How I Saw the Light – Change Your Fundraising Communications Now!

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Holy_Marketing

New options in fundraising communications and social media are literally transforming fundraising today.

I admit, I was a bit slow to get with the program.

And I’m willing to bet that any boomers on your team may be slow to get this too.

In case you have boomers (like me) – your CEO, or board members or colleagues – send this to them!

Because here’s your chance to create something truly extraordinary!

Here’s my personal journey to see the potential of digital.

I started in the world as an English major.

Words mattered.

Communicating with words worked all the way until around 2009. That’s when the Great Recession slammed in.

Revenue plummeted. Budgets were slashed.

Suddenly I had some time on my hands.

And I said to myself, “Dammit, I’m gonna learn the internet!”

Tackling the Internet in 2009.

I put my downtime to work. I took myself to an Internet Marketing BootCamp (whew!) for an immersion in a new world.

Find out how we can help you achieve your fundraising goals with world-class consulting and custom training.

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And since 2009, I’ve committed to send out my email newsletter every single week.

No matter what is going on, my Friday newsletter goes out!

Sending out a word-filled newsletter every week has helped build my brand. It built credibility.

And it was a great strategy – for a while.

New forms of communications  – the advent of a new era in fundraising.

I started experimenting with the new social media tools, and learned to love twitter the most.

We all got into the Facebook game. We started building “fans” and then “likes” for our causes.

We started experimenting with videos (that’s another blog post if you wanna hear my treacherous journey!)

The rise of the Image – our first .gif!

8-10-16-Ostrich-EarlyBird

Here’s our FIRST Gif. And we loved it!

Here’s the huge sea-change happening now.

Words suddenly don’t matter as much.

Now you have to communicate through images.

Images – whether they are designed and created, or whether they are simply a terrific photograph – are what people are using to communicate online.

OK you say – “of course I know that.”

BUT how is your nonprofit really using images?

I’m willing to bet not so very well!

My story again:

Last week I hired a fabulous smart (millennial) designer, Kate Sykes, to create something called “content” for me.

And I saw the light.

Trying out moving images.

We created our first .gif.

A .gif, (in case you are a boomer reading this) – is an image that moves a bit.

What is a GIF image?  Bitmap (CompuServe) GIF, or Graphic Interchange Format, is a file extension for an often animated raster graphics file and is the second most common image format used on the World Wide Web after JPEG. GIF uses the LZW compression algorithm and is owned by Unisys.

The boomers on my team argued vociferously against using the gif.

I mean we had a knock-down drag out fight  – they thought moving images were wildly irritating.

But I held fast. I said we were gonna give it a try!

Kate created the .gif for our Year-End Fundraising promotion.

And we all loved it. Even the nay-sayers on my team.

How images can transform your fundraising communications.

I know, you are saying “I am a homeless agency – I can’t communicate with this tool.”

But yes, you can!

I was visiting with the good folks from Passage Home this week in Raleigh and we brainstormed how they could use .gifs.

How a homeless agency could use .gifs in their fundraising communications:

Passage Home helps homeless people find affordable housing. They reunite families. They help people get back on their feet.

So we were thinking – they could have a picture of

  • someone sad without a home who smiles as a door opens.
  • a mother whose child runs into her arms
  • someone getting out of a car and into a house
  • a hand reaching out to help someone up off the ground

These images could even be animated and drawn if you don’t want to use real people.

What could your nonprofit do with a .gif?

  • A ballet company could send me a ballerina leaping
  • A food bank could show a smiling kid eating
  • An environmental group could show a fish leaping out of the water
  • A school could show a kid raising her hand in class
  • A sports group could show someone scoring.

Why I like .gifs:

They are charming, interesting ways to sum up your wonderful work.

You need to SHOW donors what you do now.

You can’t just talk about it.

And .gifs are the future. If they are really charming, people will SHARE on social media.

And you could go viral – yay!

Any nonprofit organization – large or small – can use this tool to

  • to jazz up its communications,
  • connect with supporters,
  • get emails opened,
  • reach donors thru the din of their inbox,
  • build a social media following.
  • get more Facebook likes.

It’s time to get with the program, my friend.

It’s time to actually transform the way you tell your story.

BOTTOM LINE:

How are you using the new fundraising communications tools?

I know I am only now catching up and seeing the light – and I’d LOVE for you to post your own .gif as a comment.

Let’s see what you are doing!

12 replies
  2. Denisa Casement says:

    One of the tools in an everchanging toolbox… We are this moment designing a gif for the thank you page of our next appeal. A lovely little touch of “donor delight”.

    But like all lovely new tools, if you don’t know the basics of fundraising you won’t know how to apply it in a way that actually enhances and increases your fundraising. I qualify as one of the youngest boomers and I’m having so much fun working with a young team. They have great digital skills and are eager to learn the “old school” basics that help those digital tools return real fundraising results not just vanity metrics.

  3. Denisa Casement says:

    We had a delightful video go viral this Spring. It got over 2 million views but NO increase in donations. It was posted on social media, shared repeatedly & picked up by major media channels. But because the comms staff aren’t trained in direct response there was no up-tick in donations.

    We also know, from aggregated results shared by the Google team that coaches charities, a video in the wrong place can actually suppress response rates. This is because it distracts the viewer and pulls them away from the carefully planned call to action that we know works in direct response.

    Video & gifs are terrific at engaging, educating and delighting donors. But digital conversions are hard and you have to really know your direct response basics to use all the lovely digital tools properly.

    2 million views… No donations. It happens.

  4. gailperry says:

    Wow what a story! It’s easy to fall in love with new tools but I totally agree- if the tool does not link back to a fundraising appeal, it doesn’t help us. And what is the tool trying to say? Is it a real fundraising message – or is it something dreamed up by communications that is nice but not effective in fundraising. Great point, Denisa!

  5. Alix Kempf says:

    We first started using .gifs in 2014 in emails to participants in our annual cycling fundraiser. When we hit our fundraising goal, 10 days before the event, we sent this .gif to participants thanking them for their support:

    http://25.media.tumblr.com/e8844e703954c505cb640d09267b8166/tumblr_n1op3gMXhy1six0yvo1_500.gif

    The response was incredible. By the end of the week, we’d raised 140% of the goal for the event, and the donations kept coming!

    That .gif was the beginning of a major shift for us. Instead of relying on a bunch of exclamation points and bolded text, we started using .gifs for just about everything. Registration opens = .gif. Participant hasn’t met their fundraising minimum = .gif. CASL compliance email = .gif. Annual report = series of .gifs.

    The response from donors has been incredible. We used the same .gif strategy for the event in 2015 and 2016 and got the same results with huge spikes in donations following every .gif email.

    Despite all the success, we’ve never tried a .gif to convey program impact. Thanks for the tip Gail!

  6. gailperry says:

    Oh wow Alex, thanks SO much for posting this and for your testimony to the power of the .gif. I got some pushback from some of my major gift fundraising friends, but I am with you on this one! Gail

  7. AnyTownDesign says:

    My first .gif. Hard to tell how they will upload on different sites. :) Thanks for sharing your experiences Gail.

  10. gailperry says:

    Hi Claire, I think you should work with a designer and play around with some ideas with that person. It takes some time to settle on what works for your nonprofit. Also, you can slow down the movement of the image so that it is not too jarring. That was important to me!

Comments are closed.