Confession: I’ve never been a fan of Greedy Tuesday. There, I said it. And you can see how I’ve said it before in: The True Meaning of Giving Tuesday Giving Tuesday: Don’t Take the Money and Run #GivingTuesday or #GratitudeTuesday? Choose! It’s time for a post-mortem, and some thinking about what you might do better…
Details
This relates to one of Robert Cialdini’s principles of influence and persuasion: “commitment and consistency.”
The main point is this:
Because we are wired to want to be consistent.
That to which we commit, especially publicly, becomes congruent with our self image.
What does this mean for you as a fundraiser?
Details
But it’s not easy for you. It’s hard work. Because, inside the mind of a potential donor, many things are working against you. I don’t know enough about you. I can’t make a real difference. I don’t think of myself as a philanthropist. I don’t know how to evaluate one charity against another. I don’t…
Details
People are unpredictable sometimes. They’re also predictable.
If you see someone yawn, you’re likely to yawn too.
If I tell you seats are limited, you’re likely to purchase a ticket now rather than later.
What if you knew getting people to donate to your nonprofit could be a predictable consequence of something you did?
It turns out you can encourage people to act in desirable ways, simply by applying a few lessons learned from neuroscience, psychology and behavioral economics. The truth is scientists have learned quite a lot over the past few decades. It’s up to us to put that learning to good use!
Alas, as Daniel Pink, author of To Sell Is Human, has noted: “There’s a gap between what science knows and what business does.” This applies to social sector businesses too!
That’s right. Pink explains the most successful for-profit businesses use what science knows to “convert leads to customers.” The secret to more sales is knowing what the customer wants. Your non-profit might convert prospects into donors, and donors into repeat donors, using the very same principle.
The secret to closing more gifts is knowing what the donor wants.
Today I’d like to consider five specific strategies that will help you ethically take advantage of some of the psychology underlying human behavior. Once you understand these principles, you can begin to strategically apply them to your integrated development (marketing and fundraising) strategy. If you’re nervous about this, you can test what you did before against a new strategy informed by science. Break your mailing list randomly in half, send an “A” and a “B” version of your appeal, and see which performs best.
Ready for 5 science-informed strategies?
Details
Years ago I happened on a Forbes article describing 5 Ways to Make a Killer First Impression. LIke a bolt of lightning, it struck me: It’s not only prospective employers or on matches who form an instant opinion of you! It’s also true for prospective philanthropic supporters. You should be dating your donors! Were you…
Details
Philanthropy is a mindset. An embracing culture. A noble value.
Fundraising is a means towards that end. Servant to philanthropy.
Philanthropy, not fundraising.
This has been the tagline for my business and blog since I began Clairification in 2011. It grew naturally out of my experiences working as a frontline development director for 30 years. I’ve always insisted that no single person could possibly receive credit for a donation. “Donors don’t give because of development staff,” I’d tell program staff. “They give because of the great work you do!”
Sustainable fundraising takes a village.
In fact, in my practice I went so far as to develop a point system for major gifts moves management (you can learn about it here) that ascribed many more points for a donor meeting with a program director than one with a development staffer. I wanted to show program staff how much they counted!
Everyone counts.
This is exactly the premise of the groudbreaking report commissioned in 2016 by the Evelyn & Walter Haas, Jr. Fund, “Beyond Fundraising: What Does it Mean to Build a Culture of Philanthropy?.” It was one of three reports centering on confronting chronic fundraising challenges, and showcased the paramount importance of building an organization-wide philanthropy culture as a paradigm for the 21st century. When the report came out, here’s what I said:
Details
I find a widespread misunderstanding about the notion of what constitutes being donor-centered. It derives from two misconceptions:
Both of these rationales short-change your would-be donors.
Why?
FIRST: Donors want to be asked because they’re starved for the love that comes from voluntary giving and receiving. Donors have love to give, but don’t always have an object towards which to direct their affection.
SECOND: Donors need to be asked because when they’re not, they don’t know how much you need their help. Consequently, giving feels a bit empty. Almost a bit like a crap shoot. Donors want to invest their money where they feel confident it will be most appreciated and will do the most good.
Let’s delve into both of these misconceptions more deeply, putting them into a donor-centered context.
In other words, what are your would-be donors feeling?
You must invite your donor into the story.
Take yourself out of the equation.
Donors don’t care about you, but about what they can do through you.
Stop talking about your good work.
Talk, instead, about the good work your donor wants to do.
How?
You’ve got lots of stories. They’re probably interesting enough to grab your donor’s attention. Don’t make the mistake of trying to talk about your entire mission all at once in a fundraising message. It’s too much for people’s brains to absorb.
What you want to do,
Details
“People do not give to the most urgent needs, but rather they support causes that mean something to them.”
This is the finding from a report done by the Centre for Charitable Giving and Philanthropy at the University of Kent: “How Donor Choose Charities.” They begin their study from the widely-accepted premise that charities exist primarily to help needy people and the desire to meet needs is a key criterion in the selection of charitable beneficiaries. Interviews with committed donors found this was not the reason they gave. In brief, the study concludes:
Giving and philanthropy have always been supply-led rather than demand-driven: the freedom to distribute as much as one wants, to whom one chooses, is what distinguishes giving from paying tax. Yet the methods used to encourage donations tend to assume that philanthropy depends on objective assessments of need rather than on donors’ enthusiasms. The tendency to overestimate the extent to which people act as rational agents results in fundraising literature that often focuses on the dimensions and urgency of the problem for which funding is sought. The assumption underlying this approach is that donations are distributed in relation to evidence of neediness, when in fact much giving could be described as ‘taste-based’ rather than ‘needs-based’.
If there was ever a time to commit to finding out more about the folks on your mailing list so you know what floats their boats, this report indicates that time is decidedly NOW. Otherwise, you’re just “spraying and praying” as you buy into the conceit that “if only” folks knew about the need we address, they would give. Because they should. That’s not why folks give.
The truth is people are ruled by emotion more than objective data. We’re affected by stories we’re told and emotions we feel.
The study cites four criteria that influenced donor decision making. Perhaps surprisingly, they are not based on meeting your organization’s or your beneficiaries’ needs. Of course, these things factor in. But only after you’ve captured someone’s attention with something that relates to them and resonates with them personally and met the key influencing criteria.
THE FOUR KEY INFLUENCERS ARE:
Not as much as you might think.
Yet people tell me all the time how much they’re afraid to ask wealthy people for major gifts. If you share those fears, it’s time for a little “Charity Clairity:”
Contrary to what your gut may be telling you, NOT asking is not making would-be donors feel good. Quite the opposite, in fact.
In this article, I’ll let you in on:
Three major donor truths. And I’ll cover why (1) you must stop short-changing your would-be major donors by not offering them opportunities to be the change they want to see in the world, and (2) you must stop robbing would-be major donors of chances to feel good about themselves.
Six major donor triggers. We’ll explore how you can make donors feel so good they’ll want to say “yes” — and passionately — to your solicitation.
Bottom line: When you don’t make donors feel good, they’ll go elsewhere.
F. Scott Fitzgerald is famously supposed to have told Ernest Hemingway “the rich are different than you and I.” “Yes, Scott,” Hemingway supposedly retorted. “They have more money.”
It’s good to remember major donors are, first and foremost, just people.
They may have more money, yet many of them actually don’t even feel “wealthy” (just as often so-called seniors don’t feel “old.”) In fact, a survey of 4,000 investors by UBS found that 70% of people with investible assets of $1 million or more do NOT consider themselves “wealthy.”
What most donors share (no matter their net worth) is
Details