How to Tailor Your Touch Point to Your Donor

Today we’ll talk about how to tailor and personalize a touchpoint so your donors feel like you created it for them alone.

In some cases, you did. You’re sending project reports for their named initiative and you’re congratulating a donor on a recent accomplishment or milestone. These touches are probably the easiest to personalize, so it might feel like you can shoot from the hip on them.

You know your donor, you see their name in the news or you notice it’s the day their kid graduates from college, and you fire off a note. At some level, tactically, you can trust your emotional intelligence to inform how you craft those touches. You wouldn’t be in this business if you didn’t care about people or know how to make them feel special. And, without a plan, you can remember to do this consistently for a couple dozen donors.

If you’re a major gifts officer, we recommend you work with ~150 qualified donors and have a plan for every one of them. For Mid-Level, it’s more like 500-700. While the above tactic can work great for a handful of donors, from a strategic level, you need to build into every donor’s plan a reminder to “stumble upon” an excuse to reach out with that kind of personal note.

This can look like:

• Setting news alerts on their names/companies,
• Listening for upcoming milestones they mention and then setting up timely reminders
• Reading about the latest developments in their industry (or favorite sports team)
• Chasing down some data internally to give them a program update
• Otherwise expending some energy searching for points of connection that you can craft as if they’ve just dropped in your lap.

You have to schedule time to do that. You’re not doing this for every donor every month, but you should do it for every donor at least once a year (or, for Mid-Level, every donor with whom you’ve had a meaningful connection).

For most donors, most months, your touches look very similar donor to donor. It’s an impact piece (aka YMAD – You Made A Difference) that your marketing team created or maybe a rollup of recent news coverage; it’s an articulation of the need your organization exists to fill (aka a Gap Statement).

Surely, your donors know that you have other donors you’re sending this content to, but you don’t want them to feel that.

For the donors you know well, personalizing a YMAD can come naturally: “Hey Bob, I saw this and thought you and Mary would love it. Reminds me of what you said at lunch the other day: we all do better when we all do better.” Then craft something different for John and Sarah, for Erin and Laura, for Admiral Jones. Easy day.

Did the annual report come out in booklet form? Grab some sticky notes and pop a few in the pages your donor will be most interested in based on something they’ve shared: “You’re gonna love the story on housing p. 7.”

For donors you don’t know as well, or for the majority of your mid-level caseload, it’s harder. For your tier C donors, and for those donors who have never responded, you’re fishing for information and hoping to inspire responses all the time. MGOs, don’t stop reading — there’s always something more to learn about your donors. We meet no ordinary people.

Don’t know much about their interests yet? Preface a YMAD with a question: “I think this is some exciting stuff. I’d love to hear what first caught your attention about our work?” or close a Gap Statement with: “How do you feel we can most effectively address this need [or serve our community]?”

Don’t know much about their life? Consider adding to a YMAD: “This is what we’re celebrating right now. What are you celebrating?”

Assume familiarity. Is there something in their local area you have in common? What’s happened in their town recently that they can be proud of? Can you look up the score from last week’s game? Is a famous band coming through soon? What’s the weather like? Call them by their first name, include their spouse’s first name, ask them to say hi to a local celebrity for you. I saw a gift officer attach a photo of her pets with the message, “My pets say hi to yours.”

Assume common values. If a program makes you excited, they’ll likely share some of that excitement. If your heart breaks over the problems you’re working to solve, you can assume theirs does as well. “I know you love our neighbors as much as I do, and I’m so grateful you’re making this program possible.”

Share something relatable and human about yourself. “I’m still cleaning up after my sick dog [or I’m getting ready to head off on maternity leave], but wanted to make sure you saw this piece on... [and I promise to send a baby picture as soon as I can]”

The bottom line is this: it takes time and intention and planning to effectively personalize touch points. Creativity and inspiration don’t just happen. You must create the conditions where they can blossom. Not every donor gets the same level of attention, creativity, and personalization (that’s why we tier), but every donor deserves some.

Done well, personalization communicates to donors that they are seen and known, that their involvement and investment in your organization makes a difference, and that they can trust you to send them interesting updates and address the issues they care about.

And that means more engagement, more joy, and ultimately more revenue for the life-changing work your organization does so well.

This blog is part of a series about touch points:

Part 1: Why Do You Need Touch Points?

Part 2: What Is Your Touch Point Objective?

Part 3: How to Make Touch Points Personal (And Sound Like a Real Person)