If you’re a non-profit marketer, hopefully your year-end campaign strategy is close to launching. The point of this post is to ensure your best made plans DO NOT go awry. Better yet, let’s hope they add fuel to an already glowing campaign.
1) Avoid launching on Giving Tuesday: While integrating Giving Tuesday into your social and email campaign is important, it’s too crowded with competing messages to serve as a launch date. Ideally, you should launch before Thanksgiving.
2) Consider testing your direct mail approach: Many organizations have a proven format that they recycle for year-end campaigns. Now’s a good time to test something new. Ideally an A/B split test if you have a volume of at least 5,000 or whatever it takes for you to get 100 responses from your audience. Some ideas to consider:
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- Make it more personal. Be sure to personally thank existing donors and focus on the impact their funds have on your organization. Increase the number of times your copy mentions “you” rather than “we” and “I.”
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- Include a low-cost premium item such as a calendar or something tied to your mission.
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- Change up the format. You could add a component such as a lift note with a personal appeal from your president or a short story from someone who benefits from your organization’s cause.
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- Consider more cost-effective acquisition formats. Postcards or self-mailers are often a better choice for lower-performing segments.
3) Test your website and campaign landing page: Is it user-friendly and free of glitches? Does it reinforce the messaging and style of your year-end campaign?
4) Give your social channels a boost with these best practices:
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- Engage your board to help expand reach. Ask them to do personal posts or, at the very least, share your posts during your campaign.
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- Use paid promotion because it’s budget-friendly, easily measured, tested and can have immediate impact.
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- Ahead of your campaign, make sure you’re using social media to create awareness of what you do and boost interest in supporting your organization. Nobody takes action without feeling a personal connection with your .org.
5) Tighten up your Email creative: As with social media, attention spans are extremely short for email (think less than 10 seconds). Consider a header graphic that says it all and keep the body copy light. You can leave much of the persuasion to donate at higher levels to your landing page.
As you’re ensuring that your campaign execution goes flawlessly over the next 45 days or so, start thinking about next year’s efforts. Oftentimes, great ideas pop up while you’re in the thick of it all, only to get lost when you move onto the next marketing task. Record those ideas and you’ll have an even happier holiday knowing what you’ve learned and achieved.
