The Little Mailing That Did

The mailing employs very little paper and it lacks a freemium such as address labels, making it cost effective, and it does just as well as the more expensive name label package both in terms of response rate and average gift.

L.W. Robbins likes to test a variety of ask strings in client mailings but has found that the best ask string is $35, $25, $50, other. Because VFB was a new client, it wanted to expand the gift array as much as possible and included a low ask of $15 and a high of $50. But since the mailing garnered an average gift of $35.47, it has since done away with the $15 ask and now uses the tried-and-true $35, $25, $50. When asked why $25 is put in between two higher amounts, Rohrbach says the $25, $35, $50 was tested against $35, $25, $50 and lost because most people choose the first gift amount they see.