Is your end-of-year fundraising appeal convincing your donors to give before they even finish reading it? Did you struggle to reach your fundraising goal last year? Never written a fundraising appeal before? Or maybe you’re just feeling stuck when it comes to putting pencil to paper? This is for you.
After writing hundreds of fundraising appeals and raising millions of dollars for nonprofits big + small, I have this down to a science.
YOU READY? LET’S DO THIS
Let’s get some things out of the way.
What is an annual appeal? An annual appeal is generally a set of communications (hard-copy letter, email(s), and social postings) that focus on a singular subject with a compelling ask to your donor for money. While this can take place at any time of year, the most common is at the end of the year, when nonprofits can raise up to ⅓ of their budgets in the last few months of Q4.
Should I do an annual appeal? Um...do you like meeting your budget? As mentioned above, billions of dollars are raised in November and December across all organizations. Of those, 12% come in to organization on the LAST THREE DAYS OF THE YEAR. So yes, I would advise being a player in the game.
Should I do a hard copy appeal, email appeal and social media posts? Online marketers say that on average it takes a person seeing something SEVEN times before they will take action. Therefore, I suggest tweaking the same message several times across multiple channels to maximize your results.
Is this going to be a lot of work? Yes, but it will be worth it. If you want to make this as easy and pain free as possible - check out the blog post I put together on launching a campaign.
How to write an appeal:
Step 1: Pick your theme/subject
What/who is your story going to be about? I challenge you to focus on a SINGULAR subject. You may say, “But Jess - we serve thousands of students/marine animals/trees a year…” Pick ONE of them to write a story about. People connect 1:1 best and sometimes writing about the masses is overwhelming.
Now tell me, what/who is your subject ______________________________________________
Step 2: What is the story you want to tell?
My guess is that there are various stories that can be told from the point of view of your one subject. For example, you maybe have a single mother who has benefitted from your program: are you talking about her as a mom or her education, or her career, or her mental health - do you see what I’m saying? Again, pick ONE through line.
You know the drill, what is your theme _____________________________________________
Step 3: Interview your subject
Yey! We are getting somewhere. It is time to (if applicable) interview your subject. Try to come up with a list of questions that don’t have just “yes” or “no” answers. Use this question asking opportunity to draw out pull quotes too. Need some examples of questions to ask? I got you.
What were the set of circ*mstances that brought you to (insert organization name)?
Tell me about how (insert organization) made you feel when you walked in the door.
What made your time with (insert organization) a success?
If you could describe (insert organization) in three words, what would they be?
What are your hopes and dreams for the future?
Step 4: Write and then walk away
When writing things out (even this post!), I like to do a draft and then walk away for a few days. I find that when I come back with fresh eyes that I’m able to sharpen the message, fix errors, and tweak parts that are missing. Don’t get too bogged down if you are having trouble completing every.single.sentence in your draft. Just put a “XXX” as a placeholder and then come back to it.
Make sure you clearly mark what problem you want your donor to solve
Include a sense of urgency
Use the word YOU vs. us, our, the name of your organization as much as possible
Thank your donor for their courage/trust/faith/commitment/vision/understanding/compassion (use any of those words)
Make the donor you are writing to the hero of the story
Don’t be afraid to use bold, underline text or bullet points - it helps the eye
ALWAYS include a PS sentence - it is the most read line of any letter/email!
Use psychologist Jen Shang’s words:
Q. You write that nonprofits can increase contributions “by changing a handful of words in a solicitation.” What are those magic words?
A. There are nine adjectives Americans use to describe a moral person: kind, caring, compassionate, helpful, friendly, fair, hard-working, generous and honest. Charities can randomly select a couple of adjectives from those nine words and use them in their fund-raising solicitations when appropriate. We’ve found that women then increase their giving on average by 10 percent.
Step 5 - Pass it around for edits
I truly believe that in fundraising - two heads are better than one and five heads are better than two. Once you have your draft completed - pass that baby around. My advice would be to share it amongst your team, but also with a person within your organization who doesn’t do fundraising. They will have a fresh pair of eyes to tell you if your message is impactful and if your ask is clear. Gather all of the edits and make any final changes before sending them to the designer/printer.
Step 6 - Get creative
There are many ways to spice up an appeal. Some ideas:
Include a captivating photo
Insert a pull-out quote from your subject
Bold text throughout so that if the reader reads nothing else - they would get the jist of the story
Include your most impressive stat
Whoever is “signing” the letter - have a live signature (or a copy of one)
If you can, do a mail merge to include a corresponding first name at the top and throughout the letter
For previous donors, include their previous giving amount + 20% in your ask. For example, if your donor gave $100 last year, you might ask specifically for $120 this year.
Include a remit envelope or link/button to donate - make being able to donate guess-free and SUPER easy
Step 7 - Take your appeal and adapt it for different channels
You heard me say it takes someone on average SEVEN times of seeing something before they take action, right? That means you are going to need to turn this story into at least seven versions.
BONUS:
Here is a suggested send out list, but please adjust to the cadance your organization follows.
At least 60 days of warm-up content (social media posts, email)
Mid-late November launch - hard copy lands in mailboxes
The week of Thanksgiving - have you/your staff/board send a gratitude note or do gratitude calls to every donor from the previous year
Giving Tuesday - social media post/email (Want these written for you? Check out my Giving Tuesday templates here.)
Early December - digital version of the hard copy appeal via email
Mid-December - email
December 28th - email
December 30th or 31st - final email reminder/tax reminder
***Of course in between these mailing pieces and emails you should be doing consistent social media.
Now, go forth…YOU GOT THIS!
