The final day, and I was sad! I had really enjoyed the confernce, and had looked forward to every session. Even though I wasn't sure if I could fit in any more information about fundraising, I could have easily attended a couple more days of sessions. It really was that good.
In between sessions, I did something which I hadn't had a chance to do on the first day - take photos! I wanted you guys to see where I had been 'living' for the past 3 days so I went around and took happy snaps...
Where to go and what to do!
The bar / lounge area... always filled with people on laptops
Our internet lounge
IFC online... social media was MASSIVE! People were tweeting in sessions, about sessions!
We all had our own mailbox, much to Ada's delight! She checked it everytime we went past :-)
This is an actual painting hanging in the hotel. I know that the IFC is held at the same hotel every year...but, a painting of the IFC?
First session of the day... The bus from my hotel was running late, and so I had jumped off and raced through breakfast and then raced to my first session, because I didn't want to be late - it was Adrian Sargeant again, and after seeing how popular he was yesterday, I didn't want to miss out! (Yes, some sessions they shut the door and you just miss out).
I got there 15 mins early, and got almost the last seat in the house. I kid you not, people were standing OUTSIDE the door, trying to just to glimpse in! And the session goes for 1.5hrs! Adrian was a popular man, and this I think was THE session of the conference.
Philanthropic psychology - using donor identity to grow giving
Adrian Sargeant
I'm not even sure where to start for this session... basically about social information. Social information - telling people what others like them are doing. I think that is the easiest way to explain it. I had to concentrate 110% to kep up, but it was worth it. Hopefully this will make sense to you, as I am still grappling with it 12 hours later.
Firstly, providing social information works on new donors, and current donors. Adrian talked through some experiments he had done to explain it, so I will attempt to do the same. He did a test on a fundraising drive of a public radio station in the US. When people rang in to donate, they were place in either the control group, were not asked for a specific amount to donate, and the test group. The test group was asked to donate a specific amount, but it was HOW they were asked, that was interesting.
The test group were prompted to donate an amount and were provided with social information at the point of being asked.
Donors were segmented by identity (in this case it was gender). When they rang up to donate, they were given social information relevant to them around that donation by the receiver - eg. A woman just rang in and gave $xx. The caller identifies with being a woman, and hence donates the same amount.
1** Remind donors of their identity and why it is good to be that identity (eg in direct mail, something as simple as a Male/Female tick box).
2** Remind them of others in that identity (the 'another woman' part)
3** Provide the social information eg. another women just gave $xx
Can we lift this gift amount? Yes...
4** Ask if they have more or less than x people who use/benefit from the service (eg. listen to public radio). In the test, they used '2' people, because most people who rang in knew more than 2 people who listened to public radio, and hence further identified with the service.
Can we continue to increase what they give? Being in Moral Identity...
People have an actual and ideal moral identity. Actual - waht you are vs Ideal - where you want to be. Women have a bigger moral gap.
5** Use moral words (kind, compassionate, generous, loyal, helpful, honest etc) to prime (and then thank) donors. They feel like they are getting closer to their ideal self. We are making donors feel good about their donation. ("Your compassion in donating $xx will help us to ...)
Point to note - social information MUST be given at the point just before donation - put it on the response mech, or just before you ask for the donation.
1) Remind donors of their identity and why it is good to be that identity
2) Rmind them of others in that identity
3) Ask if they know more or less than x people who also use/benefit from the service
4) Prime with moral words (and then use moral words to thank the donor after - using these words after gives a value add baack to the donor, and closes the circle of giving)
5) Provide this social information at a point JUST BEFORE you ask for the donation
Ok, I'm not sure if all of this makes sense...I think I need some more time to get my head around it...
That session was our final workshop, and now it was time for the closing plenary.
Closing Plenary - Dan Pollota
Dan is from the US and has been in fundraising for ...a long time (I can't remember the figure!). Dan set up a number of fundraising initiatives in the States, from cross country bike rides to 3 day walks. His presentation was around the discrepancies and discrimination between the charity world and the rest of the world. He described it as 2 rule books - one for charities, and one for everyone else. He wants to change the public's perception about how they view charities, and try to make it more comparable with how the corporate sector works. Dan's thoughts below...
Discrimination 1 - Salaries
Dan talked about (and didn't agree with) why people think that executives in charities should receive a low salary, while they are quite comfortable with executives of large corporations having a massive salary. He gave the example of a corporate CEO on $400k, vs a charity CEO on $80k. If we don't pay people the same as the corporate sector, why will highly educated people come to the sector. The $400k CEO could argue he does more good GIVING the charity $100k per year as opposed to being the CEO. We need to become comparible with the corporate sector to attract and retain people.
Discrimination 2 - Advertising and Marketing
Why is it that corporates can spend millions on advertising (to just make more money) but charities can't be seen to be spending money on advertising to either further a cause, or raise more money for that cause? We are ok with Mars spending millions to sell chocolate, but not on a hunger charity trying to advertise to STOP hunger?
Discrimination 3 - Risk taking for getting new donors
Why is it ok for corporates to take risks,a nd have them fail and that be ok, yet charities are scrutinised over every failure? Warner Brothers can spend million on a movie that flops, and that is ok with everyone, but a charity can't spend dollars on acquiring new donors with a new initiative?
Discrimination 4 - Time horizon
Success for a charity campaign seems to have to occur within 12 months. Many charities don't get to build capacity over a long period, because the success needs to be 'instant'. New initiatives take time.
Discrimination 5 - Using profit to attract risk capital
Why can't we as a sector reinvest fundraising dollars?
He talked about how the public sees 'dollars spent on administration' and why the public shouldn't use this as a measure of a good charity. Why not say 'how effective is the charity?' Wouldn't it be better to have a charity spending a little more and providing a better service, than to not spend money and provide a service that isn't effective and could actually be inadequate?
He also spoke about how charities report their costs, and why charities shouldn't be afraid of listing their 'overhead' costs - after all, how would they function without them! He talked about staff being an overhead cost, and that that is ok. He is working with others in the US to set up a Charity Defence Council which will be an anti-defamation face for charities who are accused of doing 'the wrong thing' with their costs. The marketing materials (posters) developed have photos of actual staff of charities complete with their title, and the words "I am overhead" on it. It was actually a great speech, and I know that I haven't presented it nearly as well as he did, so I am going to try to find the link to the video when it goes up online, so that you can all see it. When we walked out of the plenary on a high, we were given sign to wear...
:-)
All up, a great wonderful fabulous conference, that I would encourage anyone to go to. Obviously I can't convey everything that I've learnt through this blog, but hopefully you have gotten a little taste.
Finally, we were given a card in our opening plenary, and asked to write on it what generousity meant to us, and it was displayed in the foyer. The responses made me love my industry and profession even more. Here are some of the responses...
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