Fundraising needs a new story

I am disappointed that fundraising is receiving such negative press in Australia right now.

My disappointment has brought me here to opinionaid, even though I haven’t posted for nearly two years.

Today Richard Radcliffe is shown making jokes about asking for bequests, including calling people liars.

It has lead me to wonder…

Have I ever seen the heads of advertising agencies appearing on The Gruen Transfer and making jokes about the public they persuade to buy products?

No – they explain their methods and make fun of themselves.

Does Jamie Oliver insult the people he is trying to inspire to cook healthier meals?

No – he finds creative ways to inspire them to change their behaviour.

The problem with the rap that fundraising is getting at the moment is that fools are making it easier to report the story that goes “charities are tricking you.”

The story that should be being told is the hard work that fundraisers put into communicating with good people… people who wish the world was a better place.

Fundraising is not about selling a charity to someone who doesn’t want it. Fundraising is about ensuring the good people of the world can put their wishes into action. And since the world in which those people live is filled with messages about how people can improve their own lives, charities deserve the opportunity to employ fundraisers who can cut through all the noise and inspire more support for those who need help to improve theirs.

I think most fundraisers want the world to accept that what they do is challenging, and that it requires spending money to make money. But that appreciation will not come if there is any chance that people in fundraising are betraying the trust that is placed in them. And putting people down, is betraying that trust.

Most fundraisers agree that providing good customer (supporter) care is important, selecting the right audience reduces waste, and communicating with skill is necessary. Good fundraisers can show how they do that by hiring good staff, adopting good methods, and being creative.

But the reason why that story doesn’t gain prominence in the media is because the fools don’t hold their tongues.

Fundraising is in need of a new story, but surely we can turn our talents to our own plight?

I propose the rest of us adopt and communicate the code of practice by which we want to be judged:

1) I will uncover the stories of those who will suffer without charity.
2) I will present those stories truthfully, to those whom I believe want to be told, and I will convey the urgency with which support is required.
3) I will thank those that support our charity promptly, and share evidence that their support was necessary and effective.
4) To achieve all of this I will never deny that I need to spend money. I will provide an independently audited report that shows the amount I spend, and compares my efforts against a sector wide target to ensure that each dollar spent earns at least two dollars in return.

If we don’t like what is being said, we should change the conversation.

Dan.

I care deeply rather than not at all

I just read this blog and thought I’d share it here.

It reminded me of the trials and tribulations I faced when helping manage face-to-face campaigns for the likes of Christian Aid and NSPCC. We used to get complaints. Some were about the street fundraisers allegedly drinking from beer cans, which were pretty straightforward to address. Others were more subjective affairs. It helped me to realise that:

– Some people will feel bad when they are presented with a need in the world and asked to donate.
– Some people will feel bad when they are presented with a wonderful solution and asked to donate.

I believe these people feel bad because they believe they are being judged as a person. They could donate but they chose not to, and so they are left wondering whether the fundraiser thinks they are a bad person. In extremes, they realise that actually they rarely donate. They always sneer at The Big Issue seller. And they let other parents handle the after school clubs. It’s these people who get pretty riled by their lunch break being interrupted by some “pushy backpacker”.

It’s fair enough really. Turning down another American Express credit card doesn’t really change how we see ourselves. Turning down a social invite from a friend in need can cause our impression of ourselves to drop. Turning down a stranger asking us to help find a cure for cancer…. well that apparently may take us a little closer to being brutal concentration camp Commandants, and frankly few of us like that self-image do we?

It is good to acknowledge all these tangled emotions and perceptions. After all it is because of them, not despite them, that people donate.

Treating Volunteers like poo makes you an arse

Volunteers. Love them or hate them?

Love them of course.

If you let them spend time in or on behalf of your organisation – then you have to love them. If you didn’t really want to use them but you did – tough. You still have to love them.

How do you do this.? Well I have been doing lots of thinking about this and reckon I have an awesome idea. It is called a Volunteer Relationship Management approach. It must be good because it has an acronym already – VRM.

Apparently you can already take courses in it.

Courses… really?

VRM for me is doing a review of my SRM (Supporter Relationship Management) approach and adapting it for Volunteers.

Meet them – make sure you get their details and assign tasks based on what they’re good at and their availability

Understand them – make sure you know why they’re interested in your organisation, and create the relevant feedback communication (guess what – it will probably be similar to the stroy you used in your latest SRM communication).

Value them – Make sure that the tasks are meaningful, appropriate, and that you explain the worth of their efforts to the organiation’s success…. and the beneficiaries. And say thank you. And personalise that thank you.

Remember them – send them an update reminding them what their efforst achieved. And stay in touch with opportunities of how they can help again.

Check out this report on volunteering to get some more evidence of why you should treat your volunteers nicely. More than one third (36%) of volunteers reported they had not had any recognition for their good work in the last month of their volunteering

Honest challenges and hope

Image courtesy of John Hyatt http://johnhyattillustration.com

The advert above is often applauded as a successful advert. It is said that it generated over 5,000 applications for Shackleton’s adventure.

I learnt today that the advert may actually be a fake. Not just the illustration above which is of course fake (the English spelling of ‘honor’ is honour) but in fact that Shackleton may have placed an advert something more akin to:

“Hands wanted for long voyage in small boat. No pay, no prospects, not much pleasure.”

What the fake and the probable original share is raw honesty. Whilst none of us would suggest that charity marketing is full of lies. We should not neglect to tell our supporters exactly what the situation is. For example, if no breakthroughs have been made, we should explain why. Furthermore if we cannot explain why our service works, then we’re clearly not ready to be trusted with people’s money.

What the fake does offer though is hope. It presents the harsh challenge alongside the possible glorious outcome.

Honest challenges and hope – two more ingredients for successful fundraising communications.

Should you give your ‘regular givers’ a name?

I’m often asked whether charities should spend time developing product or campaign names. I believe that the answer is often to consider whether it is a trick question or not!

The question above is of course, a trick question.

If you are going to remember, recognise, and value the support of ‘regular givers’ you are going to need to acknowledge their act of regular giving, and probably their status as a ‘regular giver’.

So… rather than use a piece of unfriendly, generic jargon such as ‘regular giver’ to personalize your communication.. why not spend a little time developing a unique name for them.

Here are some examples… if you would like more details of why I have grouped them the way I have, ask me for my opinionaid!

Group 1: Futuremakers, Full Stop supporter
Group 2: Field Partners, Discovery Partners, Frontline Member, Friend of PAWS, Golden Hearts supporter
Group 3: Human Rights Defenders, Frontline Member, Child Sponsor, Heart Saver, Kennel Sponsor

Can art help charities?

This piece of art was hung in a gallery in Germany in 2006. Amnesty International reported that over 7,000 visitors saw the sculpture in just two weeks.

The clickrates on amnesty-international.de during the promotion were 16% higher than in the previous months, and they received 50% more applications for memberships right after the promotion.

I think it is a wonderful example of engaging an audience with the benficiaries of Amnesty’s work – something that is really hard to do. (See under “Who am I?” for another example)

But as a fundraiser I can see from the metrics that the strategy was to generate PR rather than generate a direct response.

This art (and many other great pieces) can generate attention and interest in a cause… I am interested in whether it can then be stratgecially partnered with elements that generate the act of giving.

Getting over guilt

Advertising here in Australia is sometimes a little blunt. Last century there was “If you drink and drive you’re a bloody idiot”, this year there is an interesting advert which shows women wiggling their little fingers at boy racers as they speed off down the street.

Australians love being direct. I love that.

So it surprises me that there are still some circles that love discussing whether their fundraising makes people feel guilty. After all, every day people are presented with advertising messages where products and services are positioned as the solution to people’s problems:
“If your home is smelly, buy our room deodorant.”
“If your children need answers for their school projects, buy our broadband.”

For charities this approach has been replicated. Step 1 – present someone or something who is in need. Step 2 – present message of “if you want to help that person or thing, donate to us”. For many, this approach is criticised because it encourages the development of a new problem for people:
“If you want to stop feeling bad about these people in need, donate to us.” Or even “Give us the money or the dog gets it”.

What are we worrying about? Complaints? Do you think anyone complains that TV adverts make them feel like they have a dirty house, or that their kids aren’t as well cared for as the Ramsey’s next door? Of course they do. What drives this criticism is a desire to reject the given marketing approach. People do not want to feel bad. So whilst for some the answer is to donate to charity, for others the solution is to criticise the organisation for trying to emotionally blackmail them.

The ethics of this approach has been debated since Dr. Barnardo told how he would have to turn homeless children away if people didn’t donate. I think it is getting boring now. Let’s get direct with people, and get over their guilt.

How can I persuade people to give via my website?

With the growing awareness that average donations online are higher than those from other channels, more charities are focusing on driving traffic to their website.

Research conducted by Amnesty International in the states has focused on investigating what factors influence people who actually arrived at their site. So, instead of focusing on what they needed to change in terms of lead generation, they were examining what to do to improve the conversion rates of the leads generated.

What a brilliant strategy!

The study was conducted with amazing integrity and focus on how o measure the impact of small changes. And their finding was that small changes can make a big impact.

Using a politely worded “ask” compared with a more slogan driven approach had a significant impact on donations.

“Please make a tax-deductible gift today to stop the abhorrent practice of extraordinary rendition”

Yielded a better conversion than…

“Donate Now! Help us end extraordinary rendition!”

They also found that there was no need to be demanding. Using firmer language on the donation button (“Donate Now” instead of “Submit“) did not produce statistically higher
Conversions.

Take a look at the report and consider how you could use the insights to test what works for your supporters.
donordigital_donation_page_optimization_research

Can we turn everyday actions into fundraising activities?

Wary of the “me-too” tag, many marketers often look for a brand new big thing to help their cause raise money.

Be it mobile phone calls, yoghurt bars, or even music downloads, there are a lot of examples.

I am often concerned that the same charities that develop these approaches are neglecting a direct relationship with supporters. And that makes me wonder if they are caught in the fundraising trap of being afraid to just ask for money.

The often cited reason for these approaches, is that they reach new audiences. Which in itself opens up a lengthy debate as to whether charitable giving should be as universally appealing as say baked beans.

This often makes me wonder whether charities should therefore be helping schools and parents educate their children as to the merits of philanthropy, rather than marketing to cynical adult audiences. I know many parents who sponsor children for this very reason, and I certainly remember (proudly) the picture of a Bolivian school child that my mum had framed on our TV, as well as my own typically obsessive collection of WWF-information as a junior member.

I recently learnt of the Tap Project in the US, and realised that it was an example of how with a little thought, the right everyday action can be chosen as the basis for a fundraising activity.

For one week a year, when you visit participating restaurants you can opt to donate to UNICEF a payment for the free tap water that the restaurant would normally provide for free. The money goes towards providing free clean water to children around the world.

The idea is simple and I look forward to it launching here in Australia.

What attracted me to it firstly, was when I heard that this was developed by an ad agency who then approached UNICEF with the near completed idea. As the creator David Droga testifies, he has finally made his mother proud after years of working on beer commercials. Nice to learn that Australia’s biggest ad-superstar (some would say the world’s) is humble enough to admit what his mum thinks of him.

I hope that UNICEF and Droga also have the sense to test ways of trying to develop an understanding of why this approach works, and whether any of the tap water purchasers would actually welcome entering a lengthier relationship with UNICEF.

Visit the tap project.

When should you be quiet?

You are proud of your organisation. You have raised a lot of money over the last ten years. You have secured a new corporate partnership.

You, you, you, you.

Whenever you feel yourself talking a lot about your organisation, stop yourself.

Don’t stop communicating altogether just keep quiet about all that stuff about you.

For the sake of your supporter relationships… try and keep out of the way of the two really important groups. It is very tempting to build your credibility with tales of your history, and information about your structure, but actually the people who care really want to hear about the beneficiaries of your work. They also want to be remembered and valued, so rather than take up their time talking about yourself… talk about them.

Just like in life, it is not always about you.