Thank you for stopping by! This is the 133rd Fundraising Writing Newsletter. If you find value here, please tell a fundraising friend. (Your fundraising friend can ​subscribe here for free.)​

In this issue:

✅ Your donors brake for fundraising bargains and curiosities

✅ Tomorrow: Gifts in wills training. Be there?

✅ Randomly yours: to inspire and recharge you

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Wednesday, May 15, 2024

Hi Reader,

Does this ever happen to you?

You're super busy, absolutely not to be interrupted — and then you pull over for ice cream.🍦

No? Just me?

Okay, I need to ride with you in your willpowermobile.

Anyhoo, rest assured your donors are more like me: predictably entice-able.

You just need to offer them ice cream.

I mean...

Your donors brake for fundraising bargains and curiosities

You know a gift unopened is not a gift at all. 🎁

Same for unopened appeal letters.

The giving opportunity is there for the taking. Alas, untaken.

What to do?

Check out the following 3 examples of outer envelopes from appeals we wrote for clients in the past year or so.

Focus on fundraising BARGAINS and CURIOSITIES.

Fundraising bargains offer donors a good deal.

Like this:

Fundraising curiosities are an itch that needs scratching.

Like this:

Or this:

Donors want to give.

That's why they are donors.

If you give your donors a fundraising bargain...

...or a fundraising curiosity (an itch to be scratched)...

...they'll happily open your outer envelope gift wrapper.

...they'll gladly receive your gift of a giving opportunity.

Giving is the ice cream your donors crave.

So, please, give your donors what they crave!

Tomorrow: Gifts in wills training. Be there?

• Tom Ahern will be training.
• Ligia Peña will be helping to answer all your questions in our All-You-Can-Eat unlimited Q&A session (itself worth the price of admission).
• Yours truly, Julie Cooper, will be moderating.

TOMORROW, Thursday, May 16, 2024 ... "In a decade, we banked $78 million in charitable bequests..." TRUE story from a mid-sized nonprofit. You'll learn about it in this master-webinar. You're not mid-sized? You'll also learn how to attract far more bequests by spending one day a year on the task.
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​Has your charity ever seen one of these?​
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BELOW: an actual bequest to a trusted nonprofit....

​Yes, it's real ... a gleeful charity shared this image with me back in 2020. They'd set up a proper bequest pipeline a few years earlier. Now that pipeline routinely produces major final gifts from true believers.
​
​PS: NOT an isolated case.​
​
Would your nonprofit like a similar and reliable STREAM of charitable bequests?
​
I'm guessing your answer is "Just tell me how, Tom!"
​
Well ... I WILL tell you how. But you'll have to invest some of your time ... and a bit of your money: $129 to be exact.
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The title of this comprehensive master-webinar?
​How to Market Bequests:
The Delicate (tho Highly Lucrative) Art
of Asking for that Final Gift​
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IF you join the crowd (and, yes, it already is an eager crowd) at our master-webinar on Thursday, May 16, 2024 (you'll receive 1.5 hours of training + unlimited Q&A with host Tom Ahern, moderator Julie Cooper, and celebrated guest expert Ligia Peña) ... you'll leave knowing exactly what YOUR nonprofit NEEDS to do, to set up an unrelenting charitable-bequest pipeline. (PS: It's SO easy.)
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You will absorb world-sourced, true-expert, best-practice advice re: how to market bequests. This treasury of advice might well change your charity's goals and expectations forever. (And, no, that's not an overstatement.)

​Join us? Please do. You won't regret it!

Randomly yours: to inspire and recharge you

For your brain, heart, and funny bone...

• Fundraisingly Informative — Strategies To Re-Engage Your Lapsed Donors by Rachel Muir (a Bloomerang article that uncovers the hidden treasure trove of legacy giving potential among older donors)​
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• Authorially Brash — David Mamet Memo to "The Unit" Writing Staff (a fiery writing manifesto you might find motivating and apply to your fundraising storytelling)
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• Obsessively Scatological — Billy & Molly: An Otter Love Story | Official Trailer | National Geographic​ (a two-minute movie trailer of the new Hulu / Disney+ must-watch documentary that's now my all-time favorite and Brett's)

Until next time: May your every outer envelope be like an ice cream truck cruising down a sunny summer street, waking in your donors a sweet hunger for giving.

Grateful,

PS: When you are ready, we're happy to chat with you about how we might be able to help you with your donor communications — e.g., planning, writing, advising, reviewing, designing, training. Reply to this email or book a no-pressure call with me here.