Finding Your Direct-Mail Donors — Online

Takeaways to consider
Even so, we like where this is headed. Here are some other takeaways from the test:

• While every station had a positive ROI of at least 3.5 to 1, there was a large variance by station. This reflects the fact that a large sample size of records (e.g., north of 500,000) is required for trying IP targeting.
• Most of the return came in the form of online ads lifting the response rates to other channels, most notably mail. For example, online display ads serve more as a passive reminder or nudge to donate elsewhere rather than as a direct-response channel themselves.
• The average household was served 25 ad impressions over the four-month test, and CDP received no reports from stations of complaints. This suggests that this form of marketing is unlikely to generate blowback for your nonprofit.
• CDP reports that this program can become easy to use. Once it is set up, the program runs on its own.
• While Facebook ads were not part of this test, Facebook now provides this capability as well through its Custom Audiences as we discussed in a recent article. Test those out, too.

Will direct-response, cookie-based targeting work for you? There’s only one way to find out — test it! And make sure you have a sufficient sample size of records to pursue first.