E-mail ($10 Million and Up): Canine Companions for Independence

2012 Initial Puppy Offering
Canine Companions for Independence
Submitted by Merkle Inc.

The numbers

• Recipients: 284,455
• Response rate: 0.23 percent
• Total cost: $50,000
• Income: 134,050 (incl. $26,100 in major gifts made offline)
• Average gift: $204.97 ($165.31 without major gifts)
• Cost to raise a dollar: $0.37

Great results are great results, and this campaign certainly has them. However, in one important way, the submitters admit, this super-cute campaign underperformed. But first, let’s look at the campaign itself. It’s a series of e-mails centered around a tongue-in-cheek theme: an Initial Puppy Offering or IPO, mirroring the Initial Public Offering process in the finance world. Recipients were asked to buy IPO shares by making a donation. Its goals were multifaceted: to raise money, of course, increase awareness of the organization and its mission, and build awareness of Canine Companions’ corporate partner (a dog-food company), etc.

One of the goals, however, was to sign up donors as monthly givers. In the end, only two converted during the campaign’s run. But success in that area came later when the organization followed up with an online monthly giving campaign that exceeded its overall fundraising goals and converted 25 of the donors who gave during the e-mail campaign to monthly givers.

This 2012 campaign stands on its own for meeting and exceeding its fundraising and other goals, but it gets extra points for seeding the monthly giving concept with supporters, making them more receptive to converting when they received the separate, dedicated 2013 message series describing the need and benefit of monthly giving in more detail. Monthly giving is the holy grail of fundraising, so we have to applaud campaigns that help pave the way for success in that area.