The Obama effect

by Jonathon Grapsas

Six lessons from President Obama’s fundraising team to help fuel growth in your organisation.

Copywriting and design strategies for better donor newsletters: a before and after success story

by Lisa Sargent

Fundraising copywriter Lisa Sargent and designer Sandie Collette, of S.Collette Design, discuss how copywriting and design go hand-in-hand to make a Dublin-based charity's newsletter overhaul a success. Discover the strategies that helped make it happen in this case study of a nonprofit newsletter.

Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children: The Wishing Well Appeal

by SOFII-author

It is difficult to do justice to a capital campaign as wide, and complex. This is a condensed summary of a major capital campaign which, at the time, was the largest appeal ever mounted in the UK.

Who would want to be a lapsed donor?

by Clément Martin

A Catholic training institute in Paris gave a telephone fundraising agency the details of 212 supporters who had stopped engaging. Some had given once, some gave more than once. The most recent supporter had been silent for twelve months and the oldest hadn’t engaged for five years – until a fundraiser picked up the phone and called all of them again. This is what happened next…

The early Christian Church: Paul the apostle motivates his church’s donors – c. 56 AD

by SOFII-author

This could be the first ever appeal for regular, committed donors. In the early days of the Christian church the missionary Paul asked his supporters in the city of Corinth to set aside a small portion of their income regularly, to sustain victims of a famine and then later to support good works generally.

Greenpeace Australia Pacific: the welcome process

by SOFII-author

Think objectively about the experience a new donor has within the first few months of joining your organisation. Greenpeace Australia Pacific has developed a new and simplified process to ensure that new donors receive clear communications that both thank and further engage them. The result is that they’re reducing the number of donors who leave within the first three months.

To ask or not to ask, that is the question when saying thank you to a donor

by Lisa Sargent & Sean Triner

Find out what Sean Triner, co-founder and director, Pareto Fundraising in Australia and Lisa Sargent, principal at Sargent Communications, LLC in the USA have to say about this.

Médecins sans Frontières (MSF) Australia: ‘Field Partners’ regular giving appeal

by SOFII-author

Without doubt all fundraisers want regular givers and lots of them. This is a great example of how to convert your existing supporters from random one-off gifts to planned regular giving, and how charities can change the giving behaviour of existing supporters.

Oxfam: Press ads from the 1950s and 1960s

by SOFII-author

These press advertisements really did change the course of fundraising in Britain. They helped Oxfam to grow into a substantial international charity. Though they might seem crude and simplistic now, these ads very effectively alerted the post-war British public to considerable humanitarian needs abroad.

Movember: A moustache-growing campaign for men’s health

by Christiana Stergiou

This fun and lively event encourages men to grow a moustache, find out more about men’s health and raise money for prostate cancer research and awareness and education on men's health issues.

Conversion of a techno-sceptic

by Richard C McPherson

Only a few things in life are worth missing a flight for. I’d like to tell you about two of them. The first is merely amusing but the other, I think, you will find of more value. The first was only the second flight I’d missed, ever. It was going to Oslo, Norway, but I was stuck on London’s Hammersmith roundabout…

Review by Ken Burnett.