Future Fundraising Now

What’s wrong with these puppies?

Yesterday, I included this photo of three happy puppies. If you saw it, you may have had a moment of feeling a little creeped-out by it:

There’s something slightly wrong with these puppies. Their eyes are oddly glowing, yet lifeless. Their tongues look more like slabs of bubble-gum than doggy tongues. Something about the combination of focus and blur, the slight asymmetry, the indeterminate edges of their faces...

It’s unsettling.

Why?

Because AI.

I asked Craiyon, a free online AI image generator, to create a photo of “three happy puppies.” And it did. Sort of.

I needed a picture of three puppies, and I didn’t have one. So AI made one for me. But I wouldn’t recommend using this image in real life. Because it’s creepy.

But you and I both know that anything digital is going to get better. And quickly.

AI-generated images are already less creepy and more realistic than they were last time I looked into them just a few months ago. Back then they were surreal and hilarious. Now they’re just sort of uncanny. Eventually: hard to tell from real photos.

But there’s something else to consider. You might be tempted to have AI create an image of people ... because you don’t have the image you need. Or the need to respect real people’s privacy makes real photos impossible.

So you could instruct AI to give you a photo-like image of Rohingya refugees in camp, mother and baby, smiling. You could be as specific as you need to be. And you’d get something.

But not a real person. A totally made-up image. It may have the elements you need to give your audience the human experience you want them to have. But it wouldn’t be with actual humans.

Would that be ethical?

I don’t know. But it feels borderline at best. It seems at the very least, AI-generated images should be identified as such.

Think about it, because it’s likely to be an issue for you eventually.

You’re doing everything right, but donors aren’t responding! [Newsletter Tuesday]

Newsletter Tuesdays: A series about doing more with your donor newsletter.

You’ve been paying attention. Your donor newsletter is really focused on donors, making clear the impact their giving has.

It’s not a brag-fest about your organization and staff, but squarely aimed at the impact donors make by giving.

You’re telling human stories about transformation, not shoveling statistics at your donors.

Your writing is clear, readable, and free from jargon. You really work to make everything relevant and interesting to your donors.

But response is low.

How can that be? Isn’t there a “formula” that makes donor newsletters “work”?

Here’s one possible reason: The stories you tell have little tension, no surprise, and lack a story arc.

You may be getting it half-right for a donor newsletter -- the half that clearly connects the story to the donor and their giving. But the other half isn’t quite there: The storytelling part.

Here’s what I mean. See if this looks familiar:

• Headline: Your generous giving saved 3 puppies
  
• Lead: Thanks to your kindness, three puppies found wandering along the freeway in a snowstorm have found forever homes with loving families.
  
• The bulk of the article is about the wonderful things that happened when the puppies were brought into the shelter and then adopted. There are a few details about what happened to the puppies before the rescue.
  
• Conclusion: Your kindness touches the lives of so many puppies and other companion animals. In the last month alone, more than 100 dogs, cats, and other species were rescued from suffering or death. Thank you for caring about our furry friends!
  

Okay, I just made this up, but it looks like a good story, clearly connected to the donor. But there’s a problem: It’s not very interesting.

Because there’s no story arc, no progress from before to after.

It’s not quite a story.

The story-ness of a story is the part that’s easy to forget when you’re working to connect donors to outcomes. You know the purpose of a donor newsletter is to let donors know that their giving accomplishes what you said it would accomplish.

So you think the story is “here’s something you helped make possible.”

But by itself, that’s not a story. At least, not the kind that will entice a reader to drop every other thing they’re doing to read.

To get their attention, you need to tell a story.

With a beginning, middle, and end. A before and an after.

With an arc that goes from a start to a crisis, to a solution.

If your story is a notice that the donor’s giving did something good, you’ve done half of the job. The other half is to capture their attention, their time, their fascination, and their heart by telling an incredible story.

More Newsletter Tuesday posts

Ways to raise more money with your donor newsletter

Wondering if you’re doing your donor newsletter right?

Here’s some useful information from the BDI Blog: Nonprofit Newsletters 101: Why less is really more.

It outlines a series of changes made to an organization’s donor newsletter:

1. Limit the number of newsletters -- from 5 a year to 4.
   
2. Change mailing months. Instead of February, May, July, September, and November, March, June, September, and November.
   
3. Reduce the number of pages and colors, from 6-page, 4-color (with a Holiday issue that was 16 pages) to 4-page, 2-color newsletters).
   

These changes yielded a significant jump in net revenue, partly from lower costs (one fewer issue and simpler specs), but mostly from increases in giving.

My thoughts on these things are only slightly different:

1. Number of newsletters.I’ve worked with organizations sending anywhere from one per year to 12, with the large majority sending two to four. Different donor files have different “sweet spots” for the “right” number of newsletters. If your newsletter is doing well, add one more to your calendar. If you’re doing poorly, remove one. Repeat every year until you discover your sweet spot.
   
2. Mailing months. I suspect this also varies for different organizations.
   
3. Pages and colors. My experience accords very much with this recommendation, across many organizations. Testing has usually found 4-color and 2-color to be equally effective. But the number of pages is very important. And surprising. Newsletter longer than four pages are less effective. And the longer they are, the worse it gets. And a 2-page newsletter (that is, front and back of a single sheet) works just as well as (sometimes better than), a 4-pager.
   

We’ve only touched on the physical aspects of a newsletter here.

Content matters too. But that’s a longer discussion. Dig in by reading the book Making Money with Donor Newsletters by Tom Ahern.

May Flowers: Top 5 blog posts of the month

Here are the 5 most-read Future Fundraising Now blog posts in the month of May:

1. What’s a bad photo for fundraising effectively?

2. 4 ways to pick more effective photos for fundraising

3. Don't snub donors with the Myth of Self-Sufficiency

4. Principled or stupid? 4 questions to ask yourself

5. When you can’t face writing: 5 tips

Looking for some really good (and specific) advice for your fundraising? Book a FREE consultation with Sean Triner of Moceanic. Sean knows his stuff, and can help you find your way forward.

5 tips for overcoming distractions that crowd out your writing

Distraction is the enemy of creativity. Especially writing, which seems to attract distraction like a magnet attracts iron shavings.

Two frightening facts:

1. The average person is distracted every 40 seconds when working at their computer.
   
2. On average it takes more than 23 minutes to get back on task after these interruptions.
   

That’s not good!

Here are some ways to beat writing distractions, from the Publication Coach Blog, at How to harness the power of distraction free writing:

1. Reduce your goals. Make your goals smaller, more reachable. Too-big goals can become barriers that invite distractions.
   
2. Write first. Write in the morning, before you do other things. For many people, those first few hours of the day are when we can best stay on task.
   
3. Do your research before writing. Separate research and preparation from writing. When you do this, the endless rabbit-trails of research won’t bother you while you write.
   
4. Turn off your technology. Shut down all the conveniences that interrupt you, like your phone, or those tempting little beeps when emails arrive. It can all wait. Many of our tools now have distraction-free modes, and there are also apps that can give you the quiet you need.
   
5. Find an accountability partner. Knowing you’ll have to report your progress to a human being can really help you stay on task. Find a partner or a group that can be that for you.
   

Why your nonprofit newsletter is a waste of your money and everyone’s time [Newsletter Tuesday]

Newsletter Tuesdays: A series about doing more with your donor newsletter.

Is your newsletter a success?

Most nonprofit newsletters are not. They’re a waste of money. They aren’t worth doing, because they don’t generate short term revenue or long-term donor retention.

Why?

It’s most likely a combination of two factors:

1. It’s irrelevant

I have difficult news for you: Your donors don’t give to support your organization. And they don’t give to fund your important and excellent programs.

They give to make the world a better place.

They want outcomes. They aren’t that interested in activities.

So if your newsletter is all about your organization and your activities, it’s irrelevant to them.

You might as well be writing about the commodity prices of copper. Yawn.

Don’t get me wrong: Your activities are very important. They are the center of your organization. They make your outcomes happen.

But for all but a very few of your donors (staff, board members, and maybe your mom), your activities not the point. All your brilliant reporting about activities and other insider information is essentially noise to your donors.

They aren’t paying attention. So they aren’t responding.

2. It’s boring

Irrelevancy is boring, so if you get relevant to your donors, you might solve the boring problem.

But there are other ways to be boring beyond irrelevance:

• No stories.
  
• No drama
  
• No humanity
  
• Uninteresting images
  
• Headlines that don’t draw readers in.
  
• Statistics that people don’t understand or care about.
  

Being boring is your enemy. It not only gets you nowhere ... but it “trains” your readers to think of everything you send them as boring.

Make sure your newsletter is relevant and fascinating.

Zen and the art of fundraising -- and you

You've probably heard the old Zen saying,

"When the student is ready the teacher will appear."

You've probably experienced it in your life. I certainly have. You develop an interest in something, or a need for some kind of knowledge -- and almost immediately a person shows up in your life who not only has exactly what you need, but they're also willing to help.

It's so clear and pronounced that it seems like magic -- or a divine gift.

It's as if your need, your curiosity, somehow sends out a silent message that is heard by the teacher you need, who obeys the call and appears to you with amazing speed.

I think what makes it happen is this: We're constantly being exposed to various "teachers" of various things. But most of the time, we're not awake to what they have to offer; we don't know or care enough to perceive the potential gift that's in front of us. Until something happens within us that awakens us to it. And then: Wow! I can't believe you just showed up like that, right when I needed you!

(I should add that my little "explanation" of this phenomenon doesn't mean it's not a divine gift or magic.)

I'm telling you all this because I think there's a powerful fundraising correlation to this same truth:

"When the donor is ready the fundraising appeal will appear."

That is, potential donors to your cause are going through their lives, unaware of your cause. No matter how many times they encounter your direct mail, your Facebook posts, your banner ads, your TV spots, your street fundraisers ... they barely perceive it. It's as if you didn't ask at all.

And then something happens. Within the potential donor. And she is suddenly aware of your message. She can now respond.

Until that moment she could not respond. Because as far as she was concerned, you weren't even there.

This can teach us a couple of useful things about fundraising:

1. Why getting new donors is so hard. Because most people, most of the time, even in the best-targeted audiences, have not had that inner call in their hearts and minds. (And many never will.) Thing is, if you're not there when or if it does happen ... you won't get that donor! (Someone else will, though!)
   
2. It's not purely random. Outside factors can turn on the light for many people at the same time. Like large natural disasters that bring in surges of donors. Or events like the election of a disturbing candidate. Unexpected fads like the Ice Bucket Challenge. Or a very well-conceived fundraising offer.
   

So practice your fundraising like you live in a world that's thick with benevolent magic. Because it is.

But also stay aware that no matter how much heart and soul you put into your fundraising, it's still partly a numbers game.

And that may be a path to true fundraising enlightenment.

(This post first appeared on April 13, 2018.)

How good is your crap detector?

Someone asked Ernest Hemingway what single quality it takes to make someone a good writer.

His answer:

A built-­in, shock-­proof, crap detector.

I doubt he had fundraising in mind when he said that, but he could have.

Crap is the chief enemy of effective fundraising.

What is crap in fundraising?

• Vague abstractions about what your organization does.
  
• Brand standards that keep you from talking to donors about the things they care about.
  
• Jargon the excludes outsiders from the conversation.
  
• Faddish modern design that’s hard to read and conveys the wrong emotional messages.
  
• Browbeating donors because they owe you support and you believe you shouldn’t have to address their reasons for donating.
  
• Blaming the ignorance and stubbornness of donors on your failure to connect with them.
  
• Pomposity: Using big words and complex communication because it makes you look important.
  

Crap is hard to avoid, because most of it comes from within, as noted by Neil Postman’s Third Law:

At any given time, the chief source of crap with which you have to contend is yourself.

Develop and fine-tune your personal crap detector. You’ll frequently catch yourself wandering into crap territory.

But you’ll also raise more money. You’ll see through more flimsy schemes. You’ll note the subtle difference between empty posturing and useful advice. You’ll generally have more fun.

More on this delightful topic: Book review: Nobody Wants to Read Your Sh*t: And Other Tough-Love Truths to Make You a Better Writer by Steven Pressfield

2 amazing things your nonprofit newsletter can do for you

Newsletter Tuesdays: A series about doing more with your donor newsletter.

An effective donor newsletter should accomplish two things:

1. It should improve donor retention. It does that by showing donors that their giving accomplishes good things. While it’s hard to directly measure this outcome, a solid donor newsletter should be part of a healthy donor file. I’ve seen organizations with no newsletter (or with a newsletter that wasn’t about donor impact) and several percentage points to their donor retention rate by publishing a solid donor newsletter.
   
2. It should raise funds directly. A good donor newsletter is itself a worthwhile fundraising channel that can raise net revenue at a decent return on investment. Typically, newsletters are just behind direct mail appeals in effectiveness ... but for some organizations they can be more effective than appeals.
   

Here’s the key thing.

You don’t have to balance these two goals. It’s not either/or.

It’s both/and.

Newsletters that have the most positive impact on retention are also the best at raising direct net revenue. And vice-versa.

Newsletters that are bad at one of those are also bad at the other.

Because if a newsletter is compelling, donors will engage with it. And that means more of them will donate to it. And more will donate to other channels later.

A good donor newsletter is a win-win for fundraisers!

This Newsletter Tuesday series is about the ways you can create a donor newsletter that does what it’s meant to do. Stay tuned.

Why so much writing is so bad, and how you can avoid it

Hard-to-read writing is bad for fundraising. It decreases response.

Why does it persist? I think it’s mainly three factors:

Sloppy writing

Easy to read is hard to write. It takes care and attention to write clearly and make things simple.

First drafts are often complex. That’s okay, even inevitable. As long as you revise for simplicity. Many writers don’t bother with that. Those who do one last draft for simplicity essentially have a communications super-power.

Bad teaching

Sometimes, though, it’s not just sloppiness. Some writers consciously and carefully make their writing difficult. Often because college writing teachers tend to require students to write long, complex sentences and use sophisticated vocabulary. That may be considered “elegant” in some circles, and it has its place. But for readers, it’s just hard to read.

Most writers’ last (and only) training in writing happened in college. It’s what they know. We were rewarded for writing complex copy; sometimes we were penalized for keeping things simple.

In fundraising (or any form of writing where you need to influence people who are not required to read your stuff), keep it simple. Most of us need to “re-train” as writers after school. Banish that English teacher from your brain who tempts you to to academic elegance.

Elitism

Some professions keep outsiders outside by using specialized, jargon-packed, complex language. If they made it easy, they wouldn’t be so special. Advanced vocabulary and jargon are often ways to signal I am educated or I am an insider.

That’s not appropriate for fundraising. We need to practice inclusive writing that invites people in. It can be difficult to step outside of the elites we want to be part of.

But it’s far better to open your heart and your mind and write to connect with everyone who’s interested ... not just your in-group.

The secret to good fundraising writing:

• Write with care, taking the time to simplify.
  
• Ignore most of what you learned about writing in college.
  
• Write with an open, inclusive attitude.