Get Inside Your Donors’ Heads

Ten Tips on How to Tap Into the Minds of Your Donors and What to Do About It When You Do

Ever wonder what your colleagues are learning about the hearts, minds and habits of today’s donors?  Wonder no more. At the DMANF 2014 Washington Nonprofit Conference, direct marketers were generously sharing their donor insights gleaned from careful testing and successful campaigns.  Here are the Top Ten Insights about Donors learned from the conference:

1. Don’t Forget Your Mid-Dollar Donors – Mid-dollar donors – the important group of givers who fall between low-dollar donors and major gift donors – must be carefully managed because 1% of mid-dollar donors produce 20% of direct mail revenue and about 6% will go on to make a major gift. Nevertheless, direct marketers often neglect this group!
2. Mid-Dollar Donors LIKE and WANT More Direct Mail – Industry benchmarks show that mid-dollar donors actually enjoy the direct mail they receive as “partners.” 
   
3. Donors Want Access to Program Staff – One organization enclosed the business card of a program staff person to help their donors feel connected to a real person, not just an imaginary office.
4. Donors Want to Interact with Your Organization – Consider your donors’ experience. Make your relationship less transactional and more transformational.  What would motivate you to take action?
5. Donors Give Through the Channel They Are Most Comfortable With – Let them lead as you follow when it comes to how they best interact with your organization.
6. $1000+ Donors May Be More Technologically Savvy than Low-Dollar Donors – Consider digital as well as mail for these donors.
7. Email Donors May Be Older than You Think – But they are still slightly younger than offline direct mail donors.
8. Donors with a Particular Disease will Donate at a Much Higher Level to that Cause.
9. Use of Digital Channels Is Increasing – The number of hours consumers spend per day on non-digital channels is decreasing, while use of digital channels is steadily increasing with the highest jumps in use of social media and digital content.
10. Sustaining Donors are “Needy” – Don’t forget to thank them…and then thank them again while you’re at it!