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It’s the most wonderful (and busiest) time of year for charitable organizations. For many nonprofits, year-end giving accounts for 50% of philanthropic revenue for the year. No doubt, it’s crunch time for development teams, and there can be challenges. For instance, in 2024, charitable giving has not outpaced inflation. People are also more distracted than ever — as in consuming an average of 12 hours of content daily.
With so many things vying for attention, how can you capture donors when you might only have 17 milliseconds to do so?
In our recent webinar, Winning the Hearts and Minds of Donors, I joined Danielle Gentry-Barth, Easterseals Redwood EVP of Agency Advancement and Veteran Services, to dive into the art and science of capturing attention. We also presented this concept at the Annual Bridge to Integrated Marketing & Fundraising Conference in National Harbor, MD.
While there isn’t a magic one-size-fits-all formula, there are three powerful ways you can grab attention and motivate donors:
- Segment your donors using heart and mind
- Simplify your message
- Be unforgettable
Follow along as we explore these three tips in more detail.
Tip #1: Segment your donors using heart and mind
Simplified donor segmentation can be incredibly effective, especially if you’re working with limited resources. According to Danielle Gentry-Barth of Easterseals Redwood, donors often fall into two broad categories:
- Heart-driven donors who respond emotionally to stories
- Mind-driven donors who prioritize data and outcomes
Segmenting by heart and mind provides a manageable framework for creating targeted donor messaging. This strategy works well for:
- Small teams or new development departments.
- Limited budgets or tight timelines.
- Campaigns ranging from annual giving to large capital drives.
Danielle has effectively used simplified heart and mind segmentation to provide donor communication structures for everything from entry-level annual giving campaigns to multimillion-dollar capital campaigns.
Why it works: Neuroscience shows that humans process information emotionally and logically. Heart-driven donors connect through empathy, while mind-driven donors rely on data to validate their decisions. This approach is supported by a study of social science and persuasive communication in Charles Duhigg’s book “Supercommunicators”.
Simplification can also help us capture attention. The book “Smart Brevity” cites a lot of evidence that we are distracted:
- On average we look at our phones 344 times a day.
- In as little as 17 milliseconds (two finger snaps) we decide to click or scroll.
- If we do capture attention, we spend, on average, 26 seconds reading content.
Messaging for heart-driven donors
We all know people who are moved by a good mission story. They are driven to give after hearing about the lives of those who are served and supported. They often get emotional and may even cry when they think of the impact. They want the anecdotes to know they are making a difference.
Messaging for mind-driven donors
Then there are the donors who make giving decisions based on facts. They think about return on investment. They want to know the number of people served. They may want to see your financial and performance data. They want to know and understand your KPIs (key performance indicators).
For these types of people, their emotions might not bubble up to the surface as quickly, but they still have feelings connected to their impact.
Segmentation activity: Get to know your donors
Create two columns on a sheet of paper — label one “Heart” and the other “Mind.” Think about your top 50 donors. Envision the type of messaging that resonates with them. Place their names into one of the columns. Keep them in mind as you create content.
Want to hear more from Lauran and Danielle? Watch the 30-minute on-demand video.
Tip #2: Simplify your donor messaging
Not all stories are the same or appeal to the same audience. In your content brief, a good place to start is to determine this: Be worthy of your audience’s attention. Tell them why this story matters to the community and to them.
Here’s how to simplify donor communications:
- Use plain language to boost understanding and recall.
- Organize content with headings, lists and active voice.
- Avoid jargon or overly complex explanations.
- Drive clarity by focusing on one main idea per message.
“Brevity is confidence, length is fear.” – Smart Brevity
Simplifying your messaging also ensures inclusivity and makes your content accessible to diverse audiences.
Tip #3: Be unforgettable through storytelling
Stories are priceless. They are vital to communicating with and mobilizing your stakeholders, all levels of current donors, and prospective donors. As you develop your mission-moment (an impactful highlight of a specific instance of an organization’s mission in action) and impact stories, lean into simplifying your message to engage your audience more quickly. (Remember, on average, you get 26 seconds of your audience’s attention.)
Key components for unforgettable donor communications:
- Visuals: Use photography, video or animation to capture attention quickly.
- Emotion plus logic: Balance heartwarming anecdotes with data to reinforce impact.
- Clarity: Edit to eliminate fluff and emphasize the main point.
- Call-to-action (CTA): Make sure your audience knows why your story matters and how they can help.
Also, be sure to repurpose stories across campaigns. A mission-moment or impact story is a marketer’s dream — we can use them in many ways. Consider how to reuse and repurpose your content to make it unforgettable, such as:
- Break it down into smaller key messages, quotes, images, etc.
- Use it on multiple channels.
- Build into different formats: an infographic, flip book, video message.
- Reuse data in reports and face-to-face donor conversations.
- Use stories in numerous campaigns with different audiences.
- Appeal to both the heart and the mind.
Examples of donor messaging that resonates
To preserve resources such as budget and time, we recommend leaning into including both heart and mind messaging in your mass communication content development efforts.
Segmenting their audience into heart donors and mind donors has provided a good foundation for Danielle and her team as they think about attracting, engaging and appropriately stewarding donors. In fact, they have used this donor communication structure for all annual giving campaigns, and she has employed it as she’s led several multimillion-dollar capital campaigns.
Here are a few examples of assets that communicate to the heart and mind.
Website landing page examples
Team Rubicon and Charity Water both get high marks for simplicity and brevity. They lead with strong visuals that stir an emotional response. They address heart-centric and mind-centric content right below the fold very clearly with data. They also have an impact by providing opportunities to learn more through back links. And there are clear calls-to-action to make a gift.
Video examples
Easterseals Redwood in Greater Cincinnati has used video as a powerful tool for telling compelling mission stories.
This animated video packs in lots of information in just 30 seconds. It leaves donors and prospects certain their investment has an impact, which makes for a stronger connection. Animation is budget-friendly and can be easily repurposed (i.e. still graphics, social content, donor engagement, etc.)
Full-production videos are unparalleled in their capacity to bring a story to life. This video from Easterseals Redwood deals with a sensitive subject and is shared with permission from Mr. and Mrs. Adamson. The video is memorable because of the strong emotions it evokes. For those who are more pragmatic in their thinking, the video also shares tangible solutions to affect change.
WG Content will help you create content that resonates with donors
Your donors and prospective donors are busy. Make their engagement with your organization easier by appealing to their emotions and need for facts, simplifying your messaging and being unforgettable.
Whether you need a hand with mission-moment and impact stories, fundraising campaign content, explainer videos, event scripts or annual reports, WG Content can offer writing, editing and design pros to help you drive engagement. Let’s chat.
Additional tips on donor communications:
