Charity Email Marketing: Going Beyond the Dreary Newsletter

Charity email marketing is an important tool for non-profit marketing and fundraising. But often, emails sent by charities are limited to the "dreary newsletter" - with content that can easily be overlooked. To get the most out of charity email marketing, we need to move beyond this and invest in four key areas: growth, automation, personalisation and optimisation. In this blog post, we'll explore how to do just that.

According to the 2023 UK Digital benchmarks, the average charity email subscriber receives 23 emails per year, while non-UK organisations in the study receive even more. Despite concerns around email fatigue, email remains a crucial way to reach out to potential donors and maintain relationships with existing ones.

• In terms of ROI, the statistics speak for themselves. In 2022, UK nonprofits raised an average of £66 for every 1,000 fundraising emails.
• Email generated 4 % of online revenue in 2021. While that share dropped to 2% in 2022, email still has the potential to drive significant revenue for nonprofits.

Of course, it's not just about the numbers. Email can also be a powerful way to connect with supporters and share stories about the impact of your organisation's work. By investing in a thoughtful and strategic email program, nonprofits can build trust, loyalty, and engagement with their supporters - all while driving donations and revenue through digital fundraising.

So where do you start?

In the realm of email communication, we often find ourselves stuck in the age-old approach of monthly newsletters, which often results in lower click-through rates and reduced engagement.

It’s time to ditch the monthly, one-size-fits-all newsletters and opt for more personalised and creative email content. Consider giving your regular emails a unique name and treating them as creative projects that delight your subscribers.

Top tip: Stop calling them ‘newsletters’ internally to unlock more creative freedom. Don’t be afraid to experiment with the format and who the emails are from. Let other voices in your organisation shine.

List churn is a normal part of email marketing, but if you don’t have an acquisition plan, your email community is essentially dying. To keep your email file growing, it's essential to have clear growth strategies in place that run throughout the year.

First, consider optimising your donation form opt-in statements. A simple "subscribe for updates" message isn't enough to entice potential donors to join your email list. Craft a compelling message that highlights the benefits of subscribing and what types of content they can expect to receive.

Paid social media campaigns can also be effective in building your email list. Consider running a values-driven campaign or a quiz that requires an email address to participate. Your organisation is filled to the brim with expert and specialist information — and supporters want to learn from you. Consider launching an email course (a simple automated email series) that dives into a specialist topic and promote in on social media or at your venue.

Lastly, don't forget to place a bigger emphasis on your general newsletter. Treat your subscribers like VIPs by providing exclusive content, discounts, or early event access.

Digital fundraising can be made even more effective by implementing automation in your email campaigns. By creating automated email journeys such as welcome series and donor stewardship, you can generate 80% more donations while saving time and resources.

Lots of organisations know automations are important but often shunt them to a section of their to-do lists reserved “for when they have time”. But I would argue automations are one of the most important tactical marketing projects for charities. By using automated email and storytelling in your welcome journey for new subscribers and donors, you can make the most of their peak level of interest — keeping them engaged in your work long after they've signed up or donated.

However, closing the gap between data and comms silos is crucial. To get the most out of your automation efforts, ensure seamless data importing and integration so that no one in your community is left without a welcome. Your automation strategy should be data-driven and tailored to your audience.

In today's digital age, personalisation is the name of the game when it comes to effective email marketing. We all know it, but are we really harnessing its full potential? It's time to move beyond basic segmentation and donation history and truly connect with our audience.

Take donation stewardship, for example. Imagine if we started personalising from the get-go by collecting reasons for giving. Rather than sending a generic welcome email to all donors, we could immediately segment based on their motivations. The result? Nuanced and deeply personalised stories resonate with each individual, keeping them engaged for the long haul.

But personalisation doesn't stop there. When it comes to single sends, behavioural data is gold. Did someone open a previous email? Click on a specific image? Tailor your emails based on these actions.

If you want to get even more creative, pay attention to subscriber interests. Run sporadic campaigns to find out what they care about most (tools like Typeform are perfect for this). Remember, you don't have to email everyone all the time. Instead, opt for campaigns to small groups of people about only the topics and areas of your work they care about.

To truly boost your email fundraising growth, you need to focus on optimisation, both in your content and our email data. When it comes to content, A/B testing is the key. Don't be afraid to run tests in at least 50% of your campaigns, starting with simple variations like subject lines, images, and Call to Action styles. Tracking the results doesn't have to be complex; your email platform should let you export data in CSV format or even offer dashboard insights on the winning elements and ideas for future testing.

However, the real value of A/B testing lies in the time we dedicate to reviewing the data and incorporating the findings into upcoming campaigns. This reflection period is essential and should be treated as a necessity rather than a luxury.

Now, let's talk about optimising your data. It might not sound as exciting as crafting creative content, but it's crucial for success. Clean email data directly impact deliverability, and yet many organisations still email subscribers regardless of their engagement. To optimise your email database, regularly remove bounces and unsubscribes. It may feel daunting, but it's essential for maintaining a healthy email list.

Another critical step is dealing with inactive subscribers. Rather than immediately removing them, try running re-engagement campaigns to warm them up again. Craft short and compelling emails asking if they still want to hear from you. If reactivation attempts fail, it's better to bid farewell to these subscribers, improving your overall email deliverability and ensuring your hard work on personalisation and content doesn't go to waste.

Remember, with a solid email data acquisition strategy in place, your email list can grow and stay consistent, ensuring that your efforts are reaching the right audience and achieving remarkable results.

When there are newer, shinier digital marketing platforms all the time, why should we make time for the humble email?

The ROI of automated stewardship campaigns should be enough to bump email up our to-do lists, but in case it’s not, we also need to address the looming challenge of the death of cookies. With changes unfolding on platforms like Gmail and Meta, building first-party data strategies is vital.

Your email database is the one marketing community you truly own. In a time of social media instability, it's essential to safeguard and mobilise your email community. Picture this: if your social media pages vanished tomorrow, could your email community fill the gaps?

Let's not forget the practical side of email magic too. Automation is a superhero that protects your team's capacity, warding off burnout. It ensures your supporters receive a top-notch experience, even when you can't be present 100% of the time.

Investing in email is not just a checkbox in your marketing to-do list; it's a strategic move towards sustainability, resilience, and fostering genuine connections with your supporters.

Alex Fearon has been building non-profit online communities that drive real-world change for nearly a decade. Now she helps purpose-led organisations combine data, storytelling and automation to build email programmes that foster connection with supporters and help internal teams ditch digital overwhelm too.

Alex founded Maybe Later to help people fall in love with storytelling and digital marketing again, to support teams with real purpose to get their messages heard and wrestle back control from social media platforms who are ultimately self-serving first.

You can join her email community at My newsletter — MaybeLater