What’s Your Answer When a Donor Asks: Why Should I be Interested in Your Cause?
By Harvey McKinnon
Mrs. Steele was called to jury duty but declined to serve, stating, “I do not believe in capital punishment.”
The judge explained. “Madam, this is not a murder trial,” he said. “It’s simply a case in which a woman is suing her husband. He’s accused of taking the $5,000 she gave him to buy a diamond necklace and donating it to charity.”
“I’ll serve,” agreed Mrs. Steele. “I could be wrong about capital punishment.”
How quickly our minds can change when we get more information.
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This article is an excerpt from Harvey McKinnon's book, The 11 Questions Every Donor Asks and the Answers All Donors Crave. For more information about the book, click here. |
A perennial question from prospective donors is, “Why should I be interested in your particular cause?” And the ready answer, “Because we do good work,” doesn’t really inspire. Many organizations do good work. You need to distinguish yourself much more.
I often ask people attending my workshop to tell me their Unique Selling Proposition (USP). What is the one thing that sets their organizations apart from all the others?
Your USP could be many things: Your history, your leadership, your accomplishments, your low administrative costs, even the nature of your appeal (e.g. “Your gift of $25 will save an area of the Amazon Rainforest forever”).
Dig deep enough and every organization has a distinguishing feature.
But, funny enough, in many cases your greatest asset is one you haven’t thought much about, even though it’s a big reason people might choose to support you. Your stories.
When your organization is involved in helping people create art, protect the environment, support human rights, or research diseases, you create stories. And stories can be yours alone.
• “I’m writing to you because 11 years ago the Crisis Hotline saved my daughter’s life. She’s now happily married and has a good job. It’s because of you and other generous donors that so many desperate people in our community have someone to turn to.”
• “I remember it vividly,” says Dr. Ken Baum, a glaucoma specialist at Kaiser Hospital in Honolulu, Hawaii, when asked about his first Seva Mobile Eye Camp. “We were in Tibet and drove for five days to reach an older woman who was completely blind from cataracts,” Ken recalls. “We did the surgery, and the next day when she took off the patch she burst into tears. She saw her grandchildren for the first time. I’ll never forget that.”
• “I gave up a lucrative vet practice because I saw how animals were suffering in our state and knew I had to do more. That’s why I founded this organization.”
People remember stories. They forget facts. Even decades later I still recall stories that motivated me to give to various causes.
In fact, a story can be so compelling people will even risk going to jail for it. Per Stenbeck discovered this while working at Sweden’s Save the Children office.
One day the office worker who opens the mail rushed into his office, very excited.
“She held up an envelope she’d just opened and poured out its contents. Inside was $9,750 U.S. dollars in mixed denominations. There was no letter and no identification. I thanked her for her honesty (she could easily have pocketed the money) and put the cash safely away.
“On the train home I was reading the local newspaper and lo and behold I caught sight of a minor news article. The day before a bank in Stockholm had been robbed. The amount missing was $9,750. Coincidence? It couldn’t be.”
The next day Per contacted the police. Apparently the bills were indeed from the robbery – every single one of them.
“A week later the police caught the young thief,” Per says. “It turned out he’d been so moved by a Save the Children message on television he felt he had to contribute something. Not having a penny himself, he decided to rob a bank and hand over the money to us.”
There was a sad ending to this story. The man was sentenced to six months in prison and Save the Children had to return every last penny to the bank.
And what did Per learn from this experience?
“Never underestimate the pulling power of a well-orchestrated fundraising ask,” he says with a wink.
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