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How big is your donor?

Along with the World Cup (depending on the team, of course), we celebrate fund raising achievements. We look at results and trends from last year and partly with a sigh of relief and hope for this year: in 2013 in US charitable giving was at the same level it was before the financial crisis and in UK there was an £800m increase in donations. So, why we shouldn’t do better this year? In reality we should also ask ourselves if this is the result of more people giving or if we are simply fishing in the same pond with a lower offer. Mark Astarita, the fundraising director of British Red Cross and outgoing chair of UK Institute of Fundraising, simply put it “Over 30 years of professional fundraising have we grown the pie, are more people giving? I’m not so sure.” And Ken Burnett argued that the actual costs of acquisition with typical low retention rates are not sustainable and charities would be stupid if they don’t take action to avoid eating their seed corn. (more…)

In the realm of fundraising senses – 1 Touch me right here!

Budweiser Superbowl HorsesRecently I had the fortune to work with Dan Hill one of the worldwide gurus on emotions applied to marketing. Dan advises the top Fortune 500 companies and political candidates on how to effectively advertise and succeed using emotions. What surprised me talking to Dan is how advanced commercial marketing is compared to fundraising. They understand better how the brain functions (specifically how to use emotions) and are using neurosciences to develop relevant messages and tactics to sell more sodas, shoes and beers. (more…)

The Big Chill: can we cure donor’s emotional breakdown?

We had all hoped it would go better with time and we tried to ignore it. But the disease is still here, how is it possible?  Is it me or is everyone experiencing the same? Everybody is tweeting and blogging about this virus eating away our income and infecting our database (among many see  Roger Craver and  Tom Belford and also the rants from Lucy Gower and Reinier Spruit). Notwithstanding the ‘prescriptions’ on donor’s loyalty and relationship by Adrian Sargeant and Ken Burnett we still sadly look mainly at the numbers: call it retention or attrition, loyalty or stewardship, donors are leaving us. (more…)