Tag: writing

Three Lessons from Writing Fundraising with Chat GPT

Steven  |  Ask
Writing robot.

I recently had an experience with AI that opened my eyes to a couple things that I think you’ll benefit from knowing. Here’s the story…

At Better Fundraising we have a letter that asks donors to consider leaving an organization in their will. We create versions of this letter for our customers, and it’s quite successful.

But we want to make it easy for all our customers to create their own version of the letter.

So, I pasted the letter into ChatGPT and asked ChatGPT to “anonymize” it. My goal was to keep the letter the same, but take out the organization it was written for, resulting in something like a template.

ChatGPT successfully anonymized the letter… but without being asked added a mass of nonprofit-ese. It took short, simple sentences and made them longer & more complex. It took casual language and made it formal. It took personal writing and made it corporate. Ugh.

Lesson #1: Chat GPT does not naturally differentiate between the types of writing needed for different types of fundraising. AI lumps “grant applications” and “direct response e-appeals” and “brochure copy” all under “fundraising.” In a nutshell, the letter it wrote for me “had too much grant application in a direct response fundraising appeal.” The writing for those two types of fundraising should be significantly different – but AI doesn’t know that.

Lesson #2: The dataset that AIs are based on is full of fundraising writing that’s overly formal, lacks specificity, and is difficult to read. This is a “garbage in, garbage out” situation – if most of the writing that ChatGPT used to create its understanding of fundraising is poor, then the writing that ChatGPT creates is going to be poor.

So, to be more specific and teach ChatGPT what I was looking for, I went ahead and wrote the anonymized letter/template myself. Then I pasted my version into Chat GPT and told it that my letter was they style I was looking for.

For fun, I asked it to analyze the letter and describe what was different about my version.

Here’s how ChatGPT replied…

Let’s analyze the differences between the two versions.
  1. Directness: Your version gets straight to the point, with a direct appeal right from the start. My initial version began by establishing context, potentially adding unnecessary fluff.
    2.
  2. Specificity: While my version aimed to generalize various aspects, your version maintained specificity in areas crucial to the appeal’s emotional resonance, like discussing the importance of the work done by the organization.
    3.
  3. Language: Your language is more personal and direct. For example, “You didn’t have to donate, but you did.” is a straightforward acknowledgment of the donor’s choice to give.
    4.
  4. Structure and Flow: Your version flows more like a conversation, emphasizing gratitude and then transitioning to the ask. It feels more personal and less formal.
    5.
  5. Reference to Beneficiaries: Your letter consistently references the beneficiaries of the work, focusing on the impact the donations have. My version was slightly more focused on the organizational aspect.
    6.
  6. Narrative: Your letter includes a personal story about revising wills, making the ask more relatable. While my version had this as well, the context and personal touch felt stronger in your version.
    7.
  7. Call to Action: Your version includes a clearer call to action, specifically about using the enclosed card for notifying about the bequest. It gives readers a tangible next step.
    8.

In summary, while both versions aimed to maintain the letter’s integrity and goal, your version manages to be personal, direct, and emotionally compelling.

Color me impressed with how well ChatGPT defined the differences between our approaches. And I couldn’t help feeling that the AI had given me a compliment, which was weirdly satisfying.

Those seven principles above are GREAT advice for writing effective direct response fundraising. When you are creating appeals, newsletters, e-appeals, etc., follow those tips and you’ll immediately be a more effective Fundraiser. I bet you could paste any piece of individual donor fundraising into ChatGPT or any other AI, then ask the AI to modify it by applying the 7 principles above, and the fundraising would be more effective.

Lesson #3: AI looks at all fundraising writing as equal – it doesn’t know how each piece performed, so it doesn’t know which approaches and types of stories raise more. At Better Fundraising know from experience & data that “personal, direct, and emotionally compelling” fundraising writing will tend to raise more money. But ChatGPT doesn’t know that because it doesn’t see results!

ChatGPT does not know that one appeal letter got a 2% response rate and another one got a 5% response rate. So when ChatGPT creates fundraising, it’s pulling from “everything it’s seen, regardless of how it worked.” When Better Fundraising creates fundraising, we’re pulling from “everything we’ve seen that we know worked great.” There’s a big difference.

ChatGPT is an incredible tool. But, at least for now, there’s no danger that it’s going to replace an experienced Fundraiser.

PS — If you’re interested in learning more about creating fundraising with AI, there’s a popular video of me using Chat GPT to write an appeal on the fly for an organization that I’d never spoken to before. People like it because you’ll quickly see all the strengths and negatives of using AI to write fundraising for individual donors. You’ll be able to decide whether it’s a good tool for your workflow or not. You can watch the video here.

Five Tips for the First Sentence of Your Next Appeal Letter

Steven  |  Ask
appeal

People ask me all the time,

“How do you start your appeals? I have the hardest time with that.”

If starting appeals or e-appeals is something you can have trouble with, check out Five Tips for the First Sentence of Your Next Appeal Letter.

The tips are easy to follow. And they make beginning your next appeal or email a snap.

By the way, I think first sentences, subject lines and teasers are becoming more important in our work as Fundraisers. Getting and keeping people’s attention is harder than it’s ever been.

The people and organizations who can reliably create great first sentences are going to have a larger impact.

Writing Tip: Put the Most Important Information First

Steven  |  Ask
important

There’s a writing principle you should live by:

Put the most important information first

Here’s what I mean.  Here’s a sentence from an e-appeal I edited recently:

Industrial, resource-heavy growth threatens Maryland’s fragile wetlands.

This sentence does what we were taught to do in school: explain and provide context, then make the point. 

Let’s look at it again, this time with a simple sentence diagram (apologies if you get flashbacks to middle school):

Industrial, resource-heavy growth
<           explains the context            > 

threatens Maryland’s fragile wetlands.
  <  idea that matters most to the donor  >

The problem is that in the mail and email, the end of a long sentence is less likely to be read than the beginning of a sentence.  (Look at a heat map and you’ll see how little most people read when they first look at your fundraising.)

So you want to put the most important information first, and then explain.

So how should you write the sentence above if you assume that many readers are only going to read the beginning of a sentence?  You’d write something like this:

Maryland’s fragile wetlands are threatened
  <  idea that matters most to the donor  >

by industrial, resource-heavy growth.
<           explains the context            > 

Writing in this way is one of the reasons that effective fundraising in email and the mail feels different from what your English teacher taught you. 

Additionally, this approach occasionally results in using the passive voice. This bothers people sometimes because the rule they live by is to ’never use the passive voice.’ The rule *I* live by is that, on behalf of beneficiaries, I’ll break any grammar rule I need to in order to create more effective communication.

Because beginning with the idea that matters most to the donor will make a few more people “get the message” your fundraising is sending.  That causes a few more people to give, which causes your organization to do more good.

It’s a great, free way to get a little more out of each appeal and e-appeal!

The Magic Words in Fundraising: “Let’s Try It”

Sarah Lundberg  |  Ask
learn

In my last post, I shared what it felt like to realize that marketing rules and fundraising rules were different. Click here to see how well I handle being wrong.

Being willing to learn the rules for fundraising writing changed everything for my organization, and for me.

I walked away from my learning and writing adventure with an appeal letter that was like nothing my organization had ever tried before.

  • The letter was direct and clear.
  • The writing was simple, around a 5th grade reading level.
  • We told donors in a clear way what the problem was and how they could give to help solve that problem.
  • We included a story that illustrated the problem.
  • We asked donors to give multiple times throughout the letter.
  • The letter was FOUR PAGES LONG, plus there was a full-sized reply sheet.
  • The font was large and readable (15 pt!).
  • And the design was simple… a lot like plain old letterhead with a few design elements.

I printed out the letter and walked into my boss’s office. I watched his facial expressions as he read it.

Nothing.

And then he said,

“Sarah, I don’t know if this will work. I’m somewhat skeptical. But let’s try it.”

“But let’s try it” – these turned out to be the magic words.

That letter where I followed FUNDRAISING rules raised five times what the previous year-end appeal raised.

And it changed the way we did direct mail and email fundraising.

Even though the new way of doing things was a lot more effective, it wasn’t all smooth sailing.

But it turned out the things I learned served me well, even when the world changed completely.

Next time… fundraising when the world turns upside down.

Comment here or find me on Twitter @sarahlundberg.

Read the series

Let’s Break Some Rules!

Sarah Lundberg  |  Ask
Rules

If I’m in an empty parking lot with nobody around as far as the eye can see, I will still follow the arrows and not cut through other parking spots to get where I need to go.

I’m a rule follower.

But today I’m going to ask you to break some rules.

Grammar rules.

Because when you break some of the grammar rules you’ve been following most of your life, something interesting happens. Your writing comes alive, and you start to sound like a real person.

The purpose of direct response fundraising writing is to build a relationship with your donor. What’s the best way to do that? By sounding like a human!

Are you feeling uncomfortable?

I get it.

At first, breaking grammar rules bugged me. Now… I delight in it! Because I’ve seen how much more donors connect with a letter or email that sounds like it’s coming from a real person.

So let me suggest a shift in thinking.

Instead of thinking, “I’m breaking the basic rules of grammar,” shift to “I’m writing with a more personal style that better connects with donors.”

This is the art of direct response fundraising writing.

You see, the most effective writing in direct response fundraising includes imitating how people talk in real life conversations. This means you do things like…

  • Start sentences with And or But.
  • Vary your paragraph length. Use a short one-liner, then a three-liner, then maybe a two-liner. No long hamburger paragraphs from grade school!
  • Sprinkle in em dashes — and ellipses … (I call these … drama dots) for dramatic effect or a break in the rhythm.
  • End a sentence with a preposition sometimes (GASP!).
  • Use a sentence fragment to make a point (DOUBLE GASP!!!).

Remember, you are not writing a grant application. Grant applications have their (very important) place. But… have you ever willingly read a grant application?

If you are getting pushback internally, please read this post.

You must do better than grant application writing to keep your donors reading.

The more your direct response writing reflects a living, breathing, emotional, messy, interesting human being… the more likely your donors will keep reading and keep engaging with your mission.

And that’s what this is all about, right?

Break free from grammar rules and let me know how it goes! Comment here or find me on Twitter @sarahlundberg.

Three Editing Principles

Steven  |  Ask
Editing

In my first job as a fundraising writer, my mentor regularly and rigorously edited my work. 

It was painful. 

But I’m forever grateful because he always explained the “why” behind the edits.  And over time I became a more effective writer.

In an effort to “pass it on,” here are three edits I made in the last week.  Hopefully seeing the “before” and the “after” – and knowing why the edit was made – will help you in the same way it helped me…

Start with the Most Important Info

Original copy:
“Today, you have an incredible opportunity. Thanks to the generosity of [company name], your gift will be TRIPLED up to $40,000.”

Edited Copy:
“Your gift will be TRIPLED up to $40,000! What an incredible opportunity to increase your impact, thanks to the generosity of [company name].”

Reasoning:
Put the most important information first.

The example paragraph contains three ideas: the donor has an opportunity, the matching funds are provided by a company, and the donor’s gift will triple.  Of those three, the most important idea *to the donor* is that their gift will triple.  Arrange the ideas in the paragraph so that the most important idea is first. 

You never want to put important information at the end of a paragraph. A significant percentage of people will scan your letter or email (instead of reading it).  And “scanners” often don’t read more than the first few words of a paragraph. 

“Don’t bury the lede” is in the Donor Communications Constitution for a reason.

Avoid Ambiguity

Original copy:
“Her mom’s ability to work has been impacted by the pandemic.”

Edited Copy:
“Her mom hasn’t been able to work as much because of the pandemic.”

Reasoning:
Avoid words and phrases that can mean multiple things.

The phrase “ability to work has been impacted” is value neutral; the ‘impact’ could be either good or bad.  But the job of this sentence (and the paragraph it resides in) is to provide evidence that a gift is needed today.  The edited copy makes it clearer, faster, that the situation is a negative one. 

Any time you require a reader to figure out exactly what you mean, you’ve increased the chances they will abandon your email or letter. 

Make It About the Reader

Original copy:
“We still need your help to reach our match goal.”

Edited Copy:
“Your help is still needed, and your gift will be doubled.”

Reasoning:
Donors are more interested in themselves than they are in organizations.

The sentence, “We still need your help to reach our match goal” is mostly about the organization.  It’s the organization that needs help.  It’s the organization’s goal. 

But that sentence can be re-written to be about the reader.  “Your help is needed, and your gift will be doubled.”   And we’ve turned the slightly ambiguous phrase “match goal” into a donor benefit; their gift will be doubled.

Editing your direct response fundraising to make it more about your reader and their interests is a counter-intuitive but proven approach to raising more money.

This post was originally published on April 1, 2021.

Fast, Bad and Wrong

Steven  |  Tips

I learned this writing tactic from a podcast, and hope it’s as helpful to you as it has been to me:

If you can’t get started writing something – or if you get stuck – just concentrate on writing fast, bad, and wrong. 

The acronym for this is “FBR.”  Even the acronym is wrong!

From the podcast:

“Write fast, write bad, and write wrong. Terrible style, terrible grammar, terrible word choice, wrong facts, and that liberates you.  And don’t stop and backtrack, because every time you stop, it’s like a car going down the highway – it’s easy to stop, but then you have to spend all this fuel to get back up to speed, and you might not get there.”

Here’s what I do: just start writing, and then just keep going. 

You can describe what you are trying to write.  You can get a few stray thoughts out of your head.  You can write the end before the middle.

But don’t edit now.  Just keep going.  The magic happens after you’ve been writing for a moment or three. 

All the sudden, a helpful thought occurs.  Then a sentence arrives.  Before you know it, a pretty good paragraph just happened.

That will happen a few more times. 

Then you have enough of those to where you know the rough structure of whatever you’re writing. 

And once you know the main ideas and the structure, the rest is connective tissue. 

Then go back and edit out the junk that helped you get there. 

FBR works for emails to co-workers, too. 

Here’s something crazy; it works for making plans.  I can’t tell you how many times I’ve sat down with teammates and clients to figure something out.  If we’re not getting anywhere, and I have a vaguest sense of an idea, I just say that I have an FBR plan to throw out to get us started. More often than you’d think, a great plan gets iterated out of the mud I threw on the wall. 

The FBR approach removes the fear from taking the first step because it lowers the stakes.  And the second and third steps are always easier than the first.      

The next time you’re writing a piece of fundraising and you’re stuck, think FBR, get started, and keep going.  You, your beneficiaries, and your donors will be glad you did! 

How to Write As If You’re Talking to One Person

Steven  |  Ask
Write

Experienced copywriters say things like this all the time:

“The best fundraising sounds like it’s from one person to one person.”

But how do you write fundraising and make it sound like you’re talking to one person?

Here’s how. The following are the ideas I have in my head as I create fundraising materials. One or all of them should help you!

Have One Person in Mind

Most of your donors will have several common traits. You can create a fictional person, imbue them with the traits your donors have, and write your letters/emails/newsletters to that person.

At my first fundraising job, there was a cardboard cutout of an older woman right inside the front door. We were instructed to write all our letters to her.

The fancy marketing word for this is “persona.” Large nonprofits with lots of donors have multiple personas; personas for online donors, personas for major donors, personas for event participants, etc.

The point is the same: visualize who you are writing to and then write to that one person.

Watch Your Plurals

If you’re writing to one person, you don’t use the plural to refer to him or her.

So don’t use plurals like these in your fundraising writing:

  • “Dear Friends,”
  • “All of your gifts…” (which doesn’t make sense for a donor who has only given one gift)
  • “Thank you to everyone who…”

What you want to watch out for is anything that makes the reader think, “Oh, I thought this thing I’m reading was to me, but it turns out it’s to everybody.”

Use the Donor’s Name

Merge in the donor’s name. It’s commonplace to merge the donor’s name in the salutation, and it’s a pro move to merge their name in the letter itself.

For instance, if there’s a paragraph I particularly want the donor to read, I often use the donor’s name as the first word in a paragraph.

People are trained from birth to pay attention to what’s said immediately after their name. Use that to your advantage!

Use the Word ‘You’

This is the obvious one. Second only to a person’s name, the word “you” gets people’s attention.

But there’s another reason “you” is so helpful: it transforms a truth about your organization into a personal truth for the donor.

You can FEEL the emotional difference between, “A gift to our organization will fight cancer” and, “your gift will fight cancer.”

I have a general rule of thumb for when I edit fundraising: whenever I see the organization’s name, I try to delete it and replace it with the word “you.” It’s not the right thing to do in all cases, but it’s the right thing to do in most cases.

Use the Language a Donor Would Use

Have you ever been in a conversation with someone who has a stellar vocabulary and kind of shows it off? Or talked to a person who’s an expert in their field and is constantly using jargon and you’re not quite sure what it means?

What’s the result when people like that talk to you? It makes you feel like the person isn’t really talking to you. It makes you feel like they are kind of talking to themselves and people “just like them.”

By using language that insiders value and appreciate, a lot of nonprofits accidentally make their donors feel like outsiders.

But using language that a donor would use crosses the gap to donors, instead of widening the gap.

Think of It This Way

Donors are looking for organizations that make it easy for them to understand what’s going on in the world and how their gift will help.

If you follow these rules, you’ll create fundraising that makes each of your donors think, “Hey, this organization is writing to me.” She’s more likely to feel known, and you’ll make it easy for her to understand what you’re writing about.

And you’ll notice that your fundraising results will tick up meaningfully.

Greatest Hit: Five Tips for the First Sentence of Your Next Newsletter Article

Steven  |  Report

The following post is one of the most popular posts in the history of this blog.

I’m reposting it because you might be new to the blog, or you might be like me and need to hear a piece of advice more than once before it really sinks in.

This post proved helpful to thousands of people, I hope it’s helpful for you!

The first sentence of every newsletter story is really important.

Don’t do what most nonprofits do. They assume that all donors read to the end of all articles. I routinely review newsletters where the most powerful parts of the stories are in the last paragraphs – where very few people will see it. Because all the eye-tracking studies show that most donors don’t “read” your newsletter. They scan it.

So, you want to work hard on the first sentence of your newsletter articles and stories. If the donor likes your first sentence, she’s more likely to read your second sentence, and so on.

And you don’t have to be a “writer” to make the first sentences of your newsletter sing. But you do have to think about them differently. I have 25 years experience that testifies that the following ‘ways of thinking differently’ about how your start your newsletter articles will help you raise more money.

Keep it simple

Make it short and easy to read. No long sentences. No complex sentences with multiple clauses. Your reader should be halfway into the second sentence before she realizes it.

Now you have momentum. Now you have a greater chance your donor is going to get the message you’re sending her.

Good Example: “Ebola took everything Elisabeth had.”

It’s not about your organization

The first sentence of any newsletter article should never be about your organization or staff.

The most successful newsletters are written with the purpose of showing your donor what her gift accomplished. Not to talk about all of the things you’ve been doing or have coming up. Because more people are reading your newsletter wondering “I wonder if my gift made a difference?” than are wondering “I wonder what the organization has been working on?”

So, your first sentence should be about the donor, or about a beneficiary.

(And remember: as your donor is deciding whether to read your story or not, she is in a hurry and has other things asking for her attention. So, if your first sentence is about your organization or staff, she’s just not as likely to keep reading.)

After all, would you be more likely to keep reading if the story was about something amazing you helped do, or something an organization you support is working on?

Bad Example: “After landing in the capital city of Kinshasa, The Democratic Republic of Congo, our team traveled inland to a village outside the town of Kivuvu.” Why would a busy donor keep reading?

Good Example: “Thanks to you, Sarah’s life turned completely around.” Bonus points for including the donor and a beneficiary in the very first sentence!

It’s the start of a summary

I need to do an entire post on writing newsletter stories. But here’s one of my tricks; the first paragraph is often a summary of the whole article.

Why? Because most people are not going to read the whole article, but you still want them to get the message you’re trying to send. So if you summarize the message in a compelling way two great things happen:

  1. More people get the message you’re sending
  2. More people will read the whole thing

Good Example: “Your gift did something simple but life changing for a mother named Teri Maes, and you might have saved the lives of her two sons.” This one is a little long, but it summarizes the whole story AND includes the donor!

Don’t start with a statistic

In a nutshell, experts love statistics. But donor’s don’t.

Experts like you, your staff, and your incredible program people love statistics. Statistics are meaningful to experts because they provide context, show progress, and show expertise.

But that’s not what most donors are looking for. They are looking for a quick, easy way to know whether their gift to your organization made a difference. That’s usually a story of a beneficiary, with a little editorial content for how the donor’s gift helped the beneficiary.

Starting with a statistic immediately reduces the number of people who will keep reading because it asks the donor to understand something new and then understand why it’s important or helpful. That’s a lot to ask of a non-expert donor who is moving fast.

She’d rather read a story, my friend. So start with a story.

Bad Example: “Only one in nine children in our great state will ever go to a symphony.”

Drama! Action! Peril!

I’m going to quote my post on appeal letters on this one:

“Fill it with drama or make it interesting to your donor. Drama and tension are two of the best tools you have for engaging their interest. Or make it something that would be interesting to your donor – which is likely something different than would be interesting to you!”

My best one-liner about this is, “You want to write like the National Inquirer, not National Geographic.” That probably over-dramatizes it, but drama and emotion catch people’s interest. Most nonprofits assume they have their donor’s interest – and that’s a bad assumption.

Bad Example: “Drs. Martha and Robert Bryant strive to use their medical practice to make an impact.” Who are those people? Why should the donor keep reading?

Good Example: “The first night Jacqueline went to community theater, her life changed in the second act.”

So as you go to work on your next newsletter, here’s what I hope you’ll remember:

  1. Very few people will read an entire newsletter article. So get to the point very quickly, summarize it, then tell the full scope of the story.
  2. To increase the chances that your donor will read more, make your first sentence easy to read and interesting to her!

This post was originally published on February 2, 2018.