The Quest for Younger Donors

Here are two questions to clarify the quest to find the elusive younger donors:

1. What is the most important indicator of whether someone will give to a direct-response appeal? Answer: Whether they've given before. To any appeal. Or, better still, to you. People in their 20s and 30s likely haven't.
2. What is the second most important indicator of whether someone will give to a direct-response appeal? Answer: Age. It's a better predictor than household income, ethnicity, education levels or religion. (Check out the chart from Russ Reid's "The Heart of the Donor Study," which confirms what we all should know from experience: Older donors give more, and are more generous and far more valuable to nonprofits than younger donors.)

What does this mean to you?