Most churches and nonprofits send appeal letters to help meet fundraising goals. 

But did you know your appeal letter can also:   

• Acquire new donors
• Re-engage lapsed donors
• Increase recurring revenue
• Cultivate long-term relationships
• Lead to major and planned gift conversations

All of these things — donor acquisition, donor retention, recurring monthly support, cultivating long-term relationships, and scheduling visits to discuss major and planned gifts — are what fundraisers work on ALL YEAR LONG. You can do all of that through an appeal. 

How?

An appeal strategy. 

An appeal strategy makes your appeal letter work hard for you. By applying an appeal strategy our client increased their year-end giving by 30%.

In this article, you will learn the four steps of an appeal strategy that will engage more of your donors and increase the results of your appeal. 

What is an appeal letter?

An appeal letter is an email or direct mail piece (sometimes and, most effectively, both) updating your donors on their impact, thanking them for their caring support, and inviting them to continue their impact. 

An appeal letter is one of the best ways to engage the breadth of your constituency.

Appeal letters are commonly sent at year-end, November or December, but can be sent at any time of the year. They can invite gifts for general operating expenses or focus on a specific program or initiative.

What is the appeal letter equivalent for churches? 

The Fall Stewardship Appeal is the church world’s equivalent to nonprofits’ appeal letters. Sometimes churches will also send appeal letters at Christmas and Easter. 

Because church attendance has declined, so has giving. 

Churches that use best fundraising practices from the nonprofit sector are those most likely to experience long term financial stability. 

Church leaders that adopt and apply fundraising best practices will use appeal strategies to:

• Educate members about finances, including how to steward resources and the joy of using resources to empower others. 
• Remind members that God is the ultimate example of generosity. And if we were created in God’s image we were created to be generous. 
• Invite members to resource a critically important mission and vision — invest in something eternal. 

When churches start thinking about fundraising in these terms they become more open to the way they invite gifts. 

Why You Need an Appeal Letter Strategy 

While appeal letters can be sent at any time of the year, fundraisers often use this strategy at the end of the year. Fundraisers approaching year-end have many tasks to accomplish. The big question they face is: How do we do a year-end appeal well when we have too many things to do? 

You make the appeal strategy work hard for you.

Done well, appeal letters can be targeted for very specific results including:

• Acquiring new donors
• Improving donor retention
• Increasing gift size
• Increasing recurring gifts

The best way to experience these results with your appeal letter is to have a strategy that includes segmentation, strategic storytelling, a digital campaign, and follow-up. 

DIY Your Appeal Letters Versus Hiring a Team 

Many nonprofits write and mail their own appeal letters. However, at year-end with so many things on your plate, you will likely experience better results working with a team that knows how to execute appeal letters. 

Working with a team who knows how to execute appeal letters well will help you:

• Set and stick to the best timeline for inviting and receiving the best gifts
• Segment your list so that you ask the right donors for the right gifts
• Write an appeal that reminds donors of the heroes they are by showing them the impact they’re making
• Create an effective and manageable digital strategy to accompany your appeal letter
• Increase gifts by crafting and helping you implement a follow-up strategy

Our team helps nonprofits maximize their appeal letter fundraising potential with the following four-step process. 

At Brenda Moore and Associates, we use a unique framework based on StoryBrand and Philanthropic Psychology. This framework provides key messages for creating copy that is donor-centric and compelling. Once completed, nonprofits can use the framework and key messages over and over again.

If you want to DIY your appeal letter or take a closer peek into our process, here are the four appeal letter strategy steps we use with our clients:

Appeal Letter Strategy Step #1: Segmentation

Donor segmentation is creating separate lists (segments) of donors to tailor communication.

A very small organization may have time to write each of their donors a personalized thank you and gift invitation. In this case, segmentation would not be necessary. But most organizations don’t have that kind of time. In these situations, segmentation provides a personalization shortcut that you could call bulk customization. 

Segmentation is the best way to send an extensive list of donors an appeal letter that is customized for them, increases giving, cultivates long-term relationships, and makes the donor feel valued. 

It is the first step in the appeal letter strategy because it informs all the other steps, specifically:

• The different gift invitations and who you will ask for each of these gifts
• How you adjust your content for each segment receiving the appeal so they feel the content was written with them in mind 
• How you follow-up with each segment (ie: phone call, email, or in-person visit)

Segmentation will look different for each church, ministry, and nonprofit. Following are a few examples of commonly used segments.

Segmentation: Nonprofits & Churches

When segmenting, the goal is to answer two questions. First, what’s going to provide the best results for the organization? Second, what gift invitation is most appropriate for each donor?

Nonprofit segments usually differentiate:

• How donors give. For example, if you ask donors who make gifts through their IRAs, DAFs, and Stock to make a $50 gift from their regular income, they likely will. But you would be leaving hundreds or even thousands of donation income on the table. 
• How donors interact with your organization. Examples could include alumni, staff, and parents. We have seen strategies such as hard-core competition between alumni groups, and personalized communication to camper parents inviting a gift in honor of their child yield significant appeal results.
• Donors’ most obvious next step. For example, if a donor has given 3+ times in one year, they can be invited to become automated monthly donors. This increases their long-term investment in your organization.

Segmentation for churches is usually more simple than for nonprofits, but two areas for significant growth include:

• Gift automation. Automating gifts helps church support not depend on church attendance  
• Non-cash gifts. Any member who has given from assets before should be asked to give in the same way again. 

After you have identified each of your segments it’s time to write your appeal letter. 

Appeal Letter Strategy Step #2: Messaging

A well-written appeal letter helps your donors experience being loved and loving others.  

Why is love the goal? Because…

“The more loved someone feels, the more they will act in love,” said Dr. Jen Shang, the first person to have a PhD in Philanthropic Psychology.

Any gift your donors make — of resource or time — is an expression of their love.

We help donors connect with and act from love with the story we share, the gift invitation we extend, and making appeals reader-friendly.

Appeal Letter Storytelling 

Storytelling is one of the best ways to show donors the impact of their love and motivate another gift.

A story that helps donors see the impact and power of their love includes three things:

1. The story of ONE. It is much easier to connect with and imagine transforming the life of one child, one woman, one veteran, or one family. Donors are much more likely to be moved by and experience feelings of love hearing about how a person's life is impacted than the cumulative impact your organization made.
2. Give donors credit for the transformation. You give donors credit in two ways. First, by replacing your organization’s name with YOU (speaking of the donor). And secondly, by connecting the moment of transformation with the donor’s gift. What is the moment of transformation…compassionate hope? a welcoming community? sweaty field games at summer camp?
3. Identify a need. One of the challenging parts of writing an appeal is that you want to share a story of hope and transformation. This could make a donor think the problem they gave to is solved. An easy way to combine hope while creating a need is to share numbers or statistics about how many more people need the same help your donor made possible. 

With these three steps, you show the impact of your donor’s love and give them the credit for transformation while showing them there’s still a deep need for their love. 

Appeal Letter Gift Invitation

Next to making donors feel important and loved, your gift invitation is the most important part of your appeal letter. 

A simple and effective framework for gift invitations in appeals includes:

• Peer invitation. Human nature indicates that people are more likely to do something that other people are also doing. Beginning the gift invitation with a phrase like “Would you join me and other faithful friends of this ministry?” helps donors feel invited into a relationship with their peers instead of just being asked for money. 
• A different gift invitation for each segment. For each segment your invitation should be specific — by amount, by gift type, by frequency, etc. Your invitation to a segment of people who may already be giving 3 or more smaller gifts a year  might look something like this - “Would you join me and other monthly donors with an automated gift of $100 each month?” 
• Clear call to action. Succinctly naming the donor’s next three steps toward completing their gift will increase the likelihood of their response.   Your entire invitation, including your call-to-action might look something like this: 

You can show your love for neighbors like Johnny all year round. Would you join me and other friends of this ministry with an automated gift of $100 each month? 

Becoming a monthly donor is easy. Would you…

1. consider the compassion you have for the people you serve through this ministry,
2. consider a monthly gift of $100, or another amount that is significant to you, 
3. set up your recurring monthly gift HERE (QR CODE, WEB LINK) or use the enclosed response form

Gift invitations don’t have to be long. In fact, they shouldn’t be. However, they should be clear and provide donors with a short explanation of how to make their gift. 

Make Your Appeal Letter Reader Friendly

Design is an often overlooked element of appeal letters. Why? Because good design takes time and space. 

But good design is worth the time it takes to create and the extra pages it requires because good design increases the chances your appeal letter will be read, which increases gifts. 

Here are seven ways to begin applying good design to your appeal letters:

• Short (no more than three lines) indented paragraphs.
• Double “enter” so there is a full line of white space between each paragraph.  
• Include a photo of the beloved people your donors care for with their gifts.
• Full margins (don’t shrink your margins). This can also be called negative space. 
• Bold key sentences so that they stand out to readers who skim content. 

Applying these seven tips will improve your appeal letter design and increase the amount of people who read the content you invest so much energy creating. 

Appeal Letter Strategy Step #3: Social Media 

A significant part of acquiring and increasing gifts at year-end is the competition for attention. Accompanying your appeal letter with a digital campaign increases the chances you’ll get your audience's attention and increase gifts. 

In 2023, a study found that 90% of the United States — that’s over 308 million users —  is on social media. This means your current and future donors are most likely on social media. Therefore…

You should invest in getting your audience’s attention on social media because that is where your audience is.

The four parts of an effective digital appeal letter campaign are consistency, stories, photos, and gift invitations.  

Be Consistent

Showing up consistently on social media makes you familiar to your audience. Familiarity is important to your fundraising goals because people are more likely to engage with something that is familiar. 

Cultivating familiarity through consistency on social media happens in two ways:

1. Frequency of posts. At Brenda Moore & Associates we recommend posting 2-3 times a week. Two to three posts a week is sustainable for our clients and usually has the maximum return on investment for a limited team and budget.
2. Visual consistency. Use your brand colors and fonts. If you don’t have brand colors and fonts choose three colors besides white and black, and two fonts. Stick to those choices when creating any design or graphic. 

Once you’ve decided on the frequency and visual consistency of your posts it’s time to dial in the content of your posts. 

Tell Stories

Stories capture attention and allow your donor to envision the impact they made with their gift. Stories make donors the hero by shifting the focus from what your organization does to what a donor makes possible in the lives of others. And, stories catalyze action. They move your viewers emotionally and motivate them to join you in making a difference. 

Here’s one we love, from an organization called Bellis.

A simple story framework for social media posts is:

• BEFORE: What was happening in a beneficiary's life before they encountered your organization?
• DURING: What did your gift allow them to experience through your organization?
• AFTER: What are they doing now as a result of your organization?

Try to keep each description to 1-2 sentences. In the end, you should have a social media post of 3-6 sentences. This framework can also be used to share donor stories. 

Share Photos

Once you have your audience’s attention you want to cultivate connection with them and help them envision the impact their gifts make. Helping your audience envision the work their gifts make possible is an important step to supporting your fundraising with social media. 

Photos are instrumental in creating a connection with your audience because they give your audience a glimpse into the work they make possible. If you are unable to use photos of beneficiaries consider using photos of where your work takes place or related features and objects. 

Invite Gifts

If you’re not inviting your audience to participate in your work through volunteering or making their best gift they may not know you need their contribution to operate. Consider this…

What action do you know you are supposed to take on Amazon? Make a purchase. Whether you realized it or not, Amazon asks you to buy on every item page with a BUY NOW button! They make it really easy for us.

All electronic communication should have a Give Button or link to your giving page in multiple places and more than once on each page. 

You help your audience know what action to take, by inviting them to make a gift. 

Appeal Letter Strategy Step #4: Follow Up

Follow up calls increase donor retention by 41-58% and on average double the size of the next gift. 

The follow up call doesn’t have to be a high-pressured “we really need you to give” follow up. It should actually be a warm call of gratitude that engages your supporters in a conversation about how they’re connected to the organization and what it means or has meant to them. 

Psychologically speaking this is a really important step for donors because it helps them think intentionally about how the organization has impacted them. In this way, followup calls become an important step in stewarding relationships for the next gift.

Get started by downloading two followup scripts HERE.

Follow up phone calls are great tasks for board members and volunteers. If board members and volunteers are making these calls make sure you train them on scripts and teach them how to track follow up responses (which you’ll read about next).

Track Follow Up Results

It’s important to track (either in your CRM or spreadsheet) both the results of your follow up and important things people say when you talk to them on the phone. This will help you set income goals for future appeals and cultivate long-term relationships with donors. 

Track results of the appeal itself because you want to know: 

• total amount raised from that appeal compared to the appeal’s past performance
• number and percentage of people who respond to each appeal segment
• number and percentage of first-time donors (they need to be nurtured right away)
• number and percentage of donors whose gift is an increase over previous gifts

Board members like these numbers but they also help you improve appeal letters, set goals for each appeal letter, and perhaps invite a matching grant for future appeals.

Build Your Own Appeal Strategy

Appeal letters are a beautiful and effective way to thank your supporters, show them their impact, and ask them to continue their impact. But an appeal letter strategy takes this several steps further by…

…making your donors feel important through personalizing outreach with segmentation

…meeting your donors where they are by implementing a social media campaign so that you stay top-of-mind and make giving easy

…cultivating a relationship with your donors through a followup call where you learn about what the organization means to them

If you would like a team to help you execute an effective appeal letter strategy, schedule a call with us HERE.

Co-authored by Rev. Jana Swenson, CFRE, and Samantha Roose, Fundraising Copywriter.