The Little Words Mean the Most

Eat/drink/think weekend in Portland, ME & about

Start with sublime roast chicken and melt-in-your-mouth meringue mushrooms by Jonathan. Visit Vena's Fizz House in Portland for mocktails. Dinner at Fore Street; the open kitchen, decisions Jonathan & Marci, the Baked Alaska. Next night, dinner at Primo in Rockland. Their menu. That's my appetizer of fried head cheese with an egg. Next lunch, at Eventide for fresh oysters in Portland again (admire the kerning on the chalkboard word, OYSTERS). CLICK an image to SAVOR BIGGER.

Age appropriate messages (and my holiday best wishes)

Did you ever think, "I wish I'd done more with my life?"

You surely still can.

Help a good mind born without much privilege reach its full potential.

[free for any youth group or UNCF]

THIS JUST IN: RI Urban Debate League ED, Ashley Belanger, put the basic idea to work with an email that had this subject line: Do you ever think... And then this headline: "I wish I'd done more with my year?"

It has (so far) a 54.1% opening rate (vs. an average of 21%). Just brilliant.

All I have to offer tonight

this Download Case_ahern_v1 about donor newsletters

How we talk to one another

I don't think I answered one question very well, though: How do you convince the boss?

I don't have a short answer. I don't KNOW a short answer. I only know a longish answer, but it's foolproof.

For the first 10 years of my consulting life I was a partner (the copywriter) in a small marketing agency: direct mail, PR, ads. Our very first client -- a medical practice -- taught me an extremely important lesson: you have to DOMINATE opinionated people, or they will not let you do what you feel is best.

The question posed in the session was: how do I convince the boss? But the REAL question is maybe: how do I, as a self-described professional, get to do what I'm learning to do?

I'll be blunt so I'm not misunderstood: you have to know SO much about how to get good and improved results that it silences every untrained opinion in the room. There's NO easy, alternative route that I know. There's no "just add water" and your boss likes what he's hearing.

Our method -- and we were eventually a successful agency winning international awards opposite competition from Disney and Boeing -- was to go in and LISTEN. Listen until the client had said everything they had to say. Let the silence ring.

Then start taking over, slowly, with smiles and with zero aggression. "I like your idea." Always start criticism with a compliment. "But there's some new research on that that could effect sales. May I explain?" BY ALL MEANS was the usual response from the sane (that did not describe all our clients by a long shot).

For the first few years we got push back. But I was secretly following the advice of a major guru to consultants.

He'd told me, "If you read one hour in your field every day, within a year you'll be an expert. If you do that every day for three years, you'll be a national expert." And I did it. Then I start speaking and writing books.

In "managing up" mode, maybe fundraisers should view themselves as consultants. If you do commit to something like that schedule of daily reading, then, when you go to your boss, you'll be saying things he'll want/need to hear, because they'll connect directly to increased revenue.

Money is the trump card. When someone asks me, "Tom, what do you do?" I answer, "I help charities make a lot more money." When the discussion's about money, the discussion gets serious instead of frivolous.

If the discussion's about who's right, you lose. If the discussion's about which version is better from a "I like it, I don't like it" standpoint, you lose. Those are NOT professional-caliber or -relevant discussions.

Talk about income instead. Have the body of knowledge under your belt. Change jobs regularly if you have to, learning a little more each time. And one day, maybe three years from now, you'll be on easy street.

I couldn't hide behind the Verbatim Rule ... I wouldn't now attract the clients of my dreams (which describes ALL my current clients) ... if I didn't know how to actually do what they want done.

It's not about getting permission. It's not about being right. It's about intellectual domination.

My self-confidence is off the charts when I speak with clients. You have to be the smartest person in the room in your field ... and in your head.

Treat your boss as a client. Listen.

Then mention money. Then dominate.

There is no shortcut I know. There is no spray for this. There is no herbicide. Your boss (despite appearances) is not a noxious weed.

To dominate, you have to be knowledgeable. And then you can slay.

Ahern 2015 prediction #1

1. (Easy one) Baby boomers (those born between 1946 and 1964) continue their exodus into "retirement" (whatever that means, survivors of the Great Recession; all we really know is that the number of Boomers leaving the workforce is massive).

            Baby Boomers will then assume, with superhuman strength and grace, their predestined place as the greatest philanthropic generation ever born.

            Stand amazed, charities.

            The advent of Baby Boomer donors could be bigger than global warming.

            Of course, it kind of depends on you, the charities, how important these donors become.

            And early warning? So far, the signs aren't that good. Seemingly "professional" 21st-century charities still debate (pound your softest head without helmet on something unforgivably hard) the merits of "donor-centricity" ... a bright idea that commercial marketers adopted back in the 1950s, to their great profit.

            Is it wrong to say that charities are behind the times and the worst salespeople on earth? (Yet proud of it.)

            No, it's not wrong. It is an observable phenomenon. It's rewarded in fact, apparently. Worst practice in donor communications is FAR more common than best practice, I promise you. I've evaluated hundreds, probably thousands, of attempts. My grand conclusion: charities commonly leave mountains of money on the table, thanks to ignorant minor errors, all easily corrected. If they only knew better. They don't, by and large.

Which headlines communicate better? ------------ [report]

 

You Are About to Enter Draftland

 

[  ] Black headlines on a white background

[  ] Colored headlines on a white background

------

Answer: Black headlines on a white background

Notes and assumptions....

This particular Q&A is more about defaults than about black-and-white [pun intended] rules.

The default since Gutenberg has been black ink on whatever substrate you had in hand: parchment, rag paper (just like the ancient Egyptians made), and later clean flat white paper when you had it. Modern newsprint didn't come along until 1844 when Canadian inventor, Charles Fenerty, invented wood-pulp paper. He didn't take out a patent. Not many "saw" what Charles Fenerty discovered. But in fact the man's invention established an entirely new industry, once people started to get it.

Of course, pray when there's a new industry.

That it does as much good as it can & as little harm as it necessary. No free lunches.

Black ink will be your default. Which means: anything other than black ink needs a second thought. Colin Wheildon told me so. Colored headlines, his studies found, reduced easy skimming. And "easy skimming" is the highest value we aspire to in donor communications. "Easy skimming" is what "streamlining" was to earlier generations;;;in our full-message-assaulted culture;;;going down for the final count culture

Just today a hospital foundation told me they'd tripled

& quintupled their response rates to acquisition direct mail, by adopting the EXTREME (rather than nominal) donor-centered "Sharp" approach, developed thanks to a great client who gives free rein to experiment

New slides ride the donor newsletter frontier {click to enlarge}

a state U asked for my opinion

OK, the annual report (AR) took me no time.

You hoped for "constructive criticism." And I hope you'll see my comments that way, as I sincerely mean them to be helpful. Still, I'm no diplomat either.

Criticism #1: the AR has no message. It's a list of names, a scattering of uncaptioned pictures, and some cover boilerplate. "Reader" behavior is pretty predictable: they skim. That's your chance to get some key philanthropy messages across (like: "We need you!") in the big type. This AR takes no advantage of that predictable skim, which lowers its return on investment to near zero.

Criticism #2: there's no story. It's just a list. It might as well be a phone book. Where's the "long story" that philanthropy at ?U plays an important role?

Criticism #3: it's predictable. There are no surprises. It's therefore dismissible. We are hardwired to pay attention to new things. We are hardwired to ignore the familiar. If I'm a donor, I'll look up my own name, see that it's spelled right, maybe check out a couple of classmates. And I'm done. I've learned nothing new about ?U and it's need for philanthropy.

Criticism #4: it's not donor-centered at all. Yes, it's a collection of donor names. But where's the embarrassing, over the top love?

It did ?U no harm. It did ?U no good. As a communications opportunity to be exploited, I'd call it a cover-to-cover failure. Of course, I realize that may well be a result of a timid, conservative internal culture. Too bad, if so.

More to come.

 

--- EARLIER EMAIL ---

 

This [newsletter] is a C or a B, depending on which page I'm looking at.

Does it give me, the donor, joy in the first few seconds? No. That's a test that no top-performing donor newsletter fails.

In this issue, the front page delivers a straight news story about a specific fund. It's a nice piece of reporting, but it leads nowhere for most readers. Sure, if they knew Peter L., they might read deeply enough to realize that his widow set up a scholarship fund. But almost no one reads that deep, studies show. This was a missed opportunity. A box headlined, His wife of 36 years set up a scholarship fund to honor him forever. You can, too.... might have led other people to consider something similar. That would also have slightly made the story donor-centric. Now it's donor-centered for exactly one person, not for all.

As this front page story demonstrates, there is no room for pure news in a donor newsletter. A donor newsletter for a foundation is also, sub rosa, a sales effort. And the front page is your first impression and your most important real estate. You should be able to explain to yourself clearly what the story you select for that space is going to do for the foundation's fundraising efforts.

This issue is littered with deflating pitfalls that turn off other donors. The R. Family story on p2. The "big check" story on p3. The C. gift on the back page. They all say, in passing, read at 100 mph, "only big bucks really matter" ... which isn't at all true, as Pr. U. with its 63% annual fund participation rate will attest.

The headlines are weak, which is a major flaw for any news publication ... and a deadly one for donor newsletters. The weaknesses include jargon ("private support"), low energy verbs ("securing") and the absence of the word "you" (appears in just one deck).

The absence of "you" in the headlines make the publication seem distant and chilly.

The typography is simply wrong. Body copy should be set in a serif face, not a sans serif, for easy reading in print (online is the exact opposite). That's from Colin Wheildon's studies. And the body copy font size is too small for older eyes, which covers the bulk of your donors. That's from the AIGA.

I could go on, but that's enough to work on for awhile.

Sorry I couldn't find more to like, [anonymous]

"We forget that part."

 

"We're mammals. Not godlings. We're a species. When we sneeze, sometimes we capital P our pants." Saluting me w/ her glass mug of muddy hot apple cider.

The mug wasn't well washed. I saw the fingerprints of a previous user beneath hers.

Dutifully I returned her salute. Felt fugged though: I'd learned nothing. And I wouldn't get a second chance with her.

As she swallowed, I secretly raced my finger across the varnished table. Her cup ring was sticky. Mine was not. Clearly I was the better person. Clearly. So @ least that. At least that @ least.