Launch an Organization in the Mail? Now? Are you Crazy?

From DM News and Views - July 2009

As bleak news about year-end fundraising came out in early 2009, two organizations that had never acquired donors through the mail took the plunge and sent a test mailing. And, both organizations were tremendously successful.

Why?

They followed the rules that work for effective fundraising – both had concrete missions and proven track records of success; they mailed prospects who were most likely to support their work; and, both created a compelling package with a strong case for support in a persuasive letter.

The Koby Mandell Foundation relied on fundraising events and direct solicitation of individuals to raise money for their programs in Israel that support men, women and especially children who have lost a family member to terrorism. Born of a tragedy – the murder of Koby Mandell, a 13-year-old American Jewish boy living with his family in Israel – the organization that bears his name offers grief counseling, support and camps where children can begin to heal.

The test mailing the Foundation sent in February reached donors to Jewish organizations, particularly those that support Israeli and children’s causes. The mailing exceeded all expectations, and acquired donors for a very low investment of only $15 each. The letter pulled prospective donors in through its gripping opening:

Dear Friend,

On the morning of May 9, 2001, the American Jewish community awoke to the news that a 13-year-old boy named Koby Mandell had been brutally murdered by terrorists in Israel.

That day, the front page of every major English-language newspaper carried a picture of me and my family weeping over the shrouded body of our dear, sweet Koby.

For most of the world, Koby’s story ended that day. But for me and my family – and hundreds of others whose lives have been ripped apart by terrorism – Koby’s story and his legacy had only just begun.

For out of the ashes of his brutal murder grew an organization that is helping hundreds of children, mothers and fathers who have suffered similarly devastating losses, find hope, healing and the strength to live productive and purposeful lives…

You see, unfortunately, here in Israel, there is often new sorrow. Beyond the immediate loss of life, these attacks rip apart families and destroy their emotional and physical health. As Koby himself told me just weeks before he was killed, “I feel bad for the people who die in these attacks, but I feel worse for the people who are left behind.”

We need your help to be there for every family who is left behind

Too lazy to learn complicated words?

If you answered 'yes', good for you. You'd probably make a better copywriter than your friend who answered 'no'. Yes, laziness in this regard is actually a good thing. Here's why:

99% of the time, simple words will do a better job of communicating your idea than complex ones. Big words are annoying. The average person doesn't wan't to take the extra second or two to digest their meaning. And not only that, but these so-called "fancy words" actually distract the reader from trying to understand your message.

Simple is better. Here are two fictional product headlines I made up. Which one reads better?

1) "Our amazing new product will help you lose weight, feel great, and keep your wallet full."

2) "Our staggeringly innovative invention will facilitate weight loss, positive sentiments, and still leave you with sufficient capital."

Ok, so I totally exaggerated with the second one. But it's to prove a point. And the truth is, I've seen some writing which isn't too different. Where people use fancy words just because they wan't to, not because it helps. And it doesn't help.

So don't feel the need to show off your SAT vocabulary just because you can. The human ego must be put aside when engaging in marketing writing. If simple is more effective (and it is), then by golly, go with it. After all, do you really have the time to start learning abstruse words like "complicated"...eh, I mean, complicated words like "abstruse"?

The AIDA formula and how it can help you in marketing

There are many formulas out there for structuring sales copy. The first one that I heard, and one I still like to use is AIDA. That stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, Action. Here's how the theory goes:

First, you need to "create a reader". That means doing something to pull a person into your copy. Before they become readers, your audience is just a bunch of random people. It's your job to get their attention and turn them into readers. Generally speaking, only a 'reader' can become a customer. A random person can't.

There are many ways to do this. You can start by telling a story. Open with an interesting and relevant quote. Ask a provocative question. State a seeming contradiction or paradox. Each of these methods can be effective in different situations.

But creating a reader is a very "pareve" occurence. ("Pareve" is a Yiddish word meaning 'neutral', but frankly the former word does a better job of conveying the idea.) Now you have their attention, for better or for worse. So what? You're not necessarily any closer to selling your product. You need to tell them why they should care. You need to pique their interest.

Creating interest takes the attention you've elicited and focuses it in on your specific cause. There should be no more neutrality. The reader is on your side now. They are interested. To acheive this, you need to show them how your message is relevant to them now.

Ok, so we've got their attention, and they are genuinely intrigued by your message. So far, so good. The next step is to instill in your reader a strong desire to own your product, use your service, or donate to your cause. This is where you convince them that they need what you have. If you're doing fundraising, offer them the opportunity to make a difference or show them how they can partner with you.

At this point, the deal is almost over. They are on board. At least theoretically.

They're captivated, motivated and ready to go. But if you don't do one more thing, all that hard work will be for naught. Sometimes it's the hardest thing to do, but it's also usually the easiest. You need to ask them to take action. It's hard because instinctively we don't like to make demands or impose on others. Informing, persuading or even annoying people are second nature to us. But to ask someone to do something, even if we know they're interested? Forget about it.

So there you have it. AIDA. Remember it, and use it next time you write your marketing material.

Typos improve fundraising results

I've been known to rant about misspelled words and how much they annoy me. I even posted about it a while back. I do differentiate between digital typos and physical typos, if we can call them that. Misspelling a word in an email or even on a blog post is regrettable, yet understandable. Doing the same on a traffic sign is appalling. Emails get sent by the boatload. They're a casual means of communication. Mistakes happen. Traffic Signs....well, a little more thought should go into them.

So you can imagine how annoyed I was when I read this from Jeff Brooks from the Donor Power Blog:

13. Typos improve fundraising results. I’m sorry, but I can’t prove that. Seriously, I can’t count the number of times we discovered an egregious typo, then waited in horror for donors to voice their wrath and confusion by not responding in droves … only to experience instead an unusually high level of giving. My theory: Once someone finds a typo, she pays a lot more attention — and that

dramatically improves the chance she’ll be moved by your message and give.

Eight type and layout facts you need to know now

Here's some good advice from Colin Wheildon's book, Type and Layout: Are You Communicating or Just Maiking Pretty Shapes?. Thanks to Ivan Levison for pointing this out and for his comments here:

On Headlines:

Wheildon has a lot to say about headlines, and well he should. Just as the job of an envelope (in direct mail) is to get opened, the headline's job is to get the reader into the body copy. That, of course, is where the heart of the message is communicated. It doesn't matter whether you're producing an email, a brochure, a Web page -- you want your headline to be easy to read and to communicate quickly. Check out some of Wheildon's key research findings . . .

1. "Headlines set in capital letters are significantly less legible than those set in lower case."

2. "The darker the headline, the greater the comprehension level. Black headlines are well understood by nearly four times as many readers as brightly colored headlines."

3. "Slightly condensing headline type makes it easier to read. Settings between 70 per cent and 90 per cent of natural width appear to be optimal."

4. "Using periods at the end of headlines may have a detrimental effect on readers' comprehension."

On Body Type:

A headline may be eight or nine words long, but body copy can run on and on. This means that readablity is an extremely important issue. People just won't stick with you and keep reading if your art director or graphic designer makes things difficult. Here are a few more of Colin Wheildon's findings that make excellent sense . . .

5. "Body type must be set in serif type if the designer intends it to be read and understood. More than five times as many readers are likely to show good comprehension when a serif body type is used instead of a sans serif body type."

6. "Text must be printed in black. Even copy set in deep colors is substantially more difficult for readers to understand. Seven times as many participants in the study demonstrated good comprehension when text was black as opposed to either muted or high intensity colors."

7. "Black text printed on light tint has high comprehensibility."

8. "Text set in capitals is difficult to read."

New Look

In honor of our 1 month anniversary, the Negev Writing blog has received a minor face lift! I hope you like the new look. Do you?

Ahhh, yes. In case you didn't know, there's some neat stuff you can do on our blog. For many of you these things are ridiculously obvious, but I still remember the day when I thought RSS was an acronym for the Russian Secret Service. True story. So for all you non-techies out there, read up:

1) Subscribe to our blog via email - This will send you an email updating you with new posts.

2) Grab our RSS feed - If you use an RSS reader like Google Reader or My Yahoo!, you can see when we have new posts up.

3) Receive our Free Report - Type in your email address and get a free pdf report that will help you navigate the waters of direct mail writing. Or any other type of marketing writing for that matter. It is free.

4) Become my friend on Facebook - I have a Facebook badge on the right side of the screen which you can click on and then be redirected to my profile.

5) Comment on articles - Just click on the comment button underneath the article and share your thoughts.

Psychology of a Sales Letter, Part I

I thought it might be interesting to delve into the step-by-step process of receiving, opening and reading a sales letter. Each step is a world in and of itself - perhaps one day we can investigate each one in more depth. For now, the general overview will suffice.

What goes through our mind as we're reading it? What do we look at first? What motivates us to act?

To answer these questions, I picked up a sales letter I recently received and observed my reactions to it. This is what I came up with:

Step 1: I get a sales letter in the mail. Congratualtions! I made it on the mailing list. Ok, so Company X is off to a good start. In addition to getting my information from somewhere (how did they get it?), they also got my address right. Quite a feat indeed.

Step 2: I decide to open it. This is even better news for Company X. Countless letters across the country have already made their way to the trash at this point.

Whoever was in charge of the outer envelope design for this letter did something right. It caught my interest. Or maybe I was already familar with the company. Either way, I'm curious, so I open it up. Of all the decisions that occur during this process, this is probably the most significant. The second I open that envelope, I invite Company X into my home to make their pitch. By opening the letter, I subconsciously tell myself, "I'm interested in what's inside." In effect, I make a subtle commitment to keep going. To "play the game." To keep reading.

Step 3: The Investigation. At this stage I had yet another opportunity to throw the letter out. But after opening it, I am still interested enough to keep going. So I open the envelope and find a few things: A letter, a reply card with a SASE, a lift note and maybe even a free gadget or toy. Cool! There is nothing cerebral about this stage. I'm just noticing the different elements of the package.

Step 4: The Glance. Now I turn my brain on first gear. I flip through all the content, on the lookout for stuff that stands out. The lift note attracts my attention. Any free item of value will do the same. Free pen? I'll put that aside for safekeeping. But I'm not really "reading" anything yet. Just browsing. Basically my eye is naturally wandering, taking in the overall tone of the mailing.

Ok, now I have a good sense of what the mailing is all about. What are they selling? Am I interested? Is this a professional looking company? I can probably answer these questions already. Human intuition works incredibly fast. And amazingly, I haven't even read one sentence of the sales letter yet!

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That's it for Part I. Look out for Part II soon, starting with Step 5: Skimming the Letter.

Electronic Dictionaries Gone Wrong

From Haaretz.com

The Strange Linguistic Marriage of Shakespeare and the Bible

By Or Kashti

A recent matriculation exam testing English knowledge asked students to write a short essay inviting a guest - a scientist, writer or actor - to lecture at their school. Alongside demonstrating the students' proficiency in English - or lack thereof - the results revealed that strange things happen when the language of Shakespeare meets the language of the Bible.

One student seemed not to realize that the Hebrew lesaper can mean both to tell and to cut hair, and that these are different words in English. "I want you to barber about your experience," the student wrote.

When asked to explain why anyone caught drunk driving should have his license suspended on the spot, another student wrote: "They should punish in a hard hand." It makes sense in Hebrew - but doesn't quite make the grade in English. Another student added, for good measure: "Drivers don't curfew in red light" - the Hebrew word otzer means both stop and curfew.

Another stated, "The reasons that support this law immigrant on the reasons that opponent the law" - since oleh can mean both "an immigrant" and "to surpass or outweigh."

English teachers said many of these errors could be explained by the misuse of electronic dictionaries.

Read the rest of the article here