Recently I surveyed the 1,000 members of Independent Charities of America asking them if they had any experience with prospecting for contributors via email using 3rd party lists (i.e. lists purchased from email list brokers). The response to my inquiry was overwhelming. More than 400 members replied.
And the answer to my question was – overwhelmingly – DON’T DO IT!
The majority of respondents had not tried 3rd party email lists, but they had thought about maybe trying them in the future and wanted to know what I learned. Those who had tried them had nothing but tales of woe: Too expensive, poor response rate, lots of bad addresses, and internet service providers threatening to cut off their service for spamming.
Example: Email solicitation sent to a targeted list of 150,000 addresses, with a repeat of the solicitation to the same addresses one month later. Total response clicks: 57. Revenue from the 57: $0.00.
This experience explains why the list brokers want their fees up front and not based on percentage of dollars raised or on number of responses.
Some member charities reported they had experimented with services that “append” email addresses to postal addresses the charities already have on file. Again, the results were not promising. It seems lots of folks don’t like the idea of you getting their email address if they didn’t send it to you themselves.
Several members had experimented with www.care2.org. It’s a social networking site organized around causes. You can post a petition there which people can sign if they wish, and they may also opt-in your email list. You can also buy targeted lists from the site. The consensus was that the site works pretty well for getting your word out but not so well for raising money. Signing your petition is one thing. Sending you money is another.
Swapping lists with another organization? Also a no-no. Trading links with another organization on your respective web sites? Don’t bother.
A couple of respondents have very sophisticated postal direct mail operations in addition to their email fund raising. Often when one uses postal mail the cost is not recouped by the initial solicitation but is amortized by repeat donors over time. Email, these charities told me, generally doesn’t work as well as postal mail in this regard. (I have no data to prove this assertion or not; I’m just passing it on).
Some members mentioned www.papilia.com. It works like this: You send your postal house list a postcard asking them to go to the papilia site, where they make an online gift and get a tax receipt immediately. The site claims this technique results in a higher response rate than postal mail alone and at the same time allows you to collect the email addresses of your supporters so you can solicit them by (cheaper) email in the future.
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OK, so what DOES Work?
ICA members reported much, much more success using their “house lists” – that is, lists assembled from people who have asked to be contacted for one reason of another. Members, newsletter recipients, web site visitors who sign a guest book or who made a previous donation using your “give now” button, etc. Soliciting these people via email is a no-brainer PROVIDING you craft your message carefully and don’t go to the well too often.
So how do you build your house list?
The #1 way is obvious. Put your "give button" front and center on your web site. When you collect a donation you collect the email address of a web-savvy giver who now has a relationship with you.
Another obvious method is to invite your web visitors to sign up for your online newsletter or for email "alerts."
Some members also reported success with "viral marketing" techniques – such as giving visitors to your web site an opportunity to send email messages to their friends, directly from your web site, encouraging them to join in supporting you as well. In the process, you’ve captured those friends’ addresses. (Caveat: Personally, I would suggest you never write those addresses independently unless they respond back to you to make a gift or otherwise engage you. Just because you harvested an address doesn’t mean you should use it without at least implied consent.)
Some members also reported success purchasing electronic display ads on commercial web sites (usually news sites) to drive traffic to the charities’ own web sites. That can be expensive but it may be worth testing for those who can afford it. What we have learned from managing the federations’ web sites is the more online traffic we get the more online gifts we receive.
I anticipate some of the federations may experiment this fall with other email-based venues. Possibly Google. I’ll keep you posted.
