Putting Donors at the Center of Your Thinking Can Cure an Ailing Fundraising Program

How healthy is your organization? Could it possibly be suffering from one of three diseases that are endemic to the nonprofit world?

Until recently, these diseases weren't anything to worry about. But donors are getting more demanding and less likely to tolerate the symptoms of these illnesses. Today, any one of these diseases could be life-threatening for your organization.

Nonprofit Navel-Gazing Syndrome
Does your newsletter (and/or Web site) contain any of the following?

• News about back-office staff.

• A photo of a well-heeled donor presenting a giant check to your organization.

• Photos of people standing around (possibly holding wine glasses) at your fundraising event.

• Articles with the sole purpose of educating donors.

If you answered yes to any of these, your organization may suffer from Nonprofit Navel-Gazing Syndrome (NPNGS). This condition causes nonprofits to believe that their own understanding of the world must be shared by others — especially donors. This leads to a lack of respect for donors who "don't get it." This elitist attitude prevents effective fundraising.

The reality is that donors simply aren't you. They're less schooled in the fine points of what it takes to accomplish your mission. Their view of what you do is less nuanced than your own. They are drawn to simplistic, even incomplete, descriptions of your work — and the strongest philosophical argument can leave them cold.

Organizations with advanced NPNGS sometimes don't even want support from "deficient" donors. They come to believe that they can get new and "better" donors who will appreciate them at a deeper level.

The sad truth is, they inevitably learn that there are few donors willing to spend the time getting "up to speed." (Fortunately, that doesn't means they're unwilling to give their money!)

Donors are interested in you because of what you help them do. You are their agent in their personal mission to make the world better. That should be the topic of all your fundraising. Not the inner workings of the organization. Not the accomplishments of notable others. Not the need for raised consciousness or philosophical buy-in.

Your top-notch staff, your wonderful events, your well-honed methodology, your superior mindset — all these things are part of your uniqueness and your ability to accomplish your mission. But donors aren't much interested in that. They just want to give to achieve clear results they can understand. Swallow your pride and meet donors where they are.

NPNGS sometimes takes an even more virulent form — called "branding." In the commercial world, branding means to identify your customers and shape your message and product to those customers. In the nonprofit world, branding often takes the exact opposite direction: Organizations identify their own beliefs and aspirations--and then strictly codify these things into a communication platform.

This is typically done with little or no connection to what donors know, believe or expect. The results are predictable: puzzled, unmotivated donors who eventually migrate toward more accommodating places to invest their giving.

A donor-centered brand--one that puts the needs of donors at center-stage — is a powerful thing. The nonprofits that cure themselves of NPNGS and create donor-centered brands are the ones with the truly bright futures.

Malignant Accountants
The most typical symptom of this common malady is not letting donors designate their giving. They simply aren't given the choice. Donors are only allowed to give unrestricted or undesignated funds.

If this is happening in your organization, it's possible you have Malignant Accountants who are not working for your donors. And if they don't work for your donors, they're not working for you. You might need to have them removed.

The new generation of donors demands choice and power. They get plenty of both from the commercial world. They increasingly demand the same from the nonprofits they support. If you can empower your donors, they will reward you. But if your accountants' need to make their jobs easy keeps you from empowering donors, you will generally end up with one or both of these problems:

1. Weak fundraising, where your lack of specificity fails to motivate donors.
2. Misleading fundraising, where specificity of any kind can give a false impression of where their money is going.

In either case, your failure to empower your donors will cause them to seek other places to give. And sooner or later, they'll find nonprofits that have had their Malignant Accountants removed and are able to give donors choice.

Accountants are quick to point out the danger of giving donors power: Donors might overfund certain programs and leave others short of funds. That's a real possibility — one your organization needs to face. But who should help you solve it? Yes, your accountants. Accountants are generally smart people who can help you solve sticky problems such as this. Sadly, far too many of them have chosen an easy solution that locks out donors.

You need accountants who will bite the bullet and put the money where the donors want it. More and more donors are demanding this power.

Web Blockage
Go ahead. Visit any random nonprofit Web site and try to give online. Unless you happen to hit one of the rare sites that practices excellent online fundraising (there are a few), you'll find Web Blockage — things that make it hard for donors to donate:

• Donation pages that have little or no info about the gift. (In essence, blank reply devices.)

• Ultra-long forms as the first step in giving.

• Unclear instructions.

• Gift engines that force donors to register even for the privilege of seeing the donation page.

Donation pages around the Web are a rogue's gallery of donation-stopping techno-follies like these and others. These Web Blockages are costing their owners revenue. Worse, they're failing to serve donors by making it hard for them to do what they came to you to do.

The record level of online giving that followed last December's tsunami disaster showed us that the Web is a maturing medium — and the medium of choice for a growing number of donors.

The time to make your Web site donor friendly is now. For the most part, that means using common sense. You have years of experience creating direct-mail reply devices that work. You know that each one needs to have these characteristics:

• Complete and compelling description of the fundraising offer.

• Motivating, emotional language.

• Simplicity and clarity.

• Choices for the donor.

• Relevance to the donor.

A good start for a strong online giving page would be to make it work like a good paper reply device. And then make it better. Online reply devices are more flexible than the paper model, so why not make them even better? They can do nifty, donor-friendly things such as:

• Forms already filled out (assuming you know who's visiting that page).

• Gift arrays based on where the donor came from.

• Instant calculations of the impact of a gift.

Study your Web usage statistics. They will show you exactly where your Web Blockages are — the points at which donors abandon their attempts to give. (If your Web people won't give you the information, fire them.) Be willing to make meaningful changes to remove every source of blockage. This may require different kinds of programming. (If your Web people won't fix it, fire them.)

If you rigorously test and improve your donation pages, you'll end up with a blockage-free Web site — ready for the coming day when online fundraising really takes off. (That day, some would say, is already here!)

The cure for each of these diseases is to treat your donors right:

• Respect your donors. Don't expect them to become carbon copies of you.

• Empower your donors. Give them meaningful choices about their investments with you.

• Serve your donors. Make giving easy and rewarding.

Be there for donors, and they'll be there for you. And they'll take you into an exciting (and healthy) future.

Jeff Brooks is the senior creative director at the Domain Group, an international direct-marketing firm serving nonprofit organizations.