In this two hour lunch and learn seminar, Parachute Digital showed Fundraising Directors from Top Australian charities how digital should best be integrated into your overall fundraising mix.
Digital fundraising or online fundraising as many call it, is a growing area within the non-profit sector.
This workshop demystifies online marketing & fundraising strategies, showing Fundraising Directors that the same strategies that they employ offline, for prospect onboarding and donor retention and telling stories, will work online too. It's just a different execution. The strategy is often the same.
Participants were given data homework to do to learn about their donor databases and online/ offline split as well as reading from Shanelle Newton Clapham's book "Attracting Donors Online - Digital Fundraising that works".
What the workshop and presentation covers is:
• Integrating your digital data with your offline database
• Integrating digital into your story-telling
• Integrating digital into your onboarding strategy
• Integrating digital into your retention strategy
• Integrating digital into your donor journey.
37. Retention, or Loyalty is
From the donor’s point of view
•I like the brand
•The cause matches my values
•The organisation values my contribution
•They keep me up to date
•They have great customer service
•They have a product that I want (to be a part of)
•They make me feel good.
2. To connect people to me tell them a story about me - that's related to the topic
My story and how Parachute Digital was born - out of frustration and sick of hearing excuses. I'm quite hard on people - I've been going through this coaching and I got a profile that had a scale of 1-10 on how self critical you are and I was a 1 - the highest possible. What this means is that I also hold others to high standards and most brand experiences weren't meeting my expectations - online and offline. So I wanted to do something about it - and online is my space.
"I believe that there is no excuse for a bad online experience".
Start by asking people what they think "Digital" means?
Q: ask them
Tell them what Digital means to me. How its different from "online" or "internet marketing"
Our desire to communicate hasn’t changed. But HOW we communicate definitely has
Tell story about “Did you get my message?”
I would connect people to themselves and each other by asking them to think of their own behaviour and that of their children and their spouses. To think back over the last 5 years and how that behaviour has changed.
Q: How many times this morning have you picked up your phone to use it for something other than a phone call?
A holiday they went on and what they packed. This will force them to acknowledge how common the use of mobile devices are for them, and thus their audience.
Statement. What is the role of online for your organisation? Or more specifically, what is the purpose of your website or mobile site?
There is always a role that it can play - for some its a time & cost saver, for others its about new audiences and engagement, for others its a direct response channel and a revenue channel. Of course it can be all of these things, but if you're able to prioritise them, your digital strategy will be more focused and successful. Get one thing right, learn from the journey and keep expanding and evolving.
Q: What is the current role of online in your org?
What could the role of online be? Where do you think you could utilise it?
Keep the donor clearly in focus. Give them what they need. Online and offline
Be clear that I love digital and believe it is a worthy fundraising channel, but that I think it works best when integrated with the overall fundraising mix and as a support or destination channel for your other mediums.
Today we're going to talk about how you can integrate Digital Marketing & Fundraising
Data - make informed decisions, no guess work
Storytelling - tell the donor stories they care about (the data guides this) - Leads into engagement
Onboarding - strategy is no different online, its just a different way of executing it. Engagement
Donor Journey - strategy is no different, its still multi-channel, just adding another channel. Might not be for all donors
Retention - cheap, easy, fast, passive and active, financial and non-financial. Just part of the mix. Same strategy, just another channel in your multi-channel strategy.
Integration chapter of the book I gave them to read, and remind them of the Wesley mission case study on integration, and how simple, but effective it was.
Q: Discussion Are any of you using this type of digital integration?
Who is creating video regularly, for each appeal? or Campaign?
Who is using SMS
Whose F2F team are signing up with iPads or still using paper?
What is your Welcome email strategy?
Is online a component at all in your acquisition and onboarding?
I will give them a statistic about attrition rates - Over 6 months the attrition rate has been reduced 10% by using email and SMS and content.
Ask TWS to share their F2F attrition wins when introducing mobile app.
Exercise: How much money are you losing by not implementing the email/ mobile on boarding?
How much is 10% to your business over 6 months? Over 12/ 18/ 36 months.
Map out Acquisition, Drop Off and CPA/ Gifts in worksheet for them to crunch numbers.
Wrap up Questions & Exercise: You don't need to tell me, but write this down.
How much income do you get through online channels? Lets say 10%
How much do you spend annually maintaining your offline Database? Growing it?
How much do you spend annually maintaining your online database? Growing it?
If its not 10% of the offline, then that might explain why you're not getting the same numbers online - because you're not nurturing it and investing in it.
Q: What could this mean to your business?
Get them thinking about their organisation and how much money they are potentially losing.
Is it worth investing the money to test it?
Q: Whose online and offline database are housed in the same place?
If not, do you know what the cross-over is? How many online supporters are also getting DM?
Exercise
Did they bring their numbers?
Exercise
Q: Do you understand the metrics
Explain which metrics to focus on (engagement, repeat visitation, conversions)
Compare with Social Media - you want comments and shares, not likes
Exercise: Log into Google Analytics
Explain which metrics are hazardous (bounce rate, time spent on site). For email, the open rate is a reflection of your brand & relationship (and the subject line). The CTR is a reflection on the content/ relevancy/ appeal.
What content is most popular? I'm sure you know anecdotally because you know which delivers the best revenue, but do you know which pages/ appeals have the best ongoing traffic?
At WWF our GBR page was by far the most visited page on the site, but it wasn't a successful appeal.
Use TV Series, Episode analogy. Like a Book, The SLAP - characters/ chapters in the same overarching story.
Great book on storytelling - The Art of Immersion, Frank Rose
Sequencing of story-telling.
You can use different channels to trigger action from supporters.
- Social media is about awareness, "share this video with your friends"
- Email - take action to stop this
- DM - long-form personal account of story. Call to action to do more
- Telephone appeal, give more snippets of information.
Integration chapter of the book I gave them to read, and remind them of the Wesley mission case study on integration, and how simple, but effective it was.
Q: Discussion Are any of you using this type of digital integration?
Who is creating video regularly, for each appeal? or Campaign?
Who is using SMS
Whose F2F team are signing up with iPads or still using paper?
What is your Welcome email strategy?
Is online a component at all in your acquisition and onboarding?
I will give them a statistic about attrition rates - Over 6 months the attrition rate has been reduced 10% by using email and SMS and content.
Ask TWS to share their F2F attrition wins when introducing mobile app.
Case Study: Greenpeace Ken & Barbie breakup (Mattel)
Seeding characters/ chapters in social media or on the website first, then launching TV appeal, then using video to expand. Launch online campaign, then DM follows with a new character, or another perspective within the same character's story.
Media runs with personal stories - push to online for hard facts. Action & response.
Sequencing of story-telling.
You can use different channels to trigger action from supporters.
- Social media is about awareness, "share this video with your friends"
- Email - take action to stop this
- DM - long-form personal account of story. Call to action to do more
- Telephone appeal, give more snippets of information.
Integration chapter of the book I gave them to read, and remind them of the Wesley mission case study on integration, and how simple, but effective it was.
Q: Discussion Are any of you using this type of digital integration?
Who is creating video regularly, for each appeal? or Campaign?
Who is using SMS
Whose F2F team are signing up with iPads or still using paper?
What is your Welcome email strategy?
Is online a component at all in your acquisition and onboarding?
I will give them a statistic about attrition rates - Over 6 months the attrition rate has been reduced 10% by using email and SMS and content.
Ask TWS to share their F2F attrition wins when introducing mobile app.
Digital is the great connector between channels.
Case Study: WSPA and Animals Australia - export of live animals.
New audiences see something on TV, reach for the phone/ iPad and search for it, find more online.
Email/ SMS pushes known supporters to the website for more information.
DM pushes known supporters to YouTube or website for the next chapter in the story, another character's point of view.
Exercise:
Lets map out the channels & sequencing of one of your recent campaigns
Q: Will one of you let us use your most recent Christmas Appeal that you've just rolled out as an example?
Q: Did you have a content plan for the appeal? For your website or on Social Media? What was your calendar of rollout of the appeal and the engagement with supporters throughout?
Scripts that Supp Rels had etc.?
Q: How could it have been done differently to use online?
It’s the same strategy
You already have an on boarding strategy - don't you?
Q: but do you give your online supporters the same attention that your offline supporters get?
Q: Have you implemented your on boarding strategy online at all?
It's the same strategy, its just a different execution.
You probably have two on boarding strategies
1. For new donors - nurturing them as part of the donor journey. We'll touch more on that later
2. For new prospects. This is what we'll focus on now.
Exercise:
What does your on boarding strategy look like?
Let's map it out as a group - let's assume its a prospect name and address we have.
What is the journey we take our prospect on? For how long?
What stories and channels do we use to engage them?
What do we ask them to do? When do we ask them for their first gift?
What reporting do you do?
What testing have you done in this space recently?
Q: Now apply this to online. Where do you get prospects?
Social Media
Email subscribers
Search Engine marketing
Mobile app?
Q: How is online any different?
Only in how they are introduced to you – engagement & acquisition strategy
But how do they become aware of you? Campaigns and appeals and STORIES
Acquiring new supporters is easy online as you can pre-qualify them because there is SO MUCH DATA.
But you need to be prepared to invest some budget into this.
If you do it organically, you need many more man hours and time.
Exercise:
What does your on boarding strategy look like?
Let's map it out as a group - let's assume its a prospect name and address we have.
What is the journey we take our prospect on? For how long?
What stories and channels do we use to engage them?
What do we ask them to do? When do we ask them for their first gift?
DONOR Journey brings us back to keeping users engaged and telling stories that interest them.
It’s also about retention.
Use TV Series, Episode analogy
Keep the donor interested. Talk to them about only slight variations on the same thing.
We’ve talked about how Online can assist in the onboarding journey.
Just the same way, online can support the ongoing donor journey – namely RETENTION
We’ve talked about how Online can assist in the onboarding journey.
Just the same way, online can support the ongoing donor journey – namely RETENTION
Exercise:
You already have your Donor Journey mapped out, now we just need to insert online into that.
Give them a standard Donor Journey - first month on boarding then rolling programs.
Get them to use coloured texters to put an arrow where they would add in online. What channel, what message/ ask/ action?
Case Study: Wesley Mission.
I told you at the start of today's session, and used it in my book, how great the Wesley Missions integration of digital was with the Face2Face acquisition. But they didn't continue to onboard me with digital. I've been rolled straight into their direct mail program. Now I get mail. I haven't had a digital piece of communication since I signed up.
I'm an online giver, but they haven't tried to activate me this way at all.
When I give cash, I only ever give online. The DM might remind me, but usually it goes straight in the bin. But I react to Media and give online and I react to email and give online.
They're losing additional revenue.
Reduced attrition rates.
Really, the donor journey is just about retention. And this is where online comes into the fore.
Q: What do your retention strategies look like?
Q: So how do we integrate digital into our Donor Journey and Retention strategies?
How do we plan it out and track it? For how long do we plan it out?
Case Study: Wesley Mission.
I told you at the start of today's session, and used it in my book, how great the Wesley Missions integration of digital was with the Face2Face acquisition. But they didn't continue to onboard me with digital. I've been rolled straight into their direct mail program. Now I get mail. I haven't had a digital piece of communication since I signed up.
I'm an online giver, but they haven't tried to activate me this way at all.
When I give cash, I only ever give online. The DM might remind me, but usually it goes straight in the bin. But I react to Media and give online and I react to email and give online.
They're losing additional revenue.
Reduced attrition rates.
Be clear that I love digital and believe it is a worthy fundraising channel, but that I think it works best when integrated with the overall fundraising mix and as a support or destination channel for your other mediums.
Today we're going to talk about how you can integrate Digital Marketing & Fundraising
Data - make informed decisions, no guess work
Storytelling - tell the donor stories they care about (the data guides this) - Leads into engagement
Onboarding - strategy is no different online, its just a different way of executing it. Engagement
Donor Journey - strategy is no different, its still multi-channel, just adding another channel. Might not be for all donors
Retention - cheap, easy, fast, passive and active, financial and non-financial. Just part of the mix. Same strategy, just another channel in your multi-channel strategy.