New Features Archives

Donors are the lifeblood of any nonprofit organization, and their value cannot be overstated – but it can be calculated.

Many fundraising and nonprofit professionals like to think that their job is different and distinct from that of people who work in sales and marketing – and in some ways it is – but the truth is that like any other business, your non-profit cannot survive without its customers: your donors.

And just like any other business, your average donor’s lifetime value can be calculated: How much do the average donor donates to your organization, multiplied by your organization’s average retention rate. For example, if your donors donate an average of $800, but you lost 70% of your donors every year, you’ve got a problem.

For more on donor retention, and why it’s important, check out our posts about what retention is, why it’s more important than donor acquisition, and how to improve it.

The key to increasing donor retention, however, is first and foremost to understand why your donors are leaving.

Donors stop donating to charitable causes for all sorts of reasons, from a change in their employment status to a change of their zip code, but many of the most common reasons are within your control.

Donors stop donating when they lose confidence in the organization. Most often, when they’re left unengaged, they don’t feel that they are familiar with the names and faces in charge of the causes to which they give. People buy from people, and donors are no exception.

Donors also end their charitable gifts when they feel that the organization doesn’t need them any more. Check out this post about how forgetting to say “thank you” can lead donors to believe that they’re an unimportant or insignificant part of your donor base – just another face in the crowd – and therefore they should probably give their gift to a cause that needs them more.

You may also find that your donors are no longer donating because the cause is no longer personal for them. Perhaps they were once touched by a campaign or project that you were undertaking, but now they feel that your organizational priorities have since shifted. It is on you to make sure that you know your donors, know what is important to them, and make sure that they continue to feel connected to the work that you’re doing. Have a quick look here at how personal and specific thank-you cards go a lot farther than form letters or template emails.

Finally, donors may simply forget about you: It seems hard to envision, since you wake up in the morning, drive to your office, spend all day thinking about your charity or foundation, spend your evenings and weekends at events and galas for your charity and foundation, and never really stop thinking about how to make an impact, but if you don’t make an effort to keep your organization top-of-mind for your donors, they can easily forget to renew their pledge. That’s why a handwritten note of gratitude, or a personalized engagement letter can go a long, long way.

It may seem painful, with such tight budgets, to invest in donor engagement and retention – after all, acquisition is the sexy step-sister of donor stewardship; but what good are one-time donations if you’re trying to build a sustainable organization that can continue to do good in the world. You need your donors to donate more and more, again and again, and to tell their friends as well (feel free to peruse this nifty post about how to drive referrals).

If it seems painful for you to spend on engaging, thanking, and retaining your donors, imagine how painful it is for them to find room in their budgets to donate to your organization; everyone knows that when the economy takes a downturn, charitable giving takes the first and biggest hit.

To build a strong, sustainable fundraising machine that can survive any economic condition, just remember why donors leave in the first place:

They lose confidence in the organization, because they no longer feel connected to the management team, or the individuals who brought them through the door in the first place.
They feel the foundation, charity, or NFP doesn’t need them any more, and redirect their dollars to a cause that does.
They lose their personal connection to the cause; fundraisers don’t know them as anything more than a name on a call list, or a dollar amount, and so they don’t know how to nurture that connection. The personal touch is missing.
They simply forget about the organization, or forget to renew their pledge, and no amount of emails that go straight to their spam filter is going to remind them.

Knowing why your donors leave is a great first step towards ensuring that they never do. Great fundraisers understand that donor retention is within their control, if they’re willing to spend the time, money, and effort to manage relationships and engage their donors.

Want to level up your direct mail? Contact us.

So you’ve decided to send thank you notes to your donors and volunteers.

Good call!

There are few combinations of words more powerful than “Thank You.” Letting someone know that their gifts or deeds not only contributed to a good cause but also inspired personal gratitude in the recipient is the simplest way to ensure that they feel unreservedly good about the time or hard-earned dollars that they’ve parted with.

Now that you’ve decided to undertake this simple but important step, here are 5 tips to help you pack as much punch as possible into a short expression of appreciation:

1) Make it Physical

The fastest way to take the wind out of the sails of your thank-you note is to email it to the recipient.

There’s a good chance they’ll never receive it. Their spam filter may consider it junk mail.

You lose all of the emotional effect that comes with holding something physical in your hands. A nice, physical, handwritten card triggers feelings of reciprocity. When is the last time that you printed off an email and put it up on your fridge? If you’re anything like the vast, overwhelming majority of people, the answer is, “never.”

When you send a handwritten thank-you card, your recipient knows that you took the time to not only think of them, but also to physically write out an expression of your gratitude, transforming thoughts into words, and words into something physical.

Everyone knows how easy it is to send an email; the recipient may assume (sometimes correctly) that they are one of dozens, hundreds, or thousands of people that you thanked simultaneously with the click of a button.

Conversely, even if you use a service like Postalgia to send handwritten notes with the ease of an email, the recipient will believe that much more work went into creating a beautiful expression of your gratitude.

2) Make it Personal

People buy from people. Products don’t sell themselves, and donations to non-profits are much the same.

Don’t be afraid to get personal in your thank-you note to donors and volunteers. Tell them how much you, as a fundraising professional, appreciate their donation.

Donors like to know that their gift did not go unnoticed into the coffers of some faceless organization. Volunteers whose efforts are ignored or lost in the crowd will quickly become ex-volunteers. Both donors and volunteers who know that they are being personally acknowledged by someone at the organization are more likely to give their money and/or time again and again, and in larger amounts.

Use their name, make specific reference to their gift or act of volunteerism, and include any other pertinent personal details that readily come to your mind (or your donor management database) such as their spouse’s or childrens’ names, the last event they attended, or something that your organization does about which they’re particularly passionate.

Postalgia empowers you to drop variables into each card, so that even if you would like to use a tried and true template (or one that is pre-approved, for that matter) as the framework of your card, you can easily personalize each and every one.

3) Make it Snappy

Mark Twain once wrote, “I didn’t have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one instead.”

It’s true that consolidating your thoughts into a brief note is more difficult than writing a long-winded essay, but your recipients will read and cherish every word if you keep it short.

The longer the letter, the less likely the recipient is to retain the information in it. No matter how excited they are when they first rip open the envelope to reveal a handwritten thank-you card, their excitement will quickly turn to distraction as their eyes glaze over halfway through the 4th paragraph.

Remember: You’re writing a quick and powerful expression of gratitude, not the next great American novel. If you want to be great at the former, leave the latter to Mark Twain.

4) Make it About Impact

Donors especially want to know details about where their dollars are going, not only as a matter of fiscal prudence (to ensure that your organization is acting with integrity and honesty), but also because of the innate human aversion to unfinished stories.

If they wanted mystery, they would throw their dollars into a wishing well and pray for an end to Tuberculosis in Africa.

Give your donors what they want: specific, measurable details about the impact that their gift has had on the lives of the people who have benefited from it. Use hard numbers. Tell real stories. Don’t just tell them that you’re grateful; tell them exactly how they’ve had an impact, and you can be sure that they’ll want to keep on having it the next time you ask them for a contribution.

5) Make it Selfless

A thank-you note is not an opportunity to ask for more money or time.

The quickest way to ruin a note of appreciation is to try to save money on postage by including a solicitation at the end.

It’s true that one of the best ways to measure the extent to which your donors are touched by your gratitude is to watch their dollars roll in with greater frequency and in larger amounts, but make sure to keep your gratitude and your solicitations separate.

Otherwise your note seems self-serving, and all the effort you put into generating goodwill and feelings of reciprocity is ruined.

To re-cap, there are 5 key ingredients to a powerful thank-you note:

1) Make it physical – don’t send an email when you should be sending a handwritten card.

2) Make it personal – donors and volunteers can smell a form letter from a mile away.

3) Make it snappy – losing someone’s attention is a quick way to lose the power of the note.

4) Make it about impact – remind them that they’ve done good in the world, and detail how.

5) Make it selfless – Don’t ask for more money or time while thanking them for their generosity.

Want to level up your direct mail? Contact us.

Category: New Features

Why Donors Stop Donating

How to be Great at Gratitude – 5 Tips for Brilliant Donor & Volunteer Thank-you Cards