Quick post today.
When you write, if you don’t have a picture in mind of what the person reading your writing is like, you tend to write for yourself.
I can speak from experience on this – the first posts from this blog are… not interesting. I was writing to myself. It took me months to develop a good picture of who I was writing to and for. And that’s when this blog started to be helpful to people and our number of subscribers started to grow.
“Writing for yourself” happens all the time in nonprofit fundraising. And it results in fundraising that’s not interesting or effective.
Contrast that to a nonprofit that has a good picture of what their donors know, care about, and the language their donors use. When the nonprofit writes to and for those donors (instead of themselves) they create fundraising that connects more and raises more money.
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If you’re like me, you want to know why “writing to and for your donors” works so much better. So even though I said this would be a short post, here’s a longer explanation if you’re interested. 🙂
When a nonprofit writes to itself: they base their fundraising on what the organization knows, what the organization cares about, and uses the words the organization uses.
This results in fundraising that:
- Tries to teach the recipient things, instead of tapping into what the recipient already knows. This is “13% of people in our county have experienced homelessness” compared to “You know that no one should have to be homeless.”
- Tries to make the recipient care about new things, instead of tapping into what the recipient already cares about. This is “Our program is one of the most effective literacy programs” compared to “You know the immediate difference knowing how to read makes on a person’s life.”
- Tries to teach the recipient new words and phrases, instead of using words and phrases the recipient already knows. This is “They are what we call a UETA – Under Exposed to The Arts” compared to “They haven’t been exposed to the Arts enough, and you can change that.”
Think about that for a second; look at all the extra work a donor has to do before they can give! The reader of the email or letter:
- Has to learn new things
- Has to care about things they didn’t care about before
- Has to learn new vocabulary (and sometimes whole new concepts)
This puts what we call an “education barrier” between the organization and its donors.
Organizations using this approach tend to stay small because their fundraising materials ensure that only the “true believers” will give; because only the “true believers” will spend the time and effort to be educated.
The more effective approach is to build a picture of what individual donors who care about your beneficiaries or cause tend to know, care about, and read.
Then write your fundraising to and for the people who fit that picture.
You’ll make your organization more accessible to more people, raise more money, and achieve more of your mission.
