Unpopular Opinion: Stop defining donors by giving level

If you know anything about me at all, you know that I identify myself as an arts marketer. You might be asking yourself why the heck am I writing about fundraising.

Before we go any further:

MARKETING AND FUNDRAISING ARE THE SAME THING.

Whether you are a “marketer” or a “fundraiser”, we all are endeavouring to send relevant and compelling messages to our target groups that will create a relationship so strong they take an action. Whether that action is a donation, ticket sale, membership, or anything else, it is all the same basic principle.

Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s get to what this post is really about.

In fundraising, when we communicate to donors, we love to put them in neat little groups, and more often than not that is by their giving level. Whether you look at it as their last gift or cumulative giving, it all centers around the dollar amount and this is killing our fundraising communications.

Communicating with someone only through the lens of how much they give completely ignores other important information such as their level of engagement with the organization, why they give, what programs are of interest to them, and many more.