Five A's of Donor Retention

The five A’s work in concert; retention suffers even if one is missing or weak. For example, if you don’t have a timely acknowledgment process, nothing you do to affirm the donor’s gift later can entirely remove that sour taste from their mouth. Asking and affirming should be part of a special sustainer journey that integrates mail, email, phone, and text (subject to the donor’s channel preferences). It’s also why a carefully crafted welcome series can help the donor relationship get off on the right foot.?

Awareness

Establish the brand as worthy of support. The donor psychology is one of trusting the organization. Direct marketing and marketplace awareness programs create this awareness using PSAs, public relations events, content marketing, and social media. Your donor marketing programs will succeed more often with higher market awareness. Donors want to see you, even after they’ve committed to you.

Appeal

Present the need and make a meaningful offer that generates a gift, building engagement. The donor’s psychology is a feeling of need and opportunity to fix a problem. When you’ve acquired a donor, you’ve already done this successfully once. You’ll want to keep up that standard of success throughout the donor’s lifetime. You’ll be appealing again for additional gifts in special circumstances, upgrades to their monthly gift, and if there are lapses or potential lapses.

Appreciate

Recognize the donor’s gift and praise the donor’s involvement, building loyalty. The donor psychology is that they feel assured that their financial gift was received and appreciated. You want to do this immediately upon receiving the gift, whether online or offline.

Ask

Understand that every relationship is most profound when based on learning — them learning who you are and you learning who they are. The key things to know early in a donor relationship are why they gave, their feelings about you, their experience, and how they want to be treated. To understand these, you must ask. And without these answers, you will be appealing, appreciating, and affirming only generically, while you get much better retention when you do it specifically. Calling programs and donor surveys via mail and email are effective for learning intent and interest. Surveys immediately after sign-up can also help you?assess satisfaction with their experience and commitment to your organization, both critical tools in modeling.

Affirm

Demonstrate how their financial gifts are used to accomplish what the donor wanted to accomplish. The donor psychology is that they believe they made a difference. And when a donor believes they made a difference, they are primed to give again. Newsletters, social media, and direct marketing prove they’re having the impact they want in the world.

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