WINter doldrums

If your programs are anything like mine, January is the toughest month of the year. It starts slow, after all the majority of folks with interest in giving did so in the blitz of solicitations, materials and holiday spirit last month. Those folks who didn't give in December are now getting the bills for what they did do in December and that certainly serves to provide a dip in giving for those folks.

Phone programs are often paused or at best understaffed for the first half of the month and training some new callers as they work at gearing up again in the second half. Weather, at least up here in the northeast, can be a challenge, at very least short days and long nights make for lower energy days.

So what to do? It is a great time for some reporting on mid fiscal year success! Talk up where you are winning! Create a couple of social media and email messages that talk about what you have accomplished this year. Use the opportunity to solicit one or two larger annual donors who "missed" the last tax year for a gift in the current tax year with the leverage of using them to share the message as a signer or email author.

This reporting can often be done quite successfully via email. I would strongly recommend using a volunteer, creating a campus account for them and sending it as a html message but using text without images (like any other email you get) containing a link or two to more information on your web page and facebook account. This is how we communicate on a daily basis via email so matching that approach will increase the open and reading rates of the message.