D.C. Nonprofit Conference Roundup: Getting the Most Out of Lists to Improve Direct Mail Acquisition Results

Converting internal non-donors to donors is a subject well known by Cheryl Lovinsky, associate director of direct response marketing at the American Diabetes Association. ADA has more than 9 million people who have participated in events, requested information or otherwise interacted with a local chapter. Lovinsky is utilizing modeling techniques to find people in this large group who are most likely to contribute and then mail to them to keep costs manageable.

I offered a case study of an organization that used list optimization to improve donor value. It didn't focus on increasing the response from acquisition, but rather sought to increase average acquisition contribution by excluding prospects who were likely to contribute $5 or less. Modeling techniques made it possible to identify these prospects, eliminate them from mailings, and then alter the package to appeal more to the higher-value donors.

Tiffany Neill is partner at Lautman Maska Neill$ Co.