Mark Etling Donor Development Manager Missionary Association of Mary Immaculate Belleville, Illinois

The “double whammy” in fundraising today: -Shrinking active donor files -Shrinking prospecting budgets

The temptation: drastically reduce or cut prospecting for short-term growth in net revenue: -Looks good after Year 1 -Ends up bad in Years 2, 3, etc.

Two bottom lines - Dollars and Donors - Net revenue : money that goes year by year to the Province, Motherhouse. - Donor file: an extremely valuable asset; worth millions of dollars over time.

How much prospecting is enough? - Short-term loss vs. long-term gain

Method 1: Prospecting to a budgeted dollar amount  Budgeted loss: $200,000  Cost per new name: $20  New names added to file: 10,000

The problem with Method 1: Not enough new names Active donors, 7/1/2015: 80,000 Multi-year donor retention: 70% Active donors, 6/30/16: 56,000 Active donors, new names included: 66,000 Active file shrinkage: 17.5%

Method 2: Prospecting to a budgeted donor file size Active donors, 7/1/15: 80,000 Multi-year donor retention: 70% Active donors, 6/30/16: 56,000 New donors needed for 0% growth: 24,000 Prospecting $20/new name: $480,000

How do you recover the first-year loss? In long-term donor value: 5,000 new $100 LTV = $500,000 24,000 new $75 LTV = $1,800,000

What about cost to mail ? Assume: 12 mailings per per mailing over 5 years. Cost to mail = $36 per donor. 5,000 new $36 per donor = $180,000 $500,000 revenue - $180,000 = $320,000 net. 24,000 new $36 per donor = $864,000 $1,800,000 - $864,000 = $936,000 net. Even when cost to mail is factored in, you still come out ahead.

Where to begin: - Establish a goal: how many active donors do you want at the end of the fiscal year? - How many new names do you need to reach your goal? Remember to factor in donor attrition. - Build your mail plan to meet your goal.

And of course: - Don’t forget about donor reactivation.

Some suggestions to improve new name prospecting

#1. Co-ops – to expand the universe of potential new donors. # 2. Don’t suppress your lapsed names forever in the merge-purge.

#3. Make your donors available for exchange. -Name protection is a myth – your donors are giving to other organizations.

#4. Mail to “super-dupes” – donors who are lapsed to your file, but are giving to two or more other organizations.

What’s working for you?

Thank you!