5 Steps to Making Direct-Response Fundraising Work Again

But that's not the only way many nonprofits defeat their own purposes. I've actually heard nonprofit executives opine that "people just don't want to get so many letters," and based on that opinion rather than on testing, they've decided to reduce the amount of contact with donors.

Others have decided to cut costs by shifting printing and postage budgets into social media because they're convinced it's the next big thing. Still others have shifted their fundraising focus to the next generation: those in their 20s and 30s with hip, edgy marketing campaigns. And when the campaigns invariably fail to raise sufficient dollars, they excuse them by claiming that they're sowing seeds to develop donors of the future.