30. Minisode: Year End Giving During an Election Year - Robin Cabral
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Overview
Meet Robin. She's here to help us prep for end of year giving, especially during an election year, during our first “minisode”. She has great advice about how to craft a clear message during a time with a lot of white noise. We work through the top questions you should ask yourself while preparing your year end giving campaign, and how you should be utilizing a multichannel communication approach this year.
“This is the year that you have to have a crystal clear and very compelling case for support in your appeal.”
Timeline of planning for end of year giving
Questions to ask yourself as you are planning your end of year appeals
Develop a crystal clear case for support
The importance of storytelling in our end of year appeals
This isn’t a one and done appeal. This needs to be a multichannel approach (mailer, calls, emails, social media)
Robin’s One Good Thing: Don’t think that your approach is the only approach. How are other places doing things? How can we learn from them?
Powerful Quotes:
“I wake up every morning and the first thing I do is I read the blogs. What are the trends? What are people saying?” -Robin
“When we look at donors who give to political campaigns, their giving is elevated during election years. People who don’t have suppressed giving.” -Robin
“If you are mailing a segment of your calendar year end as a bulk mail, be cautious of the timing of your mail-out and overall communications.” -Robin
“There is so much white noise in the world right now. We have to be aware of it and pivot. In October and November your messages are going to be drowned out.” -Becky
“This is the year that you have to have a crystal clear and very compelling case for support in your appeal.”-Robin
“This is a time to be completely candid. Your appeal can be one of your tactics to do that. There is validity to not looking at year end giving as a one and done mail piece. This needs to be a multichannel approach.” -Becky
“Let your donors be the heroes right now. Let this pivot your 2021 strategy and ramp it up in a really great way.” -Becky
Questions to ask yourself as you are planning for year end giving
Who is your audience?
Who are you mailing to?
What is your case?
Why do you need the money?
How is it going to impact people?
Why are you unique?
What is the need?
Why are you positioned to uniquely meet that need?
Why do you need donors to give today versus next year?
Helpful Articles
Giving in an Election Year - Blackbaud Study
The Top Ten Tips to Ensuring Your Non-Profit Fundraising Appeal Inspires Donor Giving (Robin’s article)
How to Plan Your Calendar Year-End Fundraising In the Middle of a Pandemic and an Election (Robin’s article)
