Testing

Our industry has developed a long list of best practices, based on experience, testing and measured results. But best practices are guidelines. When they're etched in stone they can become tombstones.

We resist experimenting with innovative tools and processes because we insist that "It" — the "It" being a predictive model, a new online tool, a new multichannel process, you name it — be 100 percent correct, 100 percent of the time. Otherwise, forget it, we’ll just stick with the same-old-same-old, thank you.

Of course we arrive at such a silly expectation without the foggiest idea of what the "failure rates" are on the techniques and technologies we’ve been using — without question — for years.

Institutional memory is a tremendous asset, especially if you've been around awhile. The problem is bad ideas can become traditions too. If your nonprofit has "always" done some things a certain way, you need to make sure they still make sense.

Institutional memory is a tremendous asset, especially if you've been around awhile. The problem is bad ideas can become traditions too. If your nonprofit has "always" done some things a certain way, you need to make sure they still make sense.

The always wonderful Seth Godin published some great wisdom on this subject in his blog recently, and I was so struck by his (always) right-on-the-money observations that I had to share them with you — adapted nonprofit style. Following are some of Seth’s main points (in bold), followed by my interpretations for the fundraising crowd.

There are a ton of myths out there about A/B testing that prevent smart marketers from making accurate, data-driven decisions. To keep you from landing in that camp, we’re going to debunk some of the most common A/B testing myths out there. Let’s get started!

Keeping our eye on how things are working can help avoid the need for "surgery" later on that could be far more painful. So here are a few tips for maintaining good fundraising health.

Most of the $690 million Barack Obama raised online came from fundraising e-mails. During the campaign, Obama’s staff wouldn’t answer questions about them or the alchemy that made them so successful. Now, with the election over, they’re opening the black box. The appeals were the product of rigorous experimentation by a large team of analysts. “We did extensive A-B testing not just on the subject lines and the amount of money we would ask people for,” says Amelia Showalter, director of digital analytics, “but on the messages themselves and even the formatting.”

As you plan the last quarter of 2012 and look ahead to 2013’s fundraising calendar, here are some things to think about to improve your chances of “happily ever after.”

Here are four mistakes to avoid and three ideas to keep in mind when digging through your data to get those major gifts.