Do you have too many match offers?

Match offers just work. It’s the charitable version of a good deal: A sort of “buy one, get one free” offer.

They dependably boost response by 10% to as much as 50%.

But can you overdo match offers? Do they become boring and ineffective, maybe even drive down response form over-use?

No, says the TrueSense Blog, at Can You Have Too Many Matching Gift Offers in Your Annual Campaigns?

And my experience confirms this.

More match offers = more donations.

As the post puts it:

… there is no clear evidence that more matches negatively impact donor response. Actually, the notion that there’s a ceiling to match frequency is mostly anecdotal. Teams that have implemented matches across many or all campaigns did not see drop-offs; in many cases, their files responded as well or better than those with less frequent match opportunities.

It’s simple: Matches don’t become a bad approach, even if you use them a lot.

The closest I’ve seen to anything like that happening is this: The more often you go out with match appeals, the less “special” each one gets. If you use just one match campaign a year, it will likely be at or near the top of your performers.

If you have a match in many or most of your campaigns, they won’t stand out as much.

But you’ll raise more with more match campaigns.

The best way to keep repeated match campaigns fresh and powerful is to vary the approach:

• Use different match multipliers. Typically, they double the donors’ gifts. But why not have them triple gifts? Or more? In my experience, those more than 2x matches get modestly more response most of the time.
• Vary the creative approach. Use big, busy packs. Small simple ones. Packs with multiple “match vouchers” instead of the standards reply device. There a many ways to do this, and they all work in my experience.
• Vary the match approach. The standard way is something like this: “When you give, someone else will match what you give, doubling your impact.” That works. Another approach: “We need $50,000 to do this project, but good news, we’re already halfway there, thanks to matching funds of $25,000.” You can also give the match a name, or focus on the deadline. These things give it different flavors.

I have never yet seen a match offer do poorly. They just work. Don’t be afraid of them!