Overachiever's Guide To Year-End Fundraising: Nine Steps You Can Use Now To Raise More Money in December

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The 2011
Overachievers
Guide to Year-End
Fundraising
Nine Steps You Can Use Now to
Raise More Money in December
Alia McKee Scott, Eric Rardin,
Sea Change Strategies Care2
page 2 The 2011 Overachievers Guide to Year-End Fundraising
Introduction
Congratulations you are an ofcial year-end
fundraising overachiever! You get a gold star!
Y
ou know that a majority of your online fundraising dollars come in
during December, and youve already started thinking about how to
improve and maximize your strategy and tactics this year.
You also know that year-end fundraising doesnt just happen in Decem-
ber. It takes months of list building, inspiring donors, cultivating them, test-
ing, and analyzing metrics to make the absolute most of year-end opportu-
nities.
Finally, you get that online giving is more than online transactions. A vast
majority of fundraising-related visits to your website are for research pur-
poses. That is, many of your ofine donors (who will also be making year-
end gifts) will have looked over your web presence as part of their personal
due diligence in deciding whether to become a donor.
The good news is that youve got several months to get your website and
online communications strategy in tip-top shape for year-end.
This Guide a companion to the Procrastinators Guide to Year-end Fund-
raising outlines nine concrete action steps you can do now to raise more
money in December.
So lets get started.
Sources:
The guidance laid out here is based on more than 20 years of focus groups with donors, including
more recently with online donors; a review of best practices and testing, mostly derived from the
commercial sector; a smattering of research conducted by non-prots; and anecdotal experience with
more than a dozen current and past fundraising clients.
The illustrations provided are not necessarily our work we drew from the collective brilliance of
the hard-working men and women who toil in the vineyards of non-prot online communications.
Our thanks to all of the organizations highlighted.
Nine Steps You Can
Do Now to Raise More
Money In December
Do what your mother taught you
Make your website an email collection &
donation magnet
Test your forms
Take your site for a test drive
Review your trafc
Get to know your supporters
Grow your list and welcome them warmly
Whats your story?
Whats your year-end plan?
I.
II.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
VII.
VIII.
IX.
i. Do What Your
Mother Taught You
Your mother gave you sage advice that holds doubly true with your donors:
always say your hellos and thank-yous.
We know welcoming new donors and thanking them is such an obvi-
ous step that you might be asking yourself, Why the heck would they start
the guide with something so obvious?
Were glad you asked.
Here are ve compelling reasons this step is number 1:
1. An un-welcomed and un-thanked donor wont be a donor for long. Period.
2. Lead generation and acquisition are expensive. Remember to invest in
your current donors so you keep them donors.
3. Saying hello and thank you is a relatively cheap and easy thing for you
to do online.
4. Its important to thank donors throughout the year not just right
before prime year-end fundraising season. Your donors will notice.
5. Despite these facts, we are surprised at how frequently this step gets
overlooked.
Because you are an overachiever and are reading this Overachievers
Guide now you still have several prime pre-year-end months to get your
thank on.
Here are some concrete ideas you should implement right now.
1. Give new donors a special welcome.

Youve spent tons of time and money on lead generation. Youve sent an appeal
that has struck a chord. Youve touched a prospect so much so that theyve
given you a gift. Magic new donor conversion happens.
Now what? Many organizations and causes send a bounce back email that looks more like a receipt
than a big warm hug. Then, its into the house le the new donor goes.
For just a little extra effort, you can make a big rst impression.
First, make your auto responder something special.
Make it come from someone - your executive director, or, even better, a program staff member
working on the campaign-specic issue to which the new donor responded.
Focus on impact - remind them again what the gift they just gave you will help you achieve.
Inspire them - give them a link to a thank-you video, send them to a photo slideshow that shows
your organization in action, or show them donor testimonials relating why others support you.
This is an opportunity to stir passion for your cause again, not just give a donor their tax receipt.
Next, send a second thank-you message.
A bounce back thank-you is just that, a bounce back. Your donors know this. So send another thank-
you a few days later. See the International Rescue Committee's heartfelt example.

In this message, you should:
Welcome the donor to your online donor
community (in your data pull, keep in mind
that some new online donors might have
given to you before through other channels).
Ask them their opinion. Give them a donor
survey and nd out what their specic inter-
ests are. Use their feedback when appropriate
to show that you are really listening.
Give your donor a VIP tour of your organi-
zation. This could be a brief donor-focused
Q&A with your executive director or a video
from your staff saying thank you.
Don't ask them for another gift. yet. We're
not against trying to get a second gift quickly,
but your thank-you message isnt the place for
it. It's a thank-you.
2. Add four thank-you messages (with no asks)
to your donors from now until year-end.
Stop right now. Look at your email calendar through calendar year-end. Add
four thank-you messages to your donors. For example:
After your summer fundraising campaign, send a thank-you message to all of your donors and
report back on how you did, and how you will use the money raised.
Send a thank-you message updating your donors on the impact you've made so far this year.
Send a news" round-up. Donors never tire of seeing your organization in the headlines.
Send a pre-year-end thank-you message that lays the foundation for your year-end appeals.
3. Dont just thank your donors thank your
super activists too!
Some of your most super engaged support-
ers might not have given you a gift yet. But
theyve shown their support by taking action,
telling friends and signing petitions.
Recognize them. Find out who on your list has taken
more than 3 actions with you in the last year and thank
them too! See the very well received example from Envi-
ronmental Defense Fund.
4. Bust out your pen or telephone.

Yes, we live in a wired world. But wired communications are eeting and noth-
ing beats the personal tone of a handwritten note or telephone call.
When you receive a high-dollar gift ($500 or more) online, recruit an intern to write a nice note
on your behalf (provide adequate direction, of course), or do it yourself. You can also pick up the
phone.
And heck, sometimes break out this tactic for repeating low-dollar donors, monthly givers and the
like. These people are important. Give them a little extra TLC.
5. Find out how it feels to be your donor.
You think you know what your donor experience is. But do you really know?
Try being your donor for the day.
Make a gift to your organization. Make sure you cover all channels online, ofine and social
media tools like Facebook Causes.
How were you treated? What kind of welcome did you receive? Would you make a second gift to
your organization?
If not, what would you change about the experience? It is likely your donors would want you to
change that too.
ii. Make Your Website
An Email Collection
& Donation Magnet
Its a great big online world out there. There are tons of wonderful shiny tools
for us all to use to reach supporters and build passion for our causes.
But among all these tools, your website and your email list are still the two
biggest online fundraising powerhouses. Are you maximizing them?
Make the trafc you drive to your website count. Here are some
ideas that you can implement now to blaze trails to your email
sign-up and donation forms.
1. Ideally, there should be at least two or three
email collection tools on your homepage. You
can approach this in a variety of ways.
!
Offer a featured action people can take that provides an email opt-in.
Offer a chance to sign up for your online communications - and make it exciting (e.g. Get
updates from the front lines of our work" rather than Sign up for our e-newsletter").
Incorporate email-collecting interactives like quizzes and polls into the experience.
2. Use a website hijack
!
On high-web-trafc occasions when your cause is in the news, put a temporary overlay page we
affectionately refer to it as a hijack on your website. This page can either call for email sign ups
(See Courage Campaign example) or donations (See International Rescue Committee example).
3. Promote sign-ups on your sub pages
above the fold
!
Make sure you have a consistent call to sign up on your sub pages. And make sure its above the fold!
4. Have multiple donate links on your home
page that go straight to your donate form.
!
5. Use consistent language for
donation buttons and links.
!
Focus on one of the following words: Give, donate, or contribute - and stick to that one word
throughout the donation process. Asking people to join is problematic unless membership is truly
core to your brand, e.g. ACLU or Sierra Club. Asking people to support you" does not signify
giving to many would-be donors.
6. Use social networks

Social networks are a great place to engage in multi-way conversations with
your online community and to build brand awareness. But also remember to
leverage them to build your list and drive donations.
Incorporate email-collecting actions and interactives into your social network messages.
Incorporate asks - at appropriate times - in your social network conversations. Emergencies,
specinc holidays and year-end are all prime times for driving trafnc for donations. See UNICEF
USA's example during the Haiti earthquake emergency:
And remember to welcome your new donors and new subscribers
warmly. See Steps 1 and 7 for more details.
iii. Test Your Forms
Direct mail fundraisers spend years and years testing every detail of the reply
form that goes into a direct mail package. E-commerce giants like Amazon
likewise test and rene their shopping cart and checkout process on a con-
stant basis.
But very few nonprots test the donate forms on their websites. With donor
dropout rates approaching 98% in some cases, we must test. And dont assume
that everyone elses results will mirror your own. Its important to test for
yourself.
Because this is the Overachievers Guide, you have time to do some A/B test-
ing of your form in advance of year-end.
Change one element on your donate form and keep it live for a few weeks or
months, depending on your trafc, to measure if the conversion rate increases
(or decreases). Here are a few ideas to get you started.
Intro copy - does short, direct intro copy outperform long
intro copy?
Vertical gift string vs. horizontal gift string - does a
horizontal gift string outperform a vertical gift string?
Gift-string order (high to low vs. low to high) - will a high
to low gift string increase average gift size?
Sustainer ask on the form will putting a sustainer ask on
the page increase the number of sustainer gifts without sup-
pressing one-time asks?
2-column form vs.1-column form will a two-column
form outperform a 1-column form?
Images -will a child's image outperform a polar bear?
Remember, testing a form can take time to get signincant results,
particularly if you have low web trafc or a small email list. Fac-
tor this in. Choose one or two changes that you think will have
the greatest impact and test them over a longer period of time.
In addition to testing, here are some best practices that you
should consider for your forms.
1. Suppress global navigation.
In his groundbreaking book The Paradox of Choice, psychologist Barry Schwartz argues that giving
people too many options stresses them out. If what you want is for someone visiting your donate
page to make a donation, then don't give them your website's full range of navigation options. It's
like offering 31 avors of ice cream when really you only want to sell vanilla.
Of course, when removing your global navigation, dont forget to keep a link back to your home
page.
2. Make sure people can tell that the form is a form.
Set your computer's screen resolution to 1024 x 768 and go to your donate page. Can you see that
there are nelds to nll out, such as name, address, etc., or are those nelds below the fold?" If the lat-
ter, you need to redesign the page to get some of those elds visible above the scroll line.
3. Do not ask for any information you dont need!
Commercial marketers say that every single additional bit of information you ask for drives some
people away. Do you really need a donor's business number? Do you really need to know which of
your issues they care most about at the time they make a gift? Do you really need to know how they
heard about you? Be ruthlessif you dont need it right away, dont ask for it.
4. Provide your mailing address, phone number and email
address on your donate page, all fundraising-related pages and
your home page.
Your mailing address, phone number and a general email address should be on every page of your
website, but the above locations are critical. It is amazing how many websites force a user to hunt
for an email address, mailing address and phone number. Focus group participants say they look for
a phone number as reassurance that there is someone to call if a problem arises with a transaction.
This is an easy x and not doing it is throwing money away.
5. Consider adding third party endorsements.
Has Charity Navigator awarded you four stars? If so, put the Charity Navigator icon on your
donation page. Do you have positive testimonials from noteworthy people? Make sure to highlight
quotes from experts, spokespeople or celebrities, as long as they are consistent with your brand.
6. Add a Secure Transaction graphic and a link to your
privacy policy.
The VeriSign bug is a well-known example of a secure transaction graphic. As for your privacy
policy, even if no one reads it, the presence of the link will reassure would-be donors.
7. Make sure error handling doesnt suck.
Isn't it annoying when you accidentally forget a required neld on a form, hit the submit button, and
then get some sort of weird error message that sounds like it was written by a programmer overdos-
ing on war games and Jolt Cola? Make a few mistakes with your donate form and see what happens.
If at all possible, make sure donors thrown into error hell don't have to re-enter all their personal
information!
8. Do not require would-be donors to create an account to make
them donate.
You might as well just provide a link to another organizations donate page.
9. Develop a why donate or case for giving page you can link to
from your form.
Remember, for every would-be donor who is prepared to consummate the deal online, you have a
dozen or more donor-visitors who are researching a potential gift but who will complete the gift via
another channel.
Include on this page simple pie charts of where you money comes from and where it goes. Also
add any third-party accolades like Charity Navigator endorsements or testimonials from credible
authorities who support your work. Include any other badges of honor and provide links to your
full nancials while 99% of people will never read them, they assure donors nonetheless.

iv. Take Your Site
For A Test Drive
Seeing is believing. And while we strongly encourage A/B testing and best prac-
tices as outlined in Step 3, nothing substitutes for watching a real live subject
navigate your site.
A small amount of time user testing your donation and sign-up forms can
help you avoid big pitfalls now and at year-end.
1. Recruit three test subjects.
Friends and relatives are ne, but they shouldnt be too familiar with your web site.

2. Conduct the test.
Sit down with each subject in front of a computer with broadband Internet access (most online
donors have it). Ask your subjects to:
a. Go to your site. Do not give them the URL. See how they navigate to your site from the launch
of their web browser. (Youll be amazed.)
b. Take an action or sign up for your e-newsletter.
c. Make a gift (give them a $10 bill). If they won't use their credit card, lend them yours.
3. Ask your subject to verbalize their thoughts and reactions.
How did they get to the homepage? Which link did they click? Did they get lost looking for your
call to sign up? Did they stumble over your donate form? Did they leave the form for some reason?
Did they forget a neld? Did something frustrate them?
Videotape your subject's efforts (try to get the screen in the shot) or have a colleague take detailed
notes.
4. Ask for feedback once theyve signed up and made a gift.
Were they confused at any time during the process? What changes would they make to simplify
the process?
Chances are, three good tests will surface as much as 80-90% of
the major usability speed bumps. Now that you know what they
are, x them!
v. Review Your Trafc
In Step 2 you made it really easy for visitors to your site to sign up for your
emails and donate. Now its time to think about where these visitors to your
site are coming from, and how to increase the ow from your best sources.
Knowing how people are nding you will help you take smart steps in pre-
paring for year-end fundraising by increasing quality trafc and making the
most of those new visitors.
Be a trafc sleuth!
Have you beer gues bloggirg or le Hurgor Fos, Care2's Cause
Channels or another media outlet?
ls a paricular revs sory or ever spilirg visis
ls a parrer orgarizaior drivirg rac
Do you lave a Google grar la is vorlirg eecively o drive rac
ls your vebsie opimized so people car rd you orgarically or searcl
engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing? (To help you prioritize, Google still
has 64% market share as compared to Bings 12% and Yahoos 18%.)
!
Analyzing your trafc can help you answer these questions. But how?
Most content management systems include analytics tools that allow you
to view the sources of inbound trafc. And Google offers a great tool for free.
Here are nve basic questions you should answer when reviewing your trafnc:
1. Can I currently track the source of visitors to our site?
2. Where is our trafnc coming from?
3. Are we controlling how we're found (do we come up nrst in Google when someone types in our
name)?
4. Are we beneting from these visitors? Once they are on our site, do they sign up, make a gift, or
get information we want them to have? [See Step 2]
5. How can we get the most trafnc from our best sources? If a news organization mentions us, do
they put our URL in their ticker?
Optimizing your web trafnc is a great way to make the most of what you're already doing. With-
out spending any additional money you can get better results from the people who are already
looking for you, and you can better take advantage of moments in the news, mentions from blog-
gers, and of course that celebrity endorsement on Twitter from Ashton Kutcher.
Here are ve steps for optimizing your trafc:
1. Set up an analytics program to measure your current trafc.
As we said, Google offers one for free.

2. Optimize organic search.
See where you appear when you search for your organizations name and related key words in major
search engines. If you don't come up in the top three results, you need to optimize your site.

This means making sure youre using words your prospective donors will use when searching for
you in the text, title pages, headings, images and elsewhere on your site. If you're Defenders of
Wildlife you probably want to make sure the words wolves, endangered species, and protecting the
environment are used liberally throughout your site.
3. Experiment with paid search or Google grants.
Once you optimize organic search, you can think about investing in paid search. Google grants are
a great way for nonpronts to experiment with paid" search for free (but it does take several months
for applications to get approved arent you glad you are an overachiever?).
4. Focus on where your trafc already is.
If you see a lot of visitors coming from social networks like Facebook you should invest more time
in maximizing that trafc. However, if you are getting more trafc from other sites you might want
to focus your energies there.

5. Leverage new and old media.
Now, about that mention from Ashton Kutcher. did he get your URL right? How about CNN?
Any communications strategy designed to generate earned (unpaid) media coverage of your organi-
zation or issue should integrate your online resources. That means including mention of your web
site and your URL in all written or verbal exchanges with reporters and, of course, bloggers.
vi. Get to Know
your Supporters
Our close friends expect us to know if they are vegetarian, enjoy scuba diving,
or like cats. Knowing these things proves were close and that we havent
been zoning out watching the NBA playoffs instead of listening.
Your donors have come to expect the same. But how do you get
to know your donors?
1. Listen through online metrics.
Get to know your donors by what they respond to. Do some of them donate when it's about rescu-
ing kittens, but not when its about rescuing horses? Target them with kitten appeals or at least
appeals with pictures of kittens.
Knowing which of your members respond to what type of appeal can help you communicate with
them in a more personal manner.
2. Personalize.
In addition to online response data, external data can be really useful. Knowing a supporter's mailing
address, even if they only give online, enables you to segment by geography. Knowing a supporters
gender can help you rene your content and tone. Knowing a supporters birthday lets you send a nice
note. Explore the ways you can make your content more relevant through personalization.
3. Think about appending data.
An email append to your ofine donor database can help you build a more rounded relationship
with your donors. Even those who only give ofine tend to give more if they are hearing from you
across channels. Further, an email thanking your donor for their recent ofine gift shows them you
have your cultivation house in order.
Five data appends that can build your relationship with your donors:
1. Mailing address
2. Phone number
3. Email address
4. Social network presence
5. Matching gift (does your donor's employer have a matching gift program)
One word of caution: We strongly encourage you to make sure your append is opt-in only. You
want to ensure that donors are giving you permission to email them.
vii. Grow Your List And
Welcome Them Warmly
No charity can survive without acquiring new donors. Some new folks will
come to you on their own because you are on the ground in Haiti, mentioned
on CNN, or their daughter cribbed her entire paper from your site. But new,
organic donors usually arent enough to replace churning donors.
Enter in paid acquisition.
If you want to increase the number of your online supporters by year-end
fundraising season through paid acquisition, now is the time to get started.
End-of-year acquisition mailings are common, and often (relatively) suc-
cessful in the ofine world. But going straight to the donation ask (think cold
call or one-night stand) is an approach that doesnt work as well online.
Most organizations that engage in paid email recruitment send their new
supporters a series of messages to welcome them to the organization and
begin building what they hope will be a long-term relationship.
Here is your list growth action plan.
1. Maximize organic trafc.
In Steps 2 and 6 we discussed capturing visitors to your website, and how to generate free visits.
Before spending any money to drive trafc to your site, review these steps again and make sure youre
getting the most out of those efforts.
2. Set your goals for list growth.
How many new contacts do you want to recruit in time for year-end fundraising, and how do you
plan to do it?
3. Understand list growth options.
There are many ways to grow your list. Cost per subscriber (aka CPA or CPL) offers the most cer-
tainty in terms of number of people versus budget, because you know up front what each lead will
cost you. Other options include cost per click (CPC) to drive trafnc to your site.
Google Adwords operates under a CPC model, while sites like Care2 offer CPA. Beware commercial
email lists; you often get what you pay for with super cheap options.
4. Do the math.
How many people will need to become donors for this acquisition to be a net positive investment, and
how soon do you need this to happen?
How will you convert these new contacts into donors? Having a welcome series of emails is an impor-
tant rst step.
How will you integrate these new contacts into your other channels? For example, many online leads
donate ofine and integrated multichannel marketing has proven to be a strong way to convert online
supporters into donors.
5. Track and measure.
No matter how you relate to these new contacts, make sure you keep track of where they came from,
which of them gave, and through what mode. Next year, go back to the sources that worked best, and
drop those that didnt.
viii. Whats Your Story?
Do your online communications make your donors and prospects feel more
connected to your cause? For many non-prots, the answer is no.
So how do you overcome the inspiration gap? You do it by re-connecting
donors with the passion and vision that inspired them to get involved with
your cause in the rst place. And you do that with emotion.
A tale of two minds

Many organizations are afraid to tap into emotion. They worry that emotion will make them appear
less intellectual, less effective or overly dramatic.
But the reality is that the human brain is literally of two minds: the rational mind and the emotional
mind. Both sides compete for control, but the emotional mind typically wins.
So whats the deal with these two minds?

The rational mind is the part that weighs costs against benents. It is analytical. The emo-
tional mind is inuenced by intuition and impulse and social inuences like peer pressure
and authority. In their book Switch, Chip and Dan Heath explain that the rational mind
wants a great beach body; meanwhile, the emotional mind is reaching for the Oreo cookie.

To successfully navigate these two minds, the Heath brothers recommend you rst appeal to
someones emotional mind and then quickly tell the rational mind what it is you need it to do.
Here is an example of a rational and emotional appeal going head-to-head.
a rational appeal
an emotional appeal
with clear directions
Food shortages in Malawi are affecting more
than three million children. And in Zambia,
severe rainfall decits have resulted in a 42%
drop in maize production from 2000. As a
result, an estimated three million Zambians
face hunger.
Make a gift and help [Organization X] provide
the people of Malawi and Zambia immediate
food assistance.
Rokia is a seven-year-old girl who lives in Mali
in Africa. She is desperately poor and faces
a threat of severe hunger, even starvation.
Your donation will change her life. With your
support, and the support of other caring
sponsors, [Organization X] will work with
Rokias family and other members of the
community to help feed and educate her, and
provide her with basic medical care.
For more specics on rationality
vs. emotion, see the Sea Change
Strategies and Network for
Good eBook Homer Simpson for
Non-Prots: The Truth About How
People Really Think and What It
Means for Promoting Your Cause.
Paul Slovic, a psychologist at the University of Ore-
gon, has studied the rational vs. emotional paradox
in detail. In an experiment using the example above,
he found that people donated more than twice as
much to the Rokia story.
This is not rational. When we are informed about
the true scope of the problem we should give more
money, not less. But according to Slovic, statistics
dont activate our moral emotions which lead to
engagement and connection to the issue at hand.
Charity:water does an excellent job at telling indi-
vidual, emotional stories that exemplify larger issues
in a compelling way.
So what are your stories? And do they appeal to reason or to
emotion?
1. Be an emotional story detective.
Track down those emotional stories! And work to shift your organization into a storytelling culture.
Here are some tips.
Interview benenciaries and ask them to tell you the story of how your organization helped them.
Ask volunteers why they are volunteering there is probably story gold in them hills.
At each staff meeting, ask one person to tell a story about how your organization helped change a
life or make a difference.
Keep a library of stories that people can easily access and add to throughout your organization.
Don't include statistics in your stories.
Try to focus on one individual, one whale, one tree. People are wired to relate to individuals, not
big statistical populations.
Be clear these stories are emblematic of your work, but dont create an impression the donors con-
tribution was specically earmarked for that individual (unless it is).
2. Provide crystal-clear direction.
The Heaths say you deal with the rational mind quite simply: you provide crystal-clear direction on
what you need it to do. You may think youre encountering resistance to your call to action when
in fact youre encountering confusion. So much of nonprot work stumbles due to poor, unclear or
overly complex calls to action. We tell people to stop global warming when we should ask them to
switch light bulbs.
3. Tell your stories across channels.
Once you have a good story and a crystal-clear action, share them through every channel you have at
your disposal, including email, website, social networks, and ofine channels including events and mail.
ix. Whats Your
Year-End Plan?
!
Okay, now that youve completed steps 1-8, its time to put your year-end plan
together.

1. First, outline your big-picture campaign strategic objectives.
Potential ideas include:
Develop a narrative arc that is sustained throughout the campaign
Include a high number of substantive cultivation and progress reports
Use advanced segmentation
Use video when appropriate
Introduce donors to program staff and benenciaries
2. Next, identify your goals and your pathway to achieving those
goals.
Outline your goals in advance of the campaign. Potential goals include, but are not limited to:
Increasing total year-end giving by XX%
Increasing total year-end gifts
Increasing average gifts
Increasing new donor acquisition rates
Upgrading current donors to a higher giving level

3. Then, identify tactics that will help you achieve those goals.
Do you have a match?
Do you have a celebrity signer?
Are you launching an optimized donation form to increase gift conversion?
Are you incorporating a donationbased website hijack? (See Step 2 for an example.)
What is your segmentation strategy?
Are you upgrading donors by landing them on appropriate forms with higher gift string suggestions based
on their highest previous contribution?
Are you targeting non-donors with a low-dollar ask or a special acquisition campaign?
Are you targeting mid-dollar donors with a high-dollar circle ask?
Are you targeting monthly givers to ask them for an additional year-end gift?
Will you send nve email appeals rather than last year's four?
Will you appeal to your social network community? How many times?
4. Next, what is your theme or narrative arc?

What issue area(s) resonate(s) most with your donors? What emotional stories do you have at your
disposal (see Step 9)? Can you weave these issues and stories together into a cohesive narrative arc
that sustains the campaign?
5. What is your messaging calendar?
Sit down with your calendar and identify for each message:
Theme/story
Launch date
Signer
Call to give/act
Segmentation
Landing page needed
Coordination with your website (the message story should be featured on your homepage during
launch)
Coordination with social media (the story/ask should be featured on your networks during
launch)
Coordination with ofnine (will this augment your ofnine plan?)
6. Finally, relax, knowing you are an overachiever and have
started this planning process in advance. You have plenty of
time to get steps 1-10 done and have a blockbuster year-end
fundraising season!

Overachiever's Guide To Year-End Fundraising: Nine Steps You Can Use Now To Raise More Money in December

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