Creative story telling and engaging communication are what charities need to do if they want to effective in their fundraising message. They need to create messages that ignite that spark in a potential supporter that will lead them to taken action on behalf of your cause.  Tom Latchford from RAISING IT boiled down the supporters journey and explains how an understanding of the charity’s message is crucial for getting support.He distills the journey down to:

  •   Attracting people so they sign up and become somebodies.
  •   Prompting them to take meaningful action and become supporters.
  •  Getting people to become advocates or superheroes.

If your charity’s message isn’t resonating with potential donors or supporters or your marketing campaign isn’t making people rush for their wallets or click on the ‘donate’ button, it’s probably due to one (or all) of these three reasons.

  1. Not creating a compelling reason to take action

It’s tempting to assume that if people have information, they will act on it.  But sadly, information doesn’t equal action.  We know it’s healthy to exercise every day — but that doesn’t mean we’re going to do it.  Inertia is a strong force.  Good causes are forever in conflict with the status quo and business as usual.  We can’t just lay out information.  We need to create a compelling reason for taking action that beats doing nothing.  In marketing terms, we need to improve our reward and lower our price.

  1. Forgetting that we’re not the audience

The messages that appeal to us, aren’t the ones that necessarily resonate with others. Every assumption should be suspect until we understand our audiences’ mindsets. When we assume our audience thinks the way we do, we are at odds with the principles of marketing.  We must think like the people we want to reach if we want to succeed.

  1. Treating marketing as an afterthought

Marketing and communications are often tacked on to a good causes’s efforts at the last minute.  In treating nonprofit marketing as an afterthought, we deprive ourselves of the great benefits that marketing can bring to all our work.  A marketing mindset throughout every dimension of our cause can help us design more effective campaigns that better meet the needs of people we want to help, win us more donations and support, and motivate people to act.

Do you want to improve the quality of your charity marketing?  We run a range of bespoke and public PR and social media courses from basic to advanced levels.  Call us today on 020 8090 2233/0794 9529 231 to discuss how we can help your organisation improve its marketing strategies. There’s even a 15% discount on all courses if you quote this blog reference CUST-AD15.