The Best Latte in Town

Say you run a coffee shop.  And over the years, through trial and error and iteration, you’ve figured out how to make a latte that people LOVE. 

More people start coming to your coffee shop.  You’re making more money.  You get voted “Best Latte in Town.”  You now have a steady stream of new and repeat customers, you’re selling more pastries, things are growing.

Here’s what no one tells you: pretty soon you’re going to be bored to tears making that latte in that way. 

And because you’re human, you’re going to be tempted to change the way you make your latte.

So you’re faced with this choice: to keep making the latte the same way (which reliably delivers revenue and growth) or try something new and see what happens.

This situation plays out in Fundraising all the time.

Through trial and error and iteration, a nonprofit creates a fundraising offer or message that reliably brings in more donations than any other offer or message… then after a while the staff get tired of that fundraising offer or approach, or they believe that if donors knew more about the organization they would give more… and pretty soon the organization is on a path to replace the proven performer with something new. 

Here’s what a smart coffeeshop owner does (and it’s the same thing a smart nonprofit should do).  They would never just “stop making the famous latte and replace it with something they think would work better.”  Instead, they would maximize that latte’s effect while simultaneously developing new products. 

So, they would put a big sign in the window that says “home of the best latte in town,” and feature large posters of the latte in the store, all while using the reliable flow of customers and revenue to fuel the business. 

And at the same time they would regularly try little experiments with boundaried consequences.  They’d make a latte in a new way and add it as a “special” for a month.  They’d try a tea drink on a random Tuesday and see how many customers buy it.  In other words, a nonprofit would try out a new offer or message in a new appeal they’ve never sent before.  Or they’d try it out in a mini email campaign.

For nonprofits, the principle is that if you’ve spent all the time and money to develop a fundraising message that you know worked really well – and your beneficiaries or cause are counting on you – don’t change it because you’re bored with it.  There’s too much at stake!

It is absolutely OK to change offers or messaging (that’s how organizations learn and grow!), but when you have a proven, reliably successful offer or message, you only change it when you’ve tested a new offer or message and have evidence that it will work as well or better than the current offer or message.

And here’s a little note for people who don’t like or are bored with fundraising that works well for your organization: just as it’s OK for the famous latte to not be the favorite thing on the menu for the owner of the coffee shop, it’s OK for a nonprofit’s most successful fundraising offer or message to not be the favorite message of the staff or leadership.  The latte isn’t made for the owner, and the fundraising isn’t made for the staff.