Bryan Earnest (Host1): Well, we're back with a new episode of the AMP UP podcast. I'm your host, Brian Earnest, here with my cohost, Rachel Holland. What are we talking about today, Rachel?

Rachael Holland (Host2): Hey, Bryan. today's topic is how a writer approaches content for a fundraising campaign.

Host 1: Wow. That sounds like a rather heady topic; content for a fundraising campaign. Well, getting through the holidays, all I saw in my email box, besides all the political messages, of course, was lots and lots of end of year solicitations to give, give, give from, you know, giving to the Lost Puppies, to Children in Africa, to every organization that's ever taken a dollar from me, they seem to come back after me here at the holidays.

And you know what? Some of them are horrible. They're just horrible.

Host 2: Well, I would assume as a business owner that you've received, you know, a piece or two throughout the year over the last 20 plus years. When you receive things in the mail, or you get emails, phone calls, what stands out to you, and what do you just throw away?

Host 1: You know, it's a great question. And, especially when it's looking for fundraising is, you know, and I say some of them were awful, some of them if they capture your attention, if you can immediately understand who the organization is, what their cause is, does it have, a quick connection to me as the potential donor of why I would want to support their cause and part with dollars to help them.

Host 2: Yeah, absolutely.

Host 1: You know, what about you, Rachel? What stands out for you? I'm sure you get a few of these fundraising pieces.

Host 2: Yeah, I would say the same thing. The first thing is usually, have I even heard of this non-profit or this campaign? Has it piqued my interest enough? Yeah, is it relatable? Is it something that I'm passionate about and willing to maybe move some of my resources over to a different campaign? So yeah, it really needs to resonate with me and it needs to kind of speak to my why and what's important to me.

Host 1: I love that. You know, if I had to say one more thing, it's like having to get the porridge just right. You know, if it's too sappy, too over the top and it looks like it was designed with every trick possible to get me to give money, I'm like, eh, I'm kind of turned off. But if it's authentic and it feels like, hey, we're an organization. It just, we need your help. And we want to authentically tell you why, I tend to lean in a little bit more. What about you?

Host 2: Sounds easy enough. Just developing all this content, reaching all of your target audiences, which is another thing, right? Like, do nonprofits and other organizations really know who they're talking to?

Host 1: You know, Rachel, we make it sound so easy but it's not. It's strategic. It takes experience. It takes knowledge to develop a fundraising piece that really does speak to the audience and help raise dollars for an organization. Today, we have the opportunity to talk to Amperage's senior writer, Graham Van Dixhorn, who truly is an expert on how to write great fundraising copy. Hello, Graham.

Graham Van Dixhorn: Hello, Bryan. Hello, Rachel. Thanks so much for having me. What a great conversation already.

Host 1: Well we're glad you could join us. So as a writer, and you're a very experienced writer, you've been doing this for some time, what is a writer's approach to developing content for a fundraising campaign? Or better yet, Graham, where do you start?

Graham Van Dixhorn: You know, in some ways it's the same as for any other marketing campaign, which is just a strategic sequence of activities that promote an organization or a business's goals and objectives. So maybe it's for awareness, maybe it's for sales, maybe it's for product launch in the for profit world.

In the non-profit world, we're not selling a product or a service per se, we're selling an idea or an aspiration or an opportunity to be part of something bigger, something good. So there's a little subtle difference there, but it's some of the process is very similar. So for example, once you've done your feasibility study and your statement of need and the campaign is approved, the campaign is a go; we're doing due diligence. We're doing research. We think of an organization as a brand with distinctions, levels of awareness about the brand, its own voice and its own tone and certainly, its own audience and competition. So where we start is with research, with a strategic plan, which has its own goals and objectives, and kind of starting to nail down some components and tactics, and Bryan, all of this is before a single word is written. So it's due diligence like you would do for any campaign, with the idea of selling an aspiration, and making someone feel something, to motivate them to be part of your campaign.

Host 1: I love that. I love that there's that depth of strategy. And I think so many people think it's just easy, right? I'll just write a letter or create a piece or put out a social post and the dollars will just come rolling in.

Host 2: If it were only that easy. We talk a lot about that importance of bringing marketing alongside fundraising. And I don't just say that because that's what we do, but that's truly important, especially, you mentioned competition. There is so much competition out there, whether we view it as competition or not, if someone's giving their money to a different organization, that is competition in a way, right? So when we're thinking about it from a marketing perspective, what are some of those essentials? You know, what are some of those written components that you have to have for a fundraising campaign?

Graham Van Dixhorn: Of course, there are many written components and pieces. You named a couple, mailers, for example, that come to your door unrequested, and whether or not that's a good idea is another story. You've got a feasibility study, you've got a statement of need, you've got campaign ask letters, landing page perhaps, or a web page, lots of collateral. But the key pieces from a marketing perspective are the campaign theme, and the campaign case statement.

Host 1: That's great. I'm glad you kind of went there, Graham. You were talking about some of the specific components or tactics, but it really does start with that theme, right? Of really, what does this all tie back to? And then you've spoken a couple of times about the case statement, maybe break those apart a little bit. And let's talk to our audience a little bit about how important is that theme?

Graham Van Dixhorn: In a fundraising campaign, theme is essential. It gives a memorable, shareable identity. You want something that's iconic, perhaps a rallying cry. You need to get people's attention, create a desire to know more. We go through a fairly elaborate process for creating themes and typically the theme is coupled with a campaign logo based on the theme. The case statement is a designed piece and the overall goal is to help to motivate donors to give money. I sort of follow a particular strategy that has a few components. I, I assume the audience is large donors, meaning people of means that will give a substantial amount. I establish in the case statement the validity of the organization and the need. I appeal to emotion, empathy, and importantly, expectations. In other words, get to the why of the donor. And in the case of large donors and people who participate as benefactors frequently, it's often impact and legacy. Those are the main whys. And then you also have to show how easy it is to part with your money.

You have to remember that a poorly crafted case statement is actually worse than no case statement. If you get an unprofessional vibe from it. If you create any doubt in a donor's mind about the organization's capacity or credibility, or make them question whether it's right for them, you're better off without a case statement. So they need to be done right.

Host 2: Interesting. It's kind of a first impression, right? Hopefully there's been some brand awareness leading up to it, but, that's a really important piece. I'm glad you touched on that. You've worked with countless organizations, Graham, throughout your career, and there are clients that have different levels of expertise, right?

Someone who might be new to the fundraising industry, someone who's been doing it for a decade. But when it comes to writing and crafting that message for those fundraising campaigns, I'm always curious about lessons learned, which could be an episode of its own. So that could be a rabbit hole.

But if you had to narrow it down, what advice would you give our listeners to avoid some of those common pitfalls that you've seen organizations experience?

Graham Van Dixhorn: Overall, the mistakes, if you will, or the lessons learned too late have to do with something we've Kind of have been hinting at all along is the lack of marketing expertise or practice or focus and specifically not enough brand awareness, recognition, not enough marketing for the organization prior to, or during the campaign.

So for that reason, and we sometimes recommend this to our clients; organizations can choose to do a brand awareness campaign either prior to, or even in conjunction with a fundraising campaign. Recently we worked with an organization that did just that. We created an awareness campaign for them, with its own theme and then the fundraising campaign, with its own theme, both of those themes were compatible and complimentary, and they worked together to both raise awareness and create motivation to share money with the organization for the particular campaign. Another challenge real quickly is folks tend to focus on describing what they do, rather than why someone should care enough to give lots of money. And we mentioned the why. Rachel, you mentioned your why. And if you don't get to that as an organization in soliciting support or funds; you're going to miss connecting with that donor audience, misconnecting with their desire to have an impact, to leave a legacy, to help the world out, to give back.

So you have to go after the why piece more even than the what. So, think of it as a product in this case. Why should I buy that product? It's the perennial challenge for nonprofits because they tend not to have that depth of background with marketing. But if they can get their heads around the why, they have a much better chance of success in that fundraising campaign.

Host 2: Absolutely. Bryan and I are both big fans of Simon Sinek's Start With Why. Let's talk about the why, how, what. I think we often get it backwards. We're not maybe wired that way, but starting with the why I think is really critical.

Host 1: Graham. Great points. I love the reminder that a theme or just the messaging content for a fundraising campaign should be using your words, compatible or complimentary to the marketing campaign. So there really looks like a sense of synergy between kind of the marketing function of an organization and the fundraising function. Too often we see in non-profits, large institutions especially, healthcare systems, large universities, large non-profits, that there tends to be this large chasm between the two. how do you bridge that a little bit to talk about a marketing theme and yet a complimentary nature of a fundraising theme? Is it a play on words? Is it using some of the same tenets and tone? What's your approach?

Graham Van Dixhorn: I think a lot of it has to do with something that you mentioned earlier, Bryan, which is authenticity. And in this case, it's a believable relationship between the campaign theme and the brand itself. If there's a disconnect, if the brand portrays itself as something meaningful in a particular way, or as something deserving of support, because of the great work that they do; and then somehow the campaign to raise money is not a good fit. Then the feeling of uncertainty or disconnect is going to grow in the donor audience. So one of the things we look for, for example, if we're creating side by side campaigns, let's say, is a thematic relationship in the language of the theme.

 So for example, if the theme has to do with the well-being of the people who the organization serves, then the brand itself has to reflect that, and the campaign theme has to reflect it, and together they're working in unison and there's no conflict or there's no separation in terms of the donor's mind about what this organization is about and what they're asking me to do.

Host 1: That's great. And great discussion today, Graham and Rachel. As we said at the onset, there is some real thinking, there's real strategy, and it takes experience to develop impactful fundraising content. So thank you, Graham. Appreciate it. I can see the charitable gifts just rolling in after this discussion today.

Graham Van Dixhorn: Well, I hope you don't get too many unsolicited requests, Bryan.

Host 1: You and me both. Well, as always, thank you Graham. Thank you Rachel. It's time to wrap up this podcast. She's Rachel Holland. And I'm Bryan Earnest. You've been listening to the AMP UP podcast an Amperage Marketing and Fundraising production. For more content on how to increase the strength and spark of your brand, head over to amperagemarketing.com and subscribe to our podcast and newsletter.

On behalf of all of us at Amperage, thank you. Check out another podcast and we will help you move the needle.