Anatomy of a Committed Donor
Commitment is an attitudinal framework. We are measuring how the donor thinks and feels. This is in direct contrast to what many nonprofits focus on, which is more typically a behavior-only view.
The great strength and weakness of direct marketing is this singular reliance on past behavior (most notably, the financial metrics of recency, frequency and monetary amount) to presume future behavior. Donors get put into buckets based on their past RFM behavior. This proven process still requires living in the world that was and assuming it always will be — good behavior begets good behavior and vice versa. The big problem is this belief creates a self-fulfilling prophecy for poor retention because the formerly "good" donor with, for example, two "missed" contributions quickly becomes tomorrow's "bad" donor — the dreaded shift from 12 to 13 months recent.
