Direct Mail

When the Southeast Texas Food Bank was incorporated in 1991, it did no fundraising whatsoever, it had two donor names (the executive director and a board member) and its budget was around $700,000. Today, it has 25,000 donor names in its database and an operating budget of $1.9 million.

To take advantage of this evolving popularity of responding online to direct-mail appeals, let’s look at some strategies that you can implement immediately that will make your mail more engaging and encourage your prospects, donors and members to give, join and renew on your website.

Online giving, specifically in response to your direct-mail appeals, is a quickly evolving phenomenon that can no longer be ignored. In fact, it’s a big part of the reason we’ve been hearing over the past couple of years that direct-mail fundraising results are declining.

Quadriga Art, the nation’s leader in nonprofit mail and strategic fundraising services, is embracing the Direct Marketing Association’s Green 15 Pledge Program as an industry guide for how organizations can derive additional value from the greening of their mailing activities across a number of strategic areas in the mail marketing channel.

Five fundraising professionals offered ideas for success and growth for this year and beyond to wrap up day 1 of the DMA Nonprofit Federation's 2011 Washington Nonprofit Conference.

DirectMail.com (www.DirectMail.com), a leading provider of integrated direct marketing solutions, announced today that Capital Hospice, a nonprofit providing expert end-of-life care to patients and families in need in Northern Virginia, Washington, D.C. and Prince George's County, Md., exercised the first of two 1-year renewal options in its contractual agreement. DirectMail.com will thus manage all aspects of the organization's 2011 direct mail program, overseeing year-end, special appeal, acquisition and renewal mailings.

The Center for Biological Diversity, an environmental charity in Tucson that fights to keep endangered species alive, decided to eliminate direct mail in 2010 after it conducted an in-depth analysis of its costs.

Getting rid of mass mailings has proved to be a boon for the center: By the final weeks of 2010, its first year without direct mail, the charity had raised $1-million more from individuals than the preceding year, an increase of 44 percent

Try dressing up the outer envelope to get your fundraising direct mail opened and read.

I deliberately became a lapsed donor (13+ months) in early 2010 in order to receive more reinstatement and acquisition mail, to see how nonprofits would endeavor to woo me back. Recent lapsed-donor direct-mail efforts from St. Labre and CARE really stand out.

Fundraising pros Dane Grams and Richard DeVeau offer some general tips for small and midsized nonprofit organizations.