DonorEye

A guide to better fundraising letters

This is the theory behind the assessment. How a donor reads a letter, what the letter has to get said, and how to write it so that it gets read.

• How does a donor read your fundraising letter?

  There is no single answer to how long a donor spends on your letter. Some skim in seconds, others read every line. How far she gets depends on how the letter is designed, which images it has and which words it uses.

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• Problem, solution and the route of the money in a fundraising letter

  Before you write a word, you should be able to answer three things. What is the problem? What is the solution? And how does the donor's money become the solution? If the letter does not answer them clearly, it is not ready to send.

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• How to write the story of one person in a fundraising letter

  A problem only becomes real when the donor meets one person who has it. That is why a fundraising letter should be about one person, not about many and not about the organisation.

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• Images in fundraising letters that work

  An image can carry the whole story, or ruin it. It says more than a thousand words, and can therefore be read in a thousand ways.

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• The you-perspective in fundraising letters and the BOY rule

  A fundraising letter that is about the organisation gives the donor little to do. A letter about what she can achieve gives her a reason to give.

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• AI language in fundraising letters, and how to clear it out

  AI pulls towards the average. A fundraising letter smoothed out to the average lacks a person, and then the human has to be the counterweight.

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• A checklist before you send the fundraising letter

  A checklist catches what you cannot see yourself, because you know the letter too well. Go through it with fresh eyes.

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• How DonorEye assesses a fundraising letter

  DonorEye gives feedback on fundraising letters before they are sent. Here is the theory behind the assessment, and what it can and cannot tell you.

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