email fundraising

Copyright ©2008 Care2, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 04/07/23

Email FundraisingJustin Perkins, Director of Nonprofit Services

© Care2, Inc. p. 2

Making a Difference

More than 9 million Care2 members are making a difference by:

• Taking Action• Volunteering• Donating• Telling friends• Sharing news• And much more…

Empowering People

Care2 empowers civically active people who care to make a difference.

• 5,000 new members everyday

• 3-4 million visitors every month

Making Connections with Nonprofits

Care2 invites its members to get involved with nonprofit organizations working on a variety of Causes Care2 members care about.

© Care2, Inc. p. 5

Engaged Influentials Online and Offline

62%

45%

26%

82%

35%

24%

34%

18%

62%

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90%

Contributed financially to a non-profit organization

Written to or personally spoken with an elected official

Written an opinion letter to an editor of a newspaper ormagazine

Created or signed a petition

Participated in online discussions about issues ofinterest to me

Attended or addressed a public meeting

Volunteered at a charity event

Volunteered at a school

Voted in a federal, state or local electionCare2 is an active online community. What makes them really special is their propensity to do more…

Online Fundraising

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•Have a plan with goals.

•Ask. Don’t Be Shy. Email once, twice, thrice… Series of appeals will outperform a stand-alone appeal.

• Create landing pages that reflect the appeal.

•Test. •Subject lines.•Landing pages.

•Segment. Send messages based upon user profiles donor, activist, volunteer, etc.

•Follow-up. Send thank you email with results of fundraiser.

Matching Gift

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• Create a sense of urgency with deadline.

• Matching gift incentivizes giving.

Personal Story

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Make it Real!

• Use a staff or member to tell their story about why the organization or campaign means so much to them.

Where Does the Money Go?

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Be specific. Tell them what how their contribution with help.

•Support a family•Buy a computer for our new staff…•Send a person to DC to lobby on issue•Start a new program to protect at-risk youth •Hire an organizer to target college kids•Put an ad on TV

Reinforce Transparency

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Reinforce!

Reinforce ask on fundraising landing page on your website.

Hit While It’s Hot

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Make the Case

Take Action. If your supporters new or old have recently taken action on an important campaign it is a great time to ask for a donation on that issue.

• Headline News. If your issue is making headline news it is a great time to ask your online supporters to take make a donation and support the campaign.

It’s an Emergency

Copyright ©2008 Care2, Inc. All rights reserved 04/07/23 12

Be prepared.

You want to be ready to respond when tragedy strikes. You should be only a few steps away from hitting send to ask for help from your online supporters.

Build the List! Be Prepared for Katrina-like Moments

•Care2 sent 600,000 email appeals

•Recruited 5000 new donors

•Raised $205,000 for American Humane in 48 hours!

Care2 aims to help nonprofits grow the capacity to respond quickly via email, or extend their reach in times of need:

Issue of the Day

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You Can’t Pay for this Kind of Attention

When your issue rolls off the tongues of everyone who talks about an issue (like the Olympics) there is no question if the timing is right – ASK!

The Holidays

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Synchronize with the Calendar.

It is often effective to tie alerts and fundraising appeals to holidays and current events. It makes your communications more relevant, and makes you more human and can be more fun. Look at your calendar and plan ahead.

Got a Month?

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Making a Commitment

Online fundraising has simplified the monthly giving process for donors.

Turn $10 into $120. Monthly giving program is a great way to move your supporters to the next level of giving.

Set a Goal

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Everyone loves a Challenge

Providing your supporters with a goal helps create a sense of community and to understand their role motivating them to action.

Setting a goal provides a great opportunity to create a series of appeals keeping users up to date on goal and urge them to help meet the challenge.

The Stand-Alone

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• Single stand-alone appeals are an important component in any organizations online fundraising plan.

The Series

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•A series of appeals built around a campaign are a great strategy to boost donation.

Series Opportunities• Matching Gift•Time Sensitive legislation•End-of-year holidays•Campaign activity such as placing ad

Who is it from?

•Together subject lines and from lines work together. Your subject line entices someone to open the email.

•Your from line discourages your supporter from deleting the email. You’ve written the email and subject line, but who sends the email?

•Consistency in from line and subject is important in building a relationship and for spam filters. •

Copyright ©2008 Care2, Inc. All rights reserved 04/07/23 20

Benchmarks: Email Appeals

• Email Open Rates: 14.8%• Email click-through rates: 1.1%• Email fundraising appeal response rate: 0.13%• Avg. Gift: $87•

• Source: 2008 eNonprofit Benchmarks Study

Copyright ©2008 Care2, Inc. All rights reserved 04/07/23 21

Copyright ©2008 Care2, Inc. All rights reserved 04/07/23 22

Subject Lines

Write it First! Don’t let your subject line be something you crafted on the fly after spending hours on your message.

Pack a Punch. It’s the first thing your supporters see. You’ve only got a few moments to catch their attention so you want to make it good.

Simultaneous Messaging. Most people read their emails in a preview pane so your subject line is and message are shown together.

Test. Try a few subject lines to a segment of your list to see what performs best.

Subject Lines

Copyright ©2008 Care2, Inc. All rights reserved 04/07/23 23

A good subject line causes a psychological reaction.

• Personal/Touching Stories

• Create a Sense of Urgency

• Provocative

• Crisis

• Tease

• Funny/Clever

Subject Line Testing

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•Test, Test, Test. The best way to find out if something works it to take it for a test drive. Split your list in half, in third or quarters and test different types of subject lines.

•Hit Send. Once you have the results send out the best performing to the remainder of your list. You’ll want to carry the learning into future distributions.

•Results. A two percent difference in an open rate and translate into thousands of dollars.

Subject Line Test

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Defenders of Wildlife tested subject lines for their online fundraising appeal.

Subject Line: Urgency

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Subject Line: Provocative

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Subject Line: Clever

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Segment your list?

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Follow Up Quickly

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About Justin PerkinsJustin Perkins joined Care2 in 2006 with an eclectic background as a social entrepreneur, accidental techie, new media marketing expert and former State water resources administrator for a major watershed in Colorado.

Justin develops partnerships with nonprofits and customizes strategic campaigns for them to reach Care2's audience of 10 million members. He also develops new tools to help nonprofits with marketing and fundraising.

Justin launched frogloop.com, Care2’s popular nonprofit marketing blog, as a way to share cutting edge case studies and best practices for nonprofit online marketing. He has an MBA from the University of Colorado, enjoys trail running & skiing, sells roasted nuts at the farmers markets on the weekends, and frequently writes & speaks at conferences about online marketing.

Contact Justin if your nonprofit would like a free hour of online marketing consulting. justin@earth.care2.com

Contact

Justin PerkinsDirector of Nonprofit ServicesJustin@earth.care2.com303-475-4827

Cutting edge nonprofit marketing tips:www.Frogloop.com & search the tagged archives