It's Time to Rethink Your Donor Engagement Strategies
Another form of personal communication includes social media and other digital channels, which allow nonprofits to connect in real time with their donors. Nonprofits should take advantage of these social hubs of connectivity and use them to build their communities of mission champions and supporters. Online communities provide unhindered access for nonprofits to uncover the “secret sauce” to what motivates their donors’ giving and support.
Although much ink has been spilled to describe the potential of new technologies to drive donor retention, the traditional outreach methods such as direct mail are still relevant and effective, if managed properly. Many donors like to share their interests on mail responses, confirm their personal information through call centers or request information on a particular program via email.
For example, nonprofits such as Paralyzed Veterans of America (PVA) utilize call centers to improve donor service productivity.
“Immediate responses and timely results are engrained in PVA’s high-touch donor strategies,” says Madison Shaffer, development coordinator at PVA. “The contact center allows PVA to receive customer feedback, which results in improving our methods for serving donors. We use a third-party vendor to help cut down time for PVA employees by performing tasks while interacting with the donors at the same time.”
As donor preferences are constantly evolving, more and more nonprofits are using separate inserts in their mailings called “Communication Cards.” These cards ask very specific information regarding communication preferences. They give donors an opportunity to define the amount of mail they receive, sign up for email, set phone preferences and communicate their feelings with the organization.
Personalize through data
What drives donors to respond to a message and contribute to an organization? The answer is that there is no one-size-fits-all strategy and messaging. Often, the key to igniting donors’ passion is personalization.
