What do we gain by drawing a line between fundraising and marketing?

I spent most of my career believing that the myriad of arms-length tactics that consume most fundraising plans (GivingTuesday, direct response, special events, etc. ) were the problem. Then I encountered a simple insight. One of the earliest scholars in the fundraising community, Paul Schervish, explained that it was important to distinguish between those efforts that lead people to become givers in the first place and those that lead some donors to make larger than average gifts or to increase their giving. The inability to make sense of such a distinction was the problem I didn’t see early in my career. Following Schervish’s logic, we encourage our clients to make sense of those efforts that most effectively yield their initial gifts and those that ensure the subsequent gift.

What was especially encouraging about today’s podcast conversation was learning that Julia is encouraging her clients to make a very similar distinction. Julia encourages her clients to make sense of the difference between what is an outcome of marketing versus what should be expected of fundraising. Julia explains that marketing strategies can be counted on to get people’s attention and generate the initial gift, while we should rely on fundraising strategies to ensure the cultivation of meaningful relationships and the subsequent gifts that accompany them. For those who haven’t made this distinction, Julia wants them to ask themselves why they would communicate with individuals they don’t know the same way they would those with whom they have a relationship. She also warns that appealing to everyone the same way is effectively not appealing to anyone.

As always, we are especially grateful to our friends at CueBack for sponsoring The Fundraising Talent Podcast. If you’d like to learn more about hosting the Responsive Fundraising roadshow in your local community, email me. And, if you’d like to download Responsive’s latest edition of Carefully & Critically, just click here.

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