or non-profit homepage with their itchy index fingers poised over the back button. They are looking for something to do, something t0 click. Or they’re gone.  They don’t want to sit and read. So unless you give them something to do (complete a poll, sign a petition, give their opinion, refer a page to a friend, volunteer) you won’t attract or keep many donors with your website.

Join
The most important button on your website does not say DONATE.  A donate button is simply the online equivalent of an offline check book. It is the medium, not the message. It is the resource, not the reason. Which means your charitable website has to persuade visitors to become donors. Not just make a donation. You don’t just want donations. You want donors. And your donors don’t want to be treated like Automatic Banking Machines with a pulse. They want to feel that they are joining with like-minded individuals in a common cause. They want to feel appreciated. So you must give them a case for support that stirs their emotions, satisfies their inner skeptic, and motivates them to join your cause. If they feel like they are joining a cause rather than making a donation, they will make the donation.

Watch
Your non-profit website needs more than words on a screen to keep the attention (and loyalty) of today’s donors. Websites that feature short, interesting videos attract more visitors and keep them on the sites longer than static websites that feature words and images only. Same goes for charities that have a presence on Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. They attract more eyeballs.

Naturally, your Internet fundraising site also needs the word DONATE to appear on every page. You can’t raise funds without it. But those other four words are more important. They must come first. In a restaurant, you view the menu, place your order, eat until satisfied, then pay. Restaurants that get the decor, service and food right, make money. And repeat business.

Learn more


Online Fundraising Secrets

Learn the latest tactics for attracting website visitors and raising money online with compelling webpages, irresistible email appeals and engaging email newsletters.

The non-profit organizations who raise the most money online use their websites to engage visitors. This is a vital step in raising money online. It’s not enough just to have a Donate Now button. You have to have a website that actually encourages people to do something on your website and get involved in some way.

Here’s an example from Heifer International’s website. Heifer does relief and development work overseas. If you visit their website, you’ll see a simple navigation bar. You can learn about their WORK. You can GET INVOLVED.

You can GIVE a gift. And you can LEARN more about the people who they help. If you click the GET INVOLVED link, it takes you to a page with the headline, “Get Involved – Help Heifer End Hunger.” And you can see all the ways that you can get involved with this organization.

You can become more engaged with the organization. You can Volunteer, for one thing. You can visit their learning centers. You can Support Partnerships, large and small, to help them achieve their mission of ending hunger around the world. You can even Take a Study Tour where you travel overseas and study the work that they’re doing and the people who they’re helping. You can help them Raise Funds. You can attend a special event, invite a speaker to come and speak to your group. And you can even refer this page (Email Page) or this organization to others that you know. There are lots of ways that you can get involved, and many nonprofits are using websites like this to engage their members and donors.

In the past, in the direct mail arena, the only option like this was Friend-Geta-Friend mailings, where we would encourage recipients of the direct mail piece to pass along a card or a buck slip or ask them to tell their friends about the organization. Whereas, online, you have many, many more creative ways and fun ways and engaging ways that you can spread the word and get your donors involved in your organization.

In North America, households that volunteer give 40% more money per year to charity than households that do not volunteer. So if you use your website to engage your donors, you’ll see your revenue increase over time.

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Online Fundraising Secrets

Learn the latest tactics for attracting website visitors and raising money online with compelling webpages, irresistible email appeals and engaging email newsletters.

Dear Alan,
Do you have any suggestions for the (post direct mail) reminder letter? I would love your thoughts on the letter as well as the donation form.
Thanks, Shannon Brown

Dear Shannon,

Thank you for writing. Just so everyone is clear, we’re talking here about a “reminder letter” or “follow-up” letter that a non-profit mails a few weeks after sending out a major appeal. The reminder letter is mailed only to donors who have not responded to the first appeal, and “reminds” them about the need discussed in the earlier mailing, and asks them to respond with a donation. We are not talking about the typical renewal series that member-based organizations mail to members  to renew their membership. (“This is your final notice: Renew today!”)

Here are my observations about reminder letters:

1. In all of my years writing fundraising letters for non-profits, I have written reminder letters for only one client.
2. Mal Warwick (How to Write Successful Fundraising Letters, Revolution in the Mailbox), Stephen Hitchcock (Open Immediately!), Benjamin Hart (Fund your Cause with Direct Mail), Roland Kuniholm (Maximum Gifts by Return Mail) and other direct mail fundraising experts have little or nothing to say on the topic.
3. Reminder letters are usually mailed by non-profit organizations that mail only once or twice a year. Any organization that mails six, eight or more times in any 12-month period could not send reminder letters because the reminders would arrive in mailboxes days before the next appeal.
4. Reminder letters are most effective when the donor has a plausible deadline to meet, such as year-end or the conclusion of a capital or special campaign.

If you’re going to mail a follow-up mailing, I recommend the following:

1. Don’t mention in your first letter that you will be following up with another letter
2. Keep the letter shorter than the one that it is following up on
3. Mail the reminder letter in a different envelope
4. Tell the donor that the letter is a reminder, that you have not heard from them, and that you need them to respond
5. Re-iterate the case for support
6. Say something original (don’t just repeat the first letter paragraph for paragraph)
7. Go for the emotions
8. Give the donor a deadline for responding, and give a reason for that deadline
9. Write the reminder letter when you write the first one
10. Use the same reply device or donation form, but print across it in bold letters LAST CHANCE TO RESPOND or something similar
11. Mail the reminder letter to your most faithful and most generous donors
12. Decide early on who will not receive the reminder (likely donors whose anticipated gift is not large enough to make the reminder mailing cost-effective)

List cleansing is the process of keeping a mailing list accurate and up to date. The process involves, among other things, removing duplicate records, formatting addresses to postal standards, and updating addresses of those who move.

See more definitions at the Glossary of Direct Mail Fundraising

In list terminology, a cell is a statistical unit or units, a group of individuals selected from a file on a common basis and isolated as a group.

See more definitions at the Glossary of Direct Mail Fundraising

UNICEF outer envelope

UNICEF is mailing a donor acquisition package that is making plenty of recipients furious. I know why. The package is a #10 window envelope that features, peeking through the window, a shiny 5 cent piece. A piece of teaser copy on the envelope points to the coin and exclaims: “This nickel could save a child’s life!”

Inside, sure enough, is a genuine American nickel stuck to the reply device. The letter recounts harrowing tales of dying children who can be saved for only pennies. “Every nickel counts in our battle to save innocent children’s lives!” the letter explains.

On the reply device, the writer asks you to mail the nickel back to UNICEF with your donation as a sign of your support. “It might be enough to save a child’s life!”

In the letter postscript, the writer asks you to mail the nickel back to UNICEF even if you don’t make a donation, “as a sign of your support for children in desperate need around the world—every nickel counts in our battle to save innocent children’s lives!”

This nickel acquisition package is upsetting potential donors because it forces them to ask some penetrating questions:

Q1. “If you at UNICEF can save a child’s life with only a nickel, then why don’t you use the nickel you mailed me to do just that?”

Q2. “If every nickel counts, then why are you folks at UNICEF proving that you have enough nickels already (by mailing hundreds of thousands of nickels to people like me)?”

Q3. “Why are you trying to guilt me into making a donation? Don’t you know that I support because I care, not because I am coerced?”

Q4. Why don’t you pay the postage on your own business reply envelope? Why do you expect me to return your nickel to you on my nickel? Or, to be more accurate, on my 37 cents?”

Q5. “Doesn’t making people hunt for a stamp to put on your business reply envelope almost guarantee those people predisposed to keep your nickel will do exactly that?”

Q6. “If, as I have been told, the response rate for a mailing like this is around 1%, then doesn’t that mean you are throwing away $5,000 for every 100,000 pieces you mail? Why didn’t you save 100,000 ‘children in desperate need around the world’ with that money instead?”

Q7. “If 5 cents is such a big deal, why do you spend more than 5 cents mailing nickels across the country? Aren’t you contradicting your case for support?”

Handbook Number 11
Attract New Donors and Members with
a Magnetic Direct Mail Donor Acquisition Package.
Discover over 75 tips, insider secrets and proven tactics by analyzing a superb donor acquisition package from a national charity.

A Carrier Route is a group of addresses that a mail carrier can deliver to in a single day. Carrier Routes “roll up” into ZIP Codes. There are roughly 15 ZIP Codes per Carrier Route.

See more definitions at the Glossary of Direct Mail Fundraising