The Little Words Mean the Most

The issue was raised on LinkedIn....

 

Per Ben Miller, SVP of Data Science and Analytics, Bonterra...

Many nonprofits saw a surge of donations and donors during 2020 and 2021. Then in 2022 things started getting back to normal. Normal in this case is a declining donor pool for more than a decade. At the end of 2022 donors were 83% of what they were at the end of 2012.

Leading the charge, new donors have declined precipitously -18%. Plus it is more costly to get new donors.

His comments elicited a strong response from fundraisers internationally. My small contribution to the mob:

Like many of you in the FEP [Fundraising Effectiveness Project] family, I can speak from different perspectives: practitioner trying to raise money, new donor, monthly donor, major donor. And I now wonder if the 10% "decline" in US donors is something similar to climate change. >> I.e., physics; natural forces normally readjusting, in other words. ¶ I'm rushing off to lunch, so I can't check my data immediately. But it's my understanding that the # of nonprofits in the US alone has something like doubled in the past 15-20 years. ¶ Then you have John Lepp's recent anecdotal reporting on how slammed his mother-in-law's mailbox is every year ... more than 500 items coming in and ONLY one was a thank you to generous Dale. ¶ What is the sum of the research done by Dr.s Jen Shang and Adrian Sargeant at their Institute for Sustainable Philanthropy? In my non-academic interpretation: "When you like your donors, they'll like you back. And they'll express that through more giving and by sticking around." ¶ THE COMPLETE DONOR.... Interesting idea, Benjamin Mohler and Andrew Polter.

love bunnies...

 

To a trusted ED of a beloved regional community foundation asking for a speaking date

 

[To him; could have been her; could have been any pronoun....]

 

The best I can say is this: in theory that date works (and thank you for the invitation). It's open on my calendar, in other words.

 

Honestly? I haven't done an in-person presentation since early 2020, March. I was leaving Scotland after a 2.5 day masterclass on the banks of Loch Ness; Simone was at my shoulder, making things SO much easier. We all knew something was odd because the big Chinese delegation had cancelled at the last minute. Suddenly they were forbidden from traveling. Simone and I flew back to the States, on small planes, then bigger planes.

 

Within two weeks the real news hit front pages: global viral deadly pandemic.

 

In the year previous, I'd done 36 presentations, mostly live. Simone was doing the same. Airplanes every 2 weeks for us.

 

In 2020, after we returned from Scotland, I did ZERO in person. Her, too.

 

[To him/her/regional foundation:] I'm not out of practice exactly. Today, for instance, I did a 1.5 hour webinar with a record crowd from 8 countries re: cases for support ... then answered audience questions for another 2.5 hours, alongside a guest expert. So, yeah, I still practice ... just not in person, in breathing distance, since March 2020.

 

Being in front of a live audience is different ... and better!

 

What I hope you'll garner from this wandering confessional: times have changed; I've changed; my dear beloved mainstay Simone died in the meantime; and maybe the rail gauge I run on now, at age 75, isn't what you need.

 

In case this sounds TOO desperate, I have a great, international expert, mid-50s, to recommend: [first name last name], who lives near you. She's a top copywriter; works internationally ... and has at least one current [nearby] as a client. And she's nice. And patient. And SUPER-well-informed (as you can discover for yourself from her blog).

 

Just saying,

 

Just ended one of THOSE phone calls: Look, I know I'm a 3rd-tier author

 

This latest firm's basic promise:

With our PR, we'll boost your book title from an also-ran to a top-seller.

I get these calls from time to time, as one does. I've published more than a half-dozen books of various kinds ... as one does when you can't stop talking.

ALL my books are also-rans. Wander into Barnes & Noble looking for my stuff? You'll be talking to customer service.

My 6-or-so I'm-relatively-proud-of how-to books speak to a limited target audience of front-line fundraisers and NGOs. My uninhibited memoir about my dad has had almost no sales (though it got one stellar review). Earlier fiction attempts by me, the chump, trying to hit in Major-League Baseball? It's a bloopers reel ... at best.

How's your writing career going?

Don't stop.

 

What happens when a new career star equipped with Post-It notes encounters a (hopefully) helpful how-to book

 

 

Thank you, David Stamps....

 

 

My working definition of donor-centricity

Let's try this one more time.

Someone asked what I thought. The reply: "Retention depends on 3 things: asking, thanking, reporting. Asking means we grab them by the shoulders and share spit. Thanking means we reach into their chests and shake their hearts profoundly. Reporting means we adopt them and explain their family obligations and joys."

Key word: retention.

In other words, technically speaking, with all the research and results left in (and politics parked at the door), donor-centricity is about retention, hence greater Lifetime Value (LTV). Ken Burnett's book on Relationship Fundraising forecast the immense potential when a charity focuses on LTV. Key researchers, Dr.s Adrian Sargeant and Jen Shang --- bolstered worldwide by many fundraising practitioners willing to take a chance on a different way of talking --- proved the point: donor-centricity (technically defined) increases giving, often reliably doubling contributions within a fairly short period of time (18 months?).

 

Forgive me, if this is a Loch Ness repeat ... it was important to Simone and me

In a small Scottish inn, we spot hints of the coming pandemic

... before the average world hears the news

         It's a master class for about 25 fundraising professionals. It starts Monday, March 2, 2020; we meet and mingle the night before. There's a fire. There's a single-malt bar. Our classroom overlooks Loch Ness. Highland cattle bagged in thick copper hair and lengthy horns graze the sloping fields in front of The Inch, our inn and classroom. These animals are an ancient Scottish breed. We're staring at Neolithic-period meat and milk.

         Loch Ness isn't all that wide. But it is the very, very, well-fine-not-really-all-that-implausibly deep home to the (please adopt this lovely word) "cryptozoological monster" touristically known in gift shops as Nessie.

         And you know what, when you're teaching a master class?

         The Nessie legend is an f*ing distraction. Delegates can't help glancing out the windows, hoping. Walk a few minutes to the nearby village of Fort Augustus: Nessie is unavoidable. Nessie burgers. Nessie squish toys in tartans. Loch Ness energy drinks: "Guzzle the damn stuff!!! You'll feel like a dragon trapped inside a fathomless lake for at least 10,000 years!" Nessie petrol. And Nessie boat patrol.

         Along with meals, lodging and pitiless fundraising instructors [us] yapping about expertise for 2.5 days, our master-class students get a complimentary boat trip up Loch Ness from Fort Augustus.

         It's a sedate ride. A colony of feral goats chewing the scenery on the loch's sheer cliffs is the highlight; that, plus sunburn if you didn't bring covering.

         In several places, the boat's windows offer a pasted-on Nessie silhouette. Through that silhouette, you can shoot your very own pretend "I saw Nessie" photo. Everyone does it. It's the highlight of the tour. The silhouette features a couple of arching black spines and the famously erect swan's neck topped by that fierce presumably-ancient fish-crushing head.

         I notice that Simone has cornered one of our brightest, most eager master-class students. He's from the Czech Republic. Went to Harvard. Now back in his home country, where he's set on reforming public school education. The vision: to make the Czech Republic a superstar amongst post-Communist states, which ended almost 30 years ago. He's got grant funding, which puts a warhead on his missile (to slip back into Cold War terms).

------

Sim One lectures him throughout our one-hour ride re: her disgust with politics in America. She's not bothering with photos of Nessie. He's attentive, polite, calm, respectful. He's a remedy, too, I suspect. His unremitting, much-younger Czech attention-span probably spares Simone's stomach a messy countdown.

         She is spectacularly prone to seasickness.

         More than once, within seconds, I've witnessed her explosive reactions to being afloat on any boat; on three continents.

         Even on today's prim, flat lake, aboard a tub in the Scottish Highlands, with waves no higher than careless gestures, waves less formidable than a gent's pocket square, I can easily imagine Simone collapsing on the deck, eyes rolling up, gracelessly puking without caring much, like a wan fire hose.

         So, PS: The cleaning crew for this Loch Ness tour boat wishes to thank the Czech Republic. Which I kept mistakenly calling Czechoslovakia in his presence, a political entity that dissolved peacefully on January 1, 1993. He was adoringly patient. He forgave me because I was clearly too old to castigate and my references were obsolete. My stamp collection was old, my atlas was old, my globe was old. I was an antique, too. I just needed to shut up and let the next generations have their say.

 

I am now magnetic!!!

Koren & Shane display their newly arrived "Trained by Tom Ahern" magnets,

suitable for metal surfaces or erasing your hard drive

(it was the Coopers' idea, not mine)

 

replying to my Southwest Airlines survey

 

I gave them 5 stars stars stars stars stars overall

(based on personal interactions with staff)

 

Yet:

 

Pre-pandemic, I was on a flight every 2 weeks or so. Routine for my business (training serious fundraising pros around the world). Southwest is always worth considering, when traveling in the US.

DCA Southwest, though, is UGLY and discomforting.

Unless absolutely necessary, I will now avoid Southwest's DCA arrival/departure in the future. It's sardine-packed squalid. Not evil exactly; clumsy and indifferent: just a reminder that the US has 330 million residents; everyone's different; and simple amenities matter a lot in terms of fast impressions.

Toilets were surprisingly OK (grade B).

Food/drink offerings, though, were bizarre: either a tunnel of grab-me's, where payment was understaffed and not-well-signed; or a bar that never had an open seat thanks to loiterers on their laptops.

General seating in the ready was a D-to-flunk: too many passengers, too few chairs; many standees (me included).

CONCLUSION: In one visit, as I was wearily departing DC to go home to RI, Southwest trained me to avoid DCA at all costs in the future.

What do I know? Maybe demand exceeds supply SO much that Southwest can inflate its middle-finger in the air for now.

For ever?

To repeat: In one visit, when I departed DC to go home to RI ... Southwest trained me to avoid DCA at all costs.

So, my beloved Southwest, do you need a UX (User Experience) analyst at Southwest DCA?

 

Sooner/better.

 

Grump-companionally yours,

Turned-Off Traveler (though will fly SW other places; but DCA outbound is a shit-show)

 

The magnets are being attached

 

Why ARE donors heroes?

 

Because they didn't succumb to inertia, the most destructive force in fundraising.

Instead, they acted. ACTUALLY DID SOMETHING.

So few do.

 

So FEW do!