WAY, WAY BACK, IN KINDER AND GENTLER TIMES, fundraising could succeed by using three little words: “We need help.”
Today? Forget it. If you want to raise funds and don't want to lean on gifts and sweepstakes, you'd better have a reasonable understanding of which words work and which ones don't. Fundraising is a brutal marketplace, a minefield that can blow the rhetorical legs off amateurs and dilettantes.
This was driven home to me when the local chairman of the now-defunct philharmonic orchestra stepped in front of the orchestra, microphone in hand, and addressed the crowd at the last concert of the current season.
“Ummm, this is the biggest organization of its type in the state,” he said. “Ummm, our budget is 10 million dollars.”
No matter what he said after that, he was doomed. He didn't have a fundraising clue. They have a budget of $10 million? That's big business. Why not point out that the orchestra needs $750,000 to keep bringing culture to the community, and if everybody in the audience (about 2,500 people) pitched in with 50 bucks, that's a huge step, one-sixth of the shortfall?
I could see people turning away to make small talk, as he made his final “Ummm, so let's all get together and support this…ummm…wonderful group of musicians.” My wife whispered wryly, “I assume he didn't do well in either Speech or Psychology 101.”
Subsequently, a fundraising campaign successfully resuscitated the “Chorale” that had been an appendage of the philharmonic. Note the logical appeal to guilt and personal image, tailored to prior supporters, sent in a personalized snail-mail letter:
Good morning, Richard.
I have good news. And I'm inviting you to make it better news.
The good news is that we who so proudly served as members of the Florida Philharmonic Chorus have “regrouped” as the Master Chorale of South Florida. Yes, 117 of us will be performing Mozart's beloved “Requiem” at [NAME OF VENUE], [DATE].
You, as a recognized supporter of the musical arts, know how significant it is to restore a classical music organization whose reputation extends well beyond South Florida. The concerts in March are just the beginning, and I am doubly pleased because more than thirty former Florida Philharmonic Orchestra musicians will accompany us. Restoration of our musical heritage is under way!
I'm sure you understand the nature of this invitation. I invite you to renew the support you've shown in the past. (Of course the Master Chorale is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) organization, which means your donation is fully deductible.)
Richard, we don't need millions to survive. We do need the support of concerned music lovers such as you. We're counting on you to keep the dream alive and, in fact, transform “dream” into “permanent reality.” We of the chorale are donating both money and time and take no salaries. Your contribution will help cover rentals, music, and a top-quality conductor.
Won't you please consider supporting the Master Chorale of South Florida? I've enclosed a pledge card. Any amount — anyamount — will help significantly. Because our first concert is scheduled very soon, I ask that you respond as speedily as you can. Don't put this into a drawer, “to get to later.” If we don't have the support of the community, another dream will die. And that could be the end.
Thank you for being a friend of the arts. A double thank you for being our friend and supporter now.
For the Mater Chorale of South Florida,
[SIGNATURE]
P.S. If you'll contribute more than $100, we'd like you to be our guest to hear Mozart's “Requiem” and will send you two tickets to that event. I certainly do look forward to seeing you there.
With even a little perspective, it's easy to see the double benefit of tailoring:
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The appeal arrows itself into the individual's experiential background.
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The requested amount is seemingly nominal, where reciting a total would appear, to many, to be an unreachable goal.
And now for some more examples of what to do and not do in fundraising letters.
A CRY OF WOLF
Is naming a specific total amount of money sound fundraising theory? The individual feels pygmy-like, a dwarf in a land of giants. The Smithsonian Institution sent us a fundraising letter inviting us to “join an elite circle of Smithsonian friends known as Contributing Members. Through their membership, these individuals, from all walks of life and from every state in the union, have taken it upon themselves to help reach an annual goal of raising $12 million in private support for the Smithsonian.”
Hold it, Buster! The implications of joining that “elite circle” are downright threatening, since it's an annual goal. And you put the concept in the past, “have taken” instead of “are taking.” Worse, the statement implies this is a fait accompli, already in existence without me, so I'm just an appendage. And how many of us are there in that Brobding-nagianelite group?
How big a deal would it have been to make the recipient feel involved, to generate a little guilt, to make our dollars seem consequential? Sigh. I guess there's lots of room in the Psychology 101 class.
Written, spoken or screamed (“We need help!”), that was an effective call to action half a generation ago. Today it's burned out. Too many fundraisers have cried “Wolf!” at the same time.
That's just one of the hair shirts professional fundraisers wear as our juggernaut careens through the Internet-driven 21st century. A more serious one is the devolving nature of society itself:
Our targets have neither the attention span their forebears had nor the percentage of time available to us they themselves had even a few years ago. Blame the Web for that one, too.
That means our messages have to either: a) strike home fast; b) grab and shake the reader within his/her own experiential background; or c) both.
I've had mixed luck lately with episodes (“Maria hopes you'll read this letter so one day she will be able to see”). Episodes used to be foolproof. So what has changed? In my opinion it's raw volume. Every fundraiser seems to have a Maria.
But I'll tell you what hasn't changed: Victims outpull success stories. Maria, whose eyes produce only tears, probably will generate more fundraising dollars than Esmeralda, who smiles because her eyes now produce bright, clear images.
What's the difference? A success story can say to the target donor, “We triumphed without you.”
Now understand, please: Generating guilt is not parallel to the old standby “We need help” or its more contemporary cousin “You can make a difference.” The difference between a cry for help and having somebody feel ashamed or conscience-stricken is the difference between helpless casualty and master psychologist.
One area in which success stories wield great power: mailings to prior donors, in which you stroke them for making success possible (“Because of you, she can see”) and present additional problems for the donor to solve.
A March of Dimes radio campaign begins: “This is Kathy Ireland. Help save vulnerable babies.”
From what?
Vulnerable?
Of all the adjectives Webster offers, why pick “vulnerable,” which draws almost no word image? We have “helpless” and “innocent” and “starving” and whatever else might be pertinent to this message. (A bridge player immediately gets sidetracked by the word.)
This parallels the ridiculous mailing of a few years ago which highlighted the non-motivational line, “As the rebels opened fire, the Rwandan children scampered into a ditch.” Can't you see how much fun they're having, scampering? What communications dilettante came up with that one?
Fundraisers know a nasty truth: Nine of every 10 potential donors have a finite amount of money to distribute to all causes. The Smithsonian is competitive with Sloan-Kettering, which is competitive with the American Heart Association, which is competitive with the local library.
The American Indian Relief Council followed contemporary fundraising technique with a “Thank you/Please” mailing. It acknowledged the prior contribution and asked for more: “I know that you have just sent a contribution to the AIRC. But I am compelled to ask — please send another contribution NOW! This emergency is the worst I have seen in all my years in Indian Country.”
OK, two points:
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Don't use the acronym to outsiders. Self-references to “AIRC” transform the group into a business and cool even lukewarm support.
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What's the emergency? Oh, propane fuel costs are high? Sorry, that doesn't qualify as an emergency, especially when the headlines are full of stories about moneymaking casinos and untaxed cigarette sales. If you're going to lean on me, do it with a problem I myself don't have.
A Spartan message has one advantage: It costs less to produce, so the organization can mail more.
Let's suppose you have a tight budget. (Suppose? How long has it been since you experienced anything else?) You can mail 20,000 well-produced packages…or 40,000 bare-bones packages. Typically, for a cause of any worth, more bare-bones pieces in the mail will bring greater response than fewer well-produced pieces.
But careful, please: Too naked an appeal says to the recipient, “You're one of the mob.” The impression that you've blanketed the universe with millions of low-cost mailings doesn't jog the checkbook or credit card out of the wallet.
Our company got a mailing from the local branch of one of America's most respected fundraising organizations. The sender: “West Broward unit.” Opinion: Big mistake. “Unit?” Ugh.
This is the key message:
Your special gift to the Annual Fund is the single most important way you can fight cancer…and save lives. Please give what you can today. Thanks!
( )$200
( )$300
( )$350
( )$___
OK, they've done a couple of things right. They underline each word individually instead of having a single underline for the whole phrase. They say “Thanks!” And they suggest specific amounts.
They've also done a couple of things wrong. They underline too many words, so emphasis is diluted. They're a unit and they treat us as a unit. They don't justify that overused, abused word “important.”
On a separate panel, a brief message tries to humanize the appeal, but the statements are boilerplate:
Your gift is urgently needed today to make sure we can help your friends and neighbors struggling with cancer…expand critically important prevention and early detection programs…and continue the search for new cancer treatments and cures!
“…to make sure we can help your friends and neighbors?” How about my family? That might have struck home. “Expand” is a business term. “Search” is a poor word, especially when “promising research” is right there in the keyboard. This part of the message has a typed-in signature but no written signature — which would have been easy to include because blue is the second color. So attempted personalization becomes impersonal. The impression is one of bulk, not individual. But they didn't ask me.
This is an excerpt from “Hot Appeals or Burnt Offerings: Do's and Don'ts for Twenty-First Century Fundraising,” by Direct columnist Herschell Gordon Lewis. It is published by Racom Communications (www.racombooks.com).
