HOW TO GO "SUPPORTER FIRST" WITHOUT LOSING YOUR FORKING MIND

AMY PEYROT (SHE/HER)VICE PRESIDENT DIGITAL FUNDRAISING & ADVOCACY

We ❤ NTEN

How you can help:

● Donate your #20NTC registration by March 30

● Make a donation to NTEN

● Share the fundraising campaign:

we-heart-nten.causevox.com

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We are M+R

We are communicators, marketers, fundraisers, and campaigners who unleash the power of people to do good.

We work exclusively with nonprofits fighting for a just and sustainable world.

Our services include:

DIGITAL FUNDRAISING+ ADVOCACY

DIGITAL ORGANIZING

MEDIARELATIONS ADVERTISING SOCIAL

MEDIA

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WWW.MRBENCHMARKS.COM

Benchmarks

Our annual in-depth review of nonprofit

digital data that tracks trends, spots outliers,

and explores from every vantage point.

Our most recent study includes new metrics

for Facebook revenue, p2p texting, and

retention. We also explore email messaging,

fundraising stats, and the expanding worlds

of digital advertising, social media, web

performance, marketing, and more.

MEDIAMARKS STUDY

Counts the number of press hits for some of nation’s leading nonprofits, broken down by month.

Download at: MRmediamarks.com

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WHERE ARE WE NOW?

AND WHERE ARE WE GOING?

Donors are aging

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Gen X

● They regularly check email and stay up to date on social media feeds

● Email prompted 31% of online donations made by Gen Xers

Millennials

● Respond best to text messages and social media. Rarely check personal email or respond to voice calls

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Up to 75% of your donors might be unreachable by email.

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Channel proliferation

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“Supporter First” in a nutshell

RIGHT PEOPLE RIGHT MESSAGE RIGHT TIME

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IF SUPPORTER FIRST ENGAGEMENT IS SO GREAT, WHY ISN’T EVERYONE DOING IT?

Answer: It’s hard!

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For example: Active donors,

People in renewal window,

Lapsed donors, Prospects,

Active sustainers, Mid-level

donors, Mid-level prospects,

Activists, Event participants,

Volunteers

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For example: Mail, Email,

Telemarketing, SMS,

Website, Search Ads,

Social/Display Ads

If you’re lucky, more!

70 unique strategies!

It’s simple math

10 segments 7 channels

...not to mention how calendar-based campaigns interact with your behaviorally targeted journeys

X =

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So what do we do instead?

Strategize by CHANNEL

RUN campaigns that are relevant &

compelling for lots of people

OPTIMIZE tactics for the list as a whole

GROW the list any way we can

MEASURE performance by immediate KPIs

TAILOR offers for gift level, mostly

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THERE IS A BETTER WAY!

Step 1: Identify and understand your priority audiences

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IDENTIFY MEASURE

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EXPAND

3

AUTOMATE

4

OPTIMIZE

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Identify Your Priority Audiences ( just a sample!)

PROSPECTSMULTI-YEAR

CURRENT DONORS

LAPSED DONORSCURRENT

SUSTAINERSMID-LEVEL DONORS

NEW DONORS

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Map their experience

How do they interact with the program (tickets, advocacy,

membership, store, etc)

What have we learned about testing creative or

strategies for this audience?

How many are reachable in different channels?

How are campaigns personalized for this audience?

Which campaign communications do they receive (all channels)?

What automated messages do they receive?

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Understand what they respond to

Multi-year donors First-year donors

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● Love our program. It’s built for them!

● Renewal series has 13x the response

rate as campaign appeals

● Respond most (proportionally) to EOY

and tentpole institutional campaigns

● Basically the opposite.

● Renewal Series approx equal to

campaign appeals

● Respond more to issue-based

messages than institutional (even EOY)

What one of our clients found...

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Don’t ignore new-to-you emails!

SourceTotal New Joins

(2019)Total Joins With

No OpensPercent Non-Opener

Organic 4,363 3,911 90%

Lead Gen 4,581 3,117 68%

Care2 28,585 17,538 61%

Joint Action 8,577 5,048 59%

Store 410 229 56%

Other 141 75 53%

Daily Kos 1,877 278 15%

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Up to 75% of your donors might be unreachable by email.

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Don’t ignore people you can’t email!

Step 2: Measure performance… the right way

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IDENTIFY MEASURE

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EXPAND

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AUTOMATE

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OPTIMIZE

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Initial Cost Per Acquisition Data

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24 Month Return on Investment Performance

Despite low cost, long-term payoff just wasn’t there

The highest performing source was a bit more expensive initially

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Measure THIS not THAT

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RESPONSE RATE

RETURN ON AD SPEND

COST PER ACQUISITION

COST PER DONOR

LIFETIME VALUE

RETENTION RATES

PROSPECT CONVERSION RATES

Measure performance of a specific channel or effort

Measure value of a donor or supporter (Total experience)

RETURN ON INVESTMENT

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Step 3: Expand into new channels

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IDENTIFY MEASURE

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EXPAND

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AUTOMATE

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OPTIMIZE

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WEBSITE SOCIAL

VIDEO MOBILE AUDIO

ADVERTISING

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You need to move beyond email...

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Pitching media right now: Feel Good Online Programming

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SMS is paying off for early adopters

● Control campaign messages to a

10-email campaign.

● They saw a 97% increase in donors

responding to the campaign

● This same client raised over $300k

from text messages in December 2019!

● (No it wasn’t Elizabeth Warren or her

dog, Bailey)

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Clickthrough rate for fundraising messages

0.44% 13%For email On SMS

Source: 2019 M+R Benchmarks Study @MRcampaigns

Step 4: Optimize strategy and creative for different audiences

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IDENTIFY MEASURE

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EXPAND

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AUTOMATE

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OPTIMIZE

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Premium increased

conversion rate 54%

(statistically significant)

No significant impact on

average gift

Test: Premium vs No premium

PROSPECTS

Premium increased

average gift by 36%

(statistically significant)

No significant impact on

conversion rate

LOW-DOLLAR DONORS (HPG <$100)

No significant impact

(positive or negative) on

conversion rate or average

gift

HIGHER VALUE DONORS

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Acquisition audience vs Retargeting audience

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Paid Search

Paid search landing page

36% increase in conversions!

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WWW.MRSS.COM/TOOLS

Check for Statistical Significance!

Even relatively big swings in test results

could be due to random error, especially if

the audience you are testing with is small.

Test to make sure your results are

“statistically significant” using one of our

calculators.

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Step 5: Automate to deliver timely, tailored messages

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IDENTIFY MEASURE

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EXPAND

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AUTOMATE

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OPTIMIZE

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Renewal Triggers

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SUPPRESS DONORS UNDER RENEWAL FROM CAMPAIGN APPEALS BECAUSE RENEWALS

ARE MORE COMPELLING....but does it work?

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Common refrain:

Test Results

Receiving campaign appeals in addition to renewalnotices drove 13% increase in proportion of donors that

renew.

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Triggered monthly ask to recent one-time donors

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● Most responsive recent donor audience gave 0-15 days ago!

● The further the last gift was, the less responsive they were to the sustainer invite

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Triggered donation ask for action takers

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Triggered donation ask for action takers

You took action—now TRIPLE your gift

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BONUS: Think you know your audiences? Think again.

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Finding Hidden Markets

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Cluster analysis is the process of

grouping objects in such a way that

objects in one cluster are more similar

to each other than to those in other

clusters.

Opportunity!

Your “average donor”

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Cluster 1 characteristics

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● 100% African American

● High percentage and highly indexing

for Evangelical Protestant

● Small percentage, but also highly

indexing for Muslim

● Highly indexing for age 25-34 and HHI

$75k-$99k

● Less likely to be married, Catholic, or a

homeowner

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Cluster 4 “Parents” Top Creative

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Measuring Email Performance for Clusters

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GO FORTH AND DO SUPPORTER FIRST

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IDENTIFY MEASURE

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EXPAND

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OPTIMIZE

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AUTOMATE

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and understand your priority audiences

performance with donor-focused

KPIs (not channel focused)

into new channels strategy and creative for

specific audiences

to deliver timely, tailored messages

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QUESTIONS?