Is the person writing your fundraising the one person in the whole world least able to do it right? Might be, according to Roy H. Williams in a recent MondayMorningMemo, Everyone is Entitled to Their Own Opinion But Not Their Own Facts.
The person who most should not be writing your organization’s fundraising is you:
… most people believe that everyone else thinks like they do. This has led to more disasters in advertising than you can possibly imagine.
Consequently, you are uniquely unqualified to write ads for your business. You know too much about it. More importantly, you care too much about it. This causes you to assume that everyone else cares, or should care as much as you do.
Williams is talking about commercial advertising, but he could easily be talking about fundraising.
You are uniquely unqualified to write your own fundraising!
Almost all the knowledge and personal qualities that make you effective in a nonprofit organization will make you a crappy fundraising writer.
I know it’s self-serving for me to say it, but please: Get outside help for your fundraising. Get a smart agency (I can steer you toward a very good one!). If you can’t afford an agency, a consultant. At the very least, a freelance writer who knows fundraising.
It will be worth it.
Jeff Brooks has been serving the nonprofit community for more than 35 years and blogging about it since 2005. He considers fundraising the most noble of pursuits and hopes you’ll join him in that opinion. You can reach him at jeff [at] jeff-brooks [dot] com.
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