Fashioning Fundraising Appeals in Times of Disaster

In some cases, he says, it meant rewriting whole appeals while in others it meant just acknowledging that the event occurred.

As for the question of whether relief organizations using images of disaster-stricken areas is ethical, Ball says that as long as you're telling the truth through your words and pictures, you shouldn't have anything to worry about. He uses the example of a recent space ad the Salvation Army ran in newspapers that had a large, very closely cropped picture of a grief-stricken mother and child who lost everything in Hurricane Katrina.

"It was just a wonderful, wonderful picture that told a very, very sad story," Ball says. "But I think it was truthful, it was decent, and it was the right thing to do And it was effective in raising lots of money for the relief."

Bob Ball can be reached at bball@thedomaingroup.com.