Organizations are doing great advocacy and fundraising work in a variety of channels -- online, offline, and everywhere in between. With an integrated approach, all that work can add up to more than the sum of its parts, but figuring out where to focus can be frustrating. Join Avalon Consulting and Change.org to learn the five critical strategies that will help integrate your efforts and drive the most value from your direct marketing work across all your channels, including: * Welcoming new supporters and capitalizing on first-time donors * Cross-channel integration best practices * Testing and tracking multichannel efforts

1. Integration Frustration?
5 Strategies to Cut Through the
Jargon and Succeed with
Multichannel Marketing

2. • Introductions
• What is Multichannel?
• #1 Feed the Pipeline
• #2 Introduce Yourself
• #3 Integrate Integration
• #4 Relevance, Timeliness & Urgency
• #5 Tracking, Testing, Analyzing
• Questions?

3. Allison Porter Lawrence Grodeska
President Nonprofit Community Manager
Avalon Consulting Change.org
Barb Perell Matt Fender
VP of Online Fundraising Senior Client Manager
Avalon Consulting Change.org

4. Who we are
Avalon Consulting Group is a full-service membership and fundraising consulting
agency that helps nonprofit organizations maximize their revenue and engagement.
Arts/Cultural Advocacy Environmental Political
We are…
15 years of service
30 employees
Client-first approach
Truly integrated, multi-channel strategy
Left-side/right-side of brain approach
Passionate about what we do

5. Avalon is honored to work with some of the most effective &
respected nonprofits

8. What IS multichannel and why
should we care?

9. Direct Mail Internet
• postcards • email
• newsletters • Website
• blogs
Face-to-face • social media
• petitions
Phone • mobile

11. Engage donors in a meaningful relationship that naturally and
progressively evolves to include financial support
The E-Engagement Continuum
High Fundraising – Direct Appeal for Financial Support
Activism – Petitions, Letters to Decision Makers, etc.
Fundraising Focus
Interaction – Surveys, Quizzes,
Contests, Downloads, etc.
Cultivation – Welcome, Thank You, Recognition,
Premiums, etc.
Education – E-Newsletters, Announcements, Action Alerts, Website
Content, etc.
Low
Low Level of Engagement High

12. Similarities:
Fundamental fundraising principles (message Online vs. Offline
development, testing, relationship building)
Differences: Less than 10% of all
Message tone, Message cadence/frequency, the giving happens
ability to engage more cost-effectively, and the online;
ability to respond quickly. Direct mail is 80%.
98% are raising no
revenue on social
media.

13. Integration strategy #1
Feed the pipeline

15. • Defy Attrition! Maintain or Grow Your List
– Online: Lead Generation
– Offline: Donor Acquisition
Supporter Leads into Ongoing Maximize
Online Acquisition Pipeline Cultivation
First Gift Second Gift
Donor Value
Donor
List Donors into Ongoing Maximize
Offline Acquisition
Acquisition
Pipeline Cultivation
Second Gift
Donor Value
& First Gift
• Have a Great Conversion Strategy

16. 3 appeals, $62 average gift
List size Response Gifts Revenue
rate
50,000 0.09% 135 $8,370
75,000 0.10% 225 $13,950

19. #integrate5 takeaway:
Your multichannel efforts are only as
good as the audiences who see
them. Defy attrition and keep feeding
the pipeline.

20. Integration strategy #2
Introduce yourself

22. The Power of an Intro
• Connect the Dots
• Identify Opportunities
• Segmentation
• Frame it as a Benefit

23. • Donors acquired through this
series join at 2-3x the rate of
those on file longer.
• Series performance has
increased year- over-year.
• The Online Welcome Series
includes the following:
• Week 1: Welcome
• Week 2: Quiz
• Week 3: Take Action
• Week 4: Ask
• Acquisition (non-
donors),
Sustainer ask (donors)
• Week 8: Sustainer ask
(non-donors who didn’t
respond to the acquisition)

25. Subject: Did you get our letter about our match?

26. Subject: We’re calling you.

27. #integrate5 takeaway:
Introduce yourself and call attention
to channel integration. Connecting
the dots = more momentum, synergy
and $$$

28. Integration strategy #3
Make Integration Part of your
Campaign Strategies

29. Coordinate communications so you
don’t confuse your supporters:
• Grid online schedules
(fundraising, communications, ev
ents) with mail, phone, and other
communications
• Integrate production schedules
to streamline execution
• Map out a contact strategy to
determine who’s getting what
and when to avoid overlap
• Identify online-only opportunities

30. Integrate schedules by program, audience, data needs & creative development.

31. Avoid last minute scrambling by planning all components of your online
campaign:
• Define the Universe
– Segmentation – who are you emailing?
• Define the Creative and Program Strategy
– Case for Giving
– Call to Action
– Ask String(s)
– Art or other technical/functionality
• Define your Tests
• Define creative (copy and art) that is appropriate for the web and
online channels.

35. #integrate5 takeaway:
Include integration at every step –
budgets, schedules data and
creative. #integrate5

36. Integration strategy #4
Hone your message:
Relevance, timeliness &
urgency

37. GOOD FUNDRAISING IS GOOD FUNDRAISING:
• Identify the Problem or Opportunity
• Identify a Deadline/Be Urgent
• Identify the Enemy
• Be Relevant
• Be Specific
• Be Emotional
• Be the Solution

38. Campaign opportunities:
• Matching Gifts
• Year-End campaigns
• Filing deadlines
• Membership Month
• Set a goal
• Set a deadline
• Increase urgency
• Make it clear
• Make it easy

39. • Test types of messaging and message style • Get to the point
• Be authentic and transparent
• Get to the point

40. Plan for Rapid Response Campaigns – Timeline for how it could work
Day 1 Day 2 Day 6 Day 10 Day 12 Day 14
Homepage Social networks
Press release
Web
eAppeal resend to eNewsletter eEngagement piece
eAppeal Follow-up
non-responders
eEngagement
piece
Email
Appeal Telemarketing
TM
Urgentgram Mail
Mail

41. Takeaway:
Good fundraising is good fundraising.
Speak to your audience and keep
your messages consistent across
channels. #integrate5

42. Integration Strategy #5
Tracking, Testing, Analyzing

43. • Set up a regular (automated or manual) data sync
between your offline database and online database.
• Ensure that information you want and need to
communicate with your donors (i.e. donation
history, interest area, geographic information, etc.) exists
in both databases.
• Without a data sync, you are not getting full picture of
your supporters and could be confusing
them, downgrading them, or not even contacting them.

44. • Create integrated budgets
• Be deliberate in how to
• allocate resources

47. $14
Millions
$12
$10
$8
$6
$4
$2
$0
FY06 FY07 FY08 FY09 FY10 FY11 FY12
Mail TM Web

48. • Tracking by program area – when acquisition is
acquisition and renewals are renewals
• Source Coding – stick with your logic!
• Segmenting
– RFM
– Prospect vs. House vs. Activist
– Beyond RFM: Issue response, action vs. non-action
takers, current vs. lapsed

49. • Gauge the response of month 1 month 2 month 3 month 4
activists to acquisition via
group A EM DM TM EM
email, telemarketing and
direct mail contacts. group B DM TM EM
• See which channels and group C EM EM
which mix of channels is group D
EM EM
most effective in converting (no model)
online activists.
Pre- Post-
• Model activist file Email Pre- DM TM Email Total
Respons Email Respons DM Avg. Respons TM Avg. Respons Post-Email Revenue/
to contact those e% Avg. Gift e% Gift e% Gift e% Avg. Gift Donor
most likely to
GROUP A
respond to an (DM/TM/EM, 2) .04% $29.16 1.04% $22.15 2.65% $29.22 .07% $27.36 $29.68
acquisition ask emails
GROUP B
and split into (DM/TM/EM, 1 .98% $23.47 2.36% $28.54 .06% $31.25 $32.59
email)
even groups.
GROUP C (EM only, .06% $25.31 .07% $25.27 $26.06
2 emails)

50. • Open rates
– Industry standard about 12%*
• Click through rates
– Industry standard about 0.47%*
• Bounce rates
– Try to keep under 1%
• Unsubscribe rates
– Industry average around 0.23% (increases with email volume)*
• Response rate
– 0.08%* fundraising, 3.8%* advocacy
• Average gift
– Dependent on your file makeup, ask, etc.

51. Use your analysis to benchmark against your organization and others.
Open % Avg. gift
30.00% $100.00
25.00% $80.00
20.00% $60.00
15.00% $40.00
10.00%
$20.00
5.00% With Acq With Acq
$0.00
0.00%
Without Acq Without Acq
Click-through % Response %
5.00% 1.60%
4.00% 1.40%
1.20%
3.00% 1.00%
0.80%
2.00% 0.60%
1.00% 0.40%
With Acq 0.20% With Acq
0.00% 0.00%
Without Acq Without Acq

52. #integrate5 takeaway:
Don’t silo your data. Look at all
channels together for an actionable
view of your whole program.
#integrate5

53. Questions?

54. Allison Porter Lawrence Grodeska
President Nonprofit Community Manager
allisonp@avalonconsulting.net lawrence@change.org
202-429-6080 x102
Matt Fender
Barb Perell Senior Client Manager
Vice President of Online Fundraising mfender@change.org
barbp@avalonconsulting.net
202-429-6080 x108
Change.org
Change.org/organizations
Avalon Consulting Group, Inc. Twitter.com/ChangeOrgs
2030 M Street, NW, Suite 700 Facebook.com/ChangeOrgs
Washington, DC 20036