digital fundraising

In the last podcast of the year, we take a look at 3 things nonprofit leaders should do more of in the New Year to grow the value of their donor file.

They don’t require you to completely change the way you do things. In most cases, they simply require you to prioritize your time and resources in a slightly different way. 

You might be weary and worn out from this year. Some of you lived through layoffs and budget cuts. 

You lived through having to keep the doors of your nonprofit open to help those who rely on you — all while struggling to raise funds in a way you’ve never had to before. 

But take heart. You've made it. 

So allow yourself a moment to feel proud about what you’ve achieved. And allow yourself a moment to just breathe and rest up a bit.

Then start making a plan on how you can implement these 3 things in 2021 to raise more money, from more donors, more often. 

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A lot of direct response fundraising advice focuses on creating effective strategies, messages and donor journeys — but we rarely talk about the design of our fundraising.

In fact, many organizations outsource the design of their fundraising to graphic designers who know a lot about how to make things look pretty, but know nothing about fundraising or how donors make decisions.

The truth is, good fundraising design is less about how something looks, and more about how something works.

To help us design fundraising materials and assets that get results, we’re talking with John Lepp from Agents of Good. 

John is a direct response marketing and design expert with over 20 years of experience working with charities across Canada and around the world. 

In our chat, we focus on how you can use design to best present and support your fundraising messages for maximum effect.

Today we’ll cover:

• [6:22] The objective of design in fundraising
• [9:43] What does a great outer envelope look like?
• [13:01] The best direct mail pack Mike has ever received
• [14:01] How donors read your letters
• [16:55] What to do and what to avoid in a letter
• [24:27] Giving donors an opportunity to share
• [28:07] What’s more important: your brand guide or personal connection?
• [32:56] What a good reply form needs
• [37:30] Always add another piece to your mail
• [40:43] John’s encouragement for nonprofit leaders

John would love to connect with you. You can find him on Twitter or on the Agents of Good website.

Please consider subscribing to, rating, or sharing the podcast on your preferred platform. You can do that by clicking here. 

To take advantage of our free resources and get your 5-minute fundraising fix, visit:

fiveminutefundraisingfix.com

Every day the human brain makes tens of thousands of decisions — most of them quickly and effectively, but not always rationally. And that can have a big impact on your fundraising.

Today, we’ll learn from Dana K. Segal how donors make decisions, and how the science behind behavioural economics can be applied to improve your fundraising.

Dana is a senior partner consultant at the Management Centre. Her consultancy portfolio includes NGOs across the UK, Europe and Africa. She has delivered decision-science training for clients that include Oxford University, RNLI, and MSF International. 

On today's podcast, Dana shares five heuristics — or tools — the brain uses to simplify its decision-making process. Along the way, you'll learn how you can use these tools in your own organization’s donor communications to raise more money,

Applying these principles can lead your donors toward greater generosity, so make sure you have a notepad and pen as you listen to this episode.

Today we’ll cover:

• [6:07] - What decision science and behavioural economics is
• [10:44] - How decision science serves ours donors
• [11:44] - The ethics of decision science
• [15:10] - What we know about how people make choices
• [17:04] - What is a heuristic and how do they drive decision making? 
• [18:36] - Heuristic #1 - Perceived effort
• [25:06] - Heuristic #2 - Social proof
• [32:02] - Heuristic #3 - Defaults
• [34:20] - Can this backfire on your organization?
• [38:07] - Heuristic #4 - Loss aversion
• [43:04] - Heuristic #5 - Messenger

Dana would love to connect with you. You can find her on Twitter and learn more about her work  in decision science and behavioural economics here.

Join in our mission to help others build good in the world by rating and sharing this podcast on all major platforms. You can do that by clicking here.

https://www.buildgood.org/

fiveminutefundrasingfix.com

Multi-channel fundraising — the concept that we should cultivate donors across as many channels as we can — gets talked about a lot.

And for good reason. The data shows that multi-channel giving is the best way to grow and maintain revenue.

But high-quality multi-channel communication is hard to do. So what exactly are nonprofits doing in their marketing to truly be multi-channel — and do it well?

To help you figure out what works, and what other organizations are doing, today we’re talking to Brady Josephson about new research on the sate of multi-channel donor communications.

Brady is the vice president of innovation and optimization at NextAfter — a research lab and consultancy.

Earlier this year, Brady and his team spent four months tracking and analyzing the giving experience of multi-channel fundraising from more than 100 different nonprofits. They gave individual gifts to each organization, and gathered all their insights into a new study they’ve just released. 

Today, Brady will share some of the most important takeaways from his research, and give you tips to help you in your own efforts so you can maximize your multi-channel fundraising potential.

Today you'll learn:

• [5:23] - Why Brady and his team focused on multi-channel fundraising even though the nonprofit world talks about it relentlessly
• [11:52] - The key data points they tracked during their research
• [16:50] - What the research revealed about how nonprofits actually approach multi-channel fundraising
• [18:40] - How caring for smaller-level donors impacts your overall fundraising goals
• [22:56] - The importance of stewarding offline donors well
• [26:53] - How nonprofits subconsciously end up treating online donors better than offline donors
• [30:35] - The glaring lack of phone follow ups from nonprofits
• [32:37] - How a phone call touch point impacts a donor's giving
• [37:54] - Practical ways nonprofits can improve their multi-channel communication
• [40:34] - The impact that social ads make on fundraising

Brady would love to connect with you. You can find him on Twitter and Linkedin. Learn more about his work at NextAfter and check out the research talked about on this episode at multichannelnonprofit.com.

This episode brought to you by fiveminutefundrasingfix.com and BuildGood. 

We live in the golden age of fundraising. 

With so much software, technology and tools at our disposal, it's never been easier to capture the attention of donors, reach new audiences and generate revenue.

And yet, fundraising performance as a whole remains largely stagnant. 

Can relying too much on technology actually hinder our ability to make meaningful and personal connections with donors? 

On today's episode, we'll hear from Steven Shattuck on how you can have the best of both worlds: strong relationships with your donors that rely on personal touches and helpful digital tools to improve your systems and processes. 

Steven is the chief engagement officer at Bloomerang, a donor management software that focuses on donor retention. He is a prolific writer and speaker who curates Bloomerang’s educational and research content.

His latest book, "Robots Make Bad Fundraisers: How Nonprofits Can the Maintain Heart in the Digital Age" was released earlier this year, with the goal of making digital fundraising more human. 

Today we’ll cover

• [4:45] - Why Steven, an exec at a tech company, wrote a book warning us to not rely too much on technology
• [8:02] - The reasons giving has remained stagnant even though technology has us in the golden age of fundraising
• [11:01] - What donors want, what they respond well to, and how technology can meet these donors needs
• [13:45] - What human-centered philanthropy looks like in practice
• [19:44] - How nonprofits should use donor data to create more human moments, interactions and connections with donors
• [25:53] - The role of mass emails in your fundraising efforts
• [30:18] - How you can make a mass email more personal
• [34:11] - How to make a giving page attractive and user-friendly
  [40:36] - What to include on your post-donation page

Steven would love to connect with you. You can find him on Twitter, LinkedIn, and learn more about his work at Bloomerang 

Join in our mission to help others build good in the world by rating and sharing this podcast on all major platforms. You can do that by clicking here 

Get FREE access to the 5 Minute Fundraising Fix by going to fiveminutefundrasingfix.com

"[Artificial intelligence] helps you understand when and how much to ask from your donor base."

If you knew every donor's next gift date and amount, what would you do with that information?

Wes Moon, COO and Co-founder of Wisely, is an expert in artificial intelligence, and he knows exactly what you would do with it. In fact, Wisely's machine learning can help you break donors into portfolios and plan for how and when to not just facilitate predicted donations, but also grow those donations (by predicted amounts, natch.)

Wes also puts us on notice: truth is in the data of the beholder, so charitable organizations are the perfect champions of accuracy and integrity as we feed the machine brain. 

Chris Hammond, CEO of Corporate Giving Connection, breaks down his method to peer-to-peer maximization in a personal CEO-to-CEO conversation with Funraise CEO and Co-founder Justin Wheeler. 

Chris takes us down both personal and professional roads—his path to CEO-status is strikingly similar to Justin's—and addresses the challenges that Black men in America face building businesses. 

He also gives compelling reasons to layer your peer-to-peer tactics, including all the non-digital tricks you've developed over the years.

In this webinar, you'll hear from Chris...

• How peer-to-peer can do more than just stand the test of time
• Examples of successful blended P2P campaigns
• The most valuable 10 minutes of research you'll spend
• Why messaging matters when you're talking fundraising success

You may just find that layering the best of off-and-online P2P tools leads to a whole new world of digital fundraising. 

Check out Chris and CGC at https://cgcgiving.com/

A conversation with cultural fundraising consultant and director of Apollo Fundraising, David Burgess. We talk about the state of digital fundraising in the sector, inter-departmental collaboration, the importance of human connection, behavioural psychology and much more.

The Digital Works Conference will take place on the 24th and 25th of April at the Leeds City Museum. Find out more and book your tickets at thedigital.works

When Sarah Lee, told Funraise CEO Justin Wheeler, "Bold ideas attract bold people," she was talking to the right person. As an experienced fundraiser and nonprofiteer used to swinging for the fences, Justin constantly champions innovation above all.

And now, with COVID-19 affecting economies across the globe, nonprofits everywhere are asking the question, "How can my nonprofit make it through the Coronavirus crisis?"

Listen in on Justin and Sarah's interview and then brainstorm with the experts in a live Q&A session directly afterward.

Nonprofits are no stranger to bringing the best possible outcomes out of bad situations—often with nothing but a wish and duck tape.

COVID-19 is next-level stuff, though. And since it's possible that the changes to... everything we know about everything we do (!) have you stressed, Funraise CEO Justin Wheeler and your dynamic digital godmother Kishshana Palmer are here to offer assistance and encouragement (and maybe deep breathing.) 

Let these experts walk you through the best way to manage through the mayhem and transition your nonprofit's fundraising strategy into the digital realm while keeping your fundraising revenue on track.