Case Study: The Home for Little Wanderers

The Home for Little Wanderers reaches major donors with a highly personalized campaign that avoids a “direct mail” look.

May 2007 By Lynn Edmonds

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• Renew donors who had given $1,000 or more in the past.

• Upgrade gifts from existing donors.

• Convert prospects into direct-mail donors.

• Offer a minimum ask of $1,000 to encourage recipients to be as generous as possible.

• Create a campaign that was easy to execute and cost-effective to maximize net income.

The key challenges were that many of these donors had little prior giving history and were not direct-mail responsive. Also, asking them to give $1,000 — through the mail — was potentially risky. Would donors feel comfortable giving this way? And what about prospects who had never given at all? How would they respond?

The strategy
The Home created a high-end, branded mailing that looked like it was personally created by and sent from The Home’s president to increase its open and response rates.

An “Office of the President” overbrand on ivory linen, stationery-style paper was used throughout the piece. Every effort was made to avoid “direct mail” graphics, treatments or other clues that would make it look like a mass-produced package.

The outer envelope was closed-faced and used a First Class stamp for postage. A personalized, one-page letter from the president praised donors for their “outstanding generosity” and “extraordinary, heartfelt commitment” to The Home’s children, and asked them to “please consider making a special donation this holiday season.” Each letter was hand-signed to increase the intimacy of the correspondence.

The reply device, on a heavier card stock, was very simple, with no scan lines or other codes. The offer was stated simply, without a headline, and continued in the voice of the president, rather than the donor-voice copy that typically appears on reply slips.

The results
The response was outstanding. In the first year of this campaign, the response rate was more than 26 percent, with an average gift of more than $1,100 and gross revenue of more than $280,000. The cost per dollar raised was an incredible $0.01.

In the second year of the campaign, the response rate increased to more than 35 percent, despite a smaller target audience, with an average gift of more than $1,200 and similar gross revenue levels.

Direct-mail campaigns allow smaller nonprofits to reach out to many more major donors and high-value prospects than is practical by traditional face-to-face methods, at a much lower cost.

Major donors do have different needs and expectations compared to regular donors, and they also might be very different people in terms of age, gender and financial status. But they will support your organization through the mail, if treated appropriately.

A highly personalized, intimate approach will enhance response. Use closed-face envelopes and First Class postage, messaging that references the donor’s special giving level, and other subtle techniques that simulate true, personal correspondence. These are all simple, cost-effective tactics that even the smallest nonprofit organizations can implement in their fundraising programs.

Lynn S. Edmonds is president of L.W. Robbins Associates. She can be reached at ledmonds@lwra.com.