One of the principles that guides my approach to fundraising comes from the world of anthropology.
Dorothea C. Leighton was living with a First Nation group in Canada when she highlighted a simple human fact. No matter what society we live in or at what time, we all share a need to feel ‘a worthwhile member of a worthwhile group’. It’s a phrase that has stuck with me ever since. And now, many years on, it has become part of Bluefrog’s operating culture.
But what does it mean? And how does it help us answer the question of how we grow giving?
It emphasises that giving has a transactional element. Though it is often meant to be selfless, the act of giving rarely is. On a rational level, when we give, we want to feel that our donations have made a difference. And at a deeper, emotional level, giving to charities helps satisfy our underlying psychological needs.
And that is the crux of the problem. If giving to charity is reciprocal in nature, why should we expect generosity to grow when donors don’t receive that much in return for their support?
If, when a donor gives, the result is the arrival of a formulaic thank you email within a few seconds of them hitting the donate button, how does that deliver a sense of purpose or satisfaction?
Of course, that might not matter if the donor received a personal thank you a few days later. And if that were followed, when appropriate, with a report showing them how their gift made a difference, which also emphasised how much their gift was appreciated.
But taking into consideration the hundreds of conversations we have with donors every year, this sort of stewardship is incredibly rare.
The result is a continuing sense of disconnect between donors and charities. It was neatly summed up by a conversation we had when we were conducting qualitative research into why people lapse. The donor stopped us halfway through the interview and said:
It’s a sentiment that we still repeatedly hear in our research today. Many donors, particularly the most valuable ones, tend to give in spite of how they are treated by the charities they support rather than because of it.
It’s worrying, but the fact is the majority of donors have come to expect very little in return for their support. To manage the dissonance this creates, they regularly resort to making excuses on behalf of the charities they give to. As one donor put it recently:
The result is that time after time, we find that giving is constrained by fundraisers’ actions (or the lack of them), with two key doubts that are regularly raised as to why people limit the amount they give:
When these concerns remain unaddressed, it elevates a sense of learned helplessness. The thought that ‘nothing can be done’ in the face of a problem relegates giving to charity to a peripheral activity rather than reinforcing the sense that a donor is part of a movement for change.
Take global poverty for instance. Even though we know that extreme poverty fell dramatically across the world from 1990 to 2019, very few people realise the extent of what the concerted action of INGOs supported by many thousands of donors across the world actually achieved.
As one donor surmised:
But it’s not just the development sector where this is an issue. It runs across all charities - particularly the larger ones. It’s a real indictment of how we communicate with donors.
Yet, as the charity ads often say, it doesn’t have to be this way.
Sense, the charity working with children and adults with complex disabilities, focused on addressing the two fundamental doubts as part of their strategic plan to grow income. This resulted in the development of a communication programme that concentrated on showing donors what their gifts had made possible. It also incorporated a dynamic thanking model where real efforts were made to give donors a sense of appreciation. The number of responsive donors grew by almost 150% within just a couple of years – with income boosted by over 170%. And the trajectory shows no signs of slowing down.
But just as importantly, this type of communication strategy doesn’t only increase the income of the charity that implements it. It can have a positive impact on broader attitudes to giving that goes far beyond a relationship with one organisation. The power of this emotional boost was summed up by another donor when they told us:
In this respect, growing giving is in our own hands. But it needs a change of approach. Fundraising isn’t just about demonstrating need in ever more creative ways or looking how to get someone to simply engage with us, so we have their contact details to exploit. It’s about showing people what can be achieved through giving as a part of group of people who have a shared desire to tackle some of the most serious problems that society faces.
That means one thing – to grow giving we need to be re-imagine fundraising to more effetively take into account the needs of donors as well as those that we serve. It’s a task that was perhaps best summed up by Alex Hyde-Smith of Alzheimer’s Society when he shared another great insight into how fundraising should function. It had profound influence on me and I think it’s worth repeating here as it presents a vision of the sector that we should all embrace if growth is to become the norm: