We are trying to increase our online fundraising efforts, and I'm trying to find out what methods other organizations are using.
From my experience, and what I've learned from others, most people do not use online fundraising unless it is coupled with direct mail or another traditional form of solicitation because email solicitations in and of themselves tend to produce little to no response rate. We are currently sending emails as follow-up reminders after a direct mail is sent, and we are considering sending email acquisition emails to people after they attend a performance.
Is anyone doing anything similar? What do you guys find to be effective/ineffective?
We have done emails solicitations to patrons after a performance that is particularly popular or unique. we don't do it very often, but when we have done it, we have seen a pretty decent response.
Thanks for the response! Do you send those emails to everyone who attend the particular performance, or do you segment?
Recently we've begun sending extremely targeted emails (think 250 or fewer patrons) asking for money and it is working. Basically we are trying to figure out which motivating factors (about to miss attending this donor benefit, "hey, missing your complimentary parking yet?") will push people's buttons. Good luck.
In an effort to find new donors, we most recently chose to segment only single ticket buyers (non-subscribers) and of course extracted staff, VIP, etc. We also pulled out those had had given in the last 2 monthes.
I think the main thing is just to be aware of how much email different groups are getting and make sure you don't do this type of email campaign when lots of other marketing/solicts are going on.
We also found that by getting people fresh after the show, they were more excited and passionate about giving.