Future Fundraising Now

Don’t blast your donors

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by

Jeff Brooks
in

Does it strike you as a potential problem that when we email our donors it’s called a blast?

As if it’s a loud noise attended by a lot of damage. I sure hope none of the emails I do are like that.

I know calling it a blast doesn’t make it a literal blast. But the words we use affect us. How many fundraisers are working with the image of a blast in their minds while they create an email fundraising piece. Those who do are making their message somewhat more blast-like, I can almost guarantee.

Call it something else!

Launch? Release? Send?

    Comments

    4 responses to “Don’t blast your donors”

    1. Pamela Grow Avatar
      Pamela Grow

      How about “touch?”

    2. Pamela Grow Avatar
      Pamela Grow

      How about “touch?”

    3. Nicole B Nash Avatar
      Nicole B Nash

      Greeting, touch-base, update, news-share, connecting, communicating
      It helps to think of donors as partners in the mission. “Mission Members” if you will. What types of email do you have with others in the organization and with collaborating organizations? Think of your donor emails in similar terms. I don’t blast my coworkers; I communicate with them, touch base with them on projects, update them on progress, share information with them, send them birthday greetings. You get the idea. Donors are a unique group INSIDE the organization, not some “other” outsiders.

    4. Nicole B Nash Avatar
      Nicole B Nash

      Greeting, touch-base, update, news-share, connecting, communicating
      It helps to think of donors as partners in the mission. “Mission Members” if you will. What types of email do you have with others in the organization and with collaborating organizations? Think of your donor emails in similar terms. I don’t blast my coworkers; I communicate with them, touch base with them on projects, update them on progress, share information with them, send them birthday greetings. You get the idea. Donors are a unique group INSIDE the organization, not some “other” outsiders.

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    The future of fundraising is not about social media, online video, or SEM. It’s not about any technology, medium, or technique. It’s about donors. If you need to raise funds from donors, you need to study them, respect them, and build everything you do around them. And the future? It’s already here. More.

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    Jeff BrooksJeff 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. More.

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    The future of fundraising is not about social media, online video, or SEM. It’s not about any technology, medium, or technique. It’s about donors. If you need to raise funds from donors, you need to study them, respect them, and build everything you do around them. And the future? It’s already here. More.

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    About the blogger

    Jeff Brooks has been serving the nonprofit community for more than 30 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.