How Charities Give Thanks

Handwritten notes, phone calls, and other gestures impress donors

For years, David Dunlop, now retired as a major-gifts fund raiser for Cornell University, would spend part of his Thanksgiving Day calling a handful of donors to let them know how much he appreciated their support. The recipients of the calls, usually people who had little or no family to share the holiday with, would hear updates from Mr. Dunlop about gifts they had made, such as the renovation of a student lounge or the completion of a building.

Mr. Dunlop says the calls were a powerful tool in building long-term giving relationships, partly because the donors weren’t anticipating them. “Everybody expects to be thanked for a major gift,” he says. “But this was another way to show them that the human feelings on the other side even transcend what’s expected, and that we really do feel grateful.”

Making a thank-you warm and personal is key to retaining a donor, veteran fund raisers say. They stress that, particularly at a time when the economy is weak and competition among charities is high, crafting the right follow-up with contributors can be a smart investment.

Fund raisers at Cedar Valley Hospice, in Waterloo, Iowa, believe the handwritten notes they started writing last year have played a big role in attracting subsequent gifts. Terri Walker, a development director at the hospice, says the number of gifts over $500 — the minimum it takes to receive a handwritten thank-you — increased from 103 in 1999 to 124 in 2000. In just the first six months of this year, the hospice received 88 gifts exceeding $500.

“It seemed like the more we wrote, the more we heard from people,” says Ms. Walker. Each note takes only a few minutes of her time, she says. Now, in addition to mailing 200 to 300 letters a year to major donors, hospice officials are starting to hand write thank-you notes to some longtime donors of small gifts and to volunteers.

One donor who received a handwritten letter followed up her $2,100 gift with a contribution of $3,400 the same year. When asked what prompted her generosity, the woman replied, “You’re the only ones who send me a handwritten note anymore.”

Michael A. Shapiro, executive director of the High Museum of Art, in Atlanta, estimates that he writes a few hundred notes a year. “With a handwritten note, you’re communicating that that person is special and they’re the only one you’re thinking of when you’re writing that note,” Mr. Shapiro says.

Even computer-printed letters can be written in ways that help a donor feel connected to an organization, say consultants and fund raisers.

The Southern Poverty Law Center, in Montgomery, Ala., whose direct-mail campaigns attract thousands of new donors each year, has recently developed a four-page letter to welcome those people into the fold and describe its fight against discrimination. The letter is full of highly personal anecdotes by Morris Dees, co-founder of the center. Mr. Dees, who is white, describes growing up in the South when segregation was so entrenched that he was surprised to see his father drink water from the same dipper as a black woman. His letter also discusses some of the center’s cases, such as its defense of a black musician who shot and wounded a Ku Klux Klan member as the hooded figure was attacking the musician’s family with a club.

Andrew E. Svenson Jr., the center’s development director, says the organization has received hundreds of replies from donors since it began mailing the letter in the spring. “A lot of people just say they were moved to tears,” he reports. The thank-you letter the center previously used, which was more straightforward and lacked the personal anecdotes, didn’t attract nearly as strong a response, says Mr. Svenson.

Details on Spending

The Jewish Community Federation in San Francisco struck a personal tone when a beneficiary of its services wrote a thank-you letter to donors last spring in addition to the one the federation’s fund raisers had already sent. The man described how the federation had helped him and his family cope with his wife’s terminal cancer through a rabbi who said prayers with his wife at home and, after her death, provided counseling and led her memorial service. The letter was simple, but unlike most federation mailings, it drew a number of complimentary letters and phone calls from donors, says Suzan Berns, the federation’s executive director.

Other fund raisers suggest that a letter that talks about forthcoming plans can help a donor feel involved in the group’s future, and perhaps stimulate additional gifts. A good thank-you letter “should engage the reader in the excitement of what the future holds for the organization,” says Michael Durall, the principal of Commonwealth Consulting Group, in Belmont, Mass., which advises many religious charities.

The Natural Resources Defense Council keeps donors looking ahead by updating them on the progress of its environmental causes. The thank-you letter includes a paragraph or two on the latest news of the campaign for which the donor has given money. The council follows up with newsletters, which it considers part of its acknowledgment process, and sends out bulletins when a campaign reaches a turning point. “We’re constantly acknowledging their role in subsidizing everything we do,” says Linda Lopez, the council’s membership director.

Many fund raisers confess privately that it can be tough to follow advice to stay in touch with a donor after the first thank-you letter. Dee Vandeventer, a consultant in Cedar Falls, Iowa, who has advised the Cedar Valley Hospice, tells charities to thank large donors seven times. She suggests mailing the tax receipt separately from the thank-you letter, as well as having different people within the charity, including staff members and trustees, send separate thank-you notes.

“You don’t want to bombard the person all at once with these, but it’s another way to keep the organization’s name in front of the donor, and to show the gift is really appreciated,” she says. Another suggestion, says Ms. Vandeventer, is to send gifts that cost little but that feature the charity’s name or logo after sending an initial letter of thanks.

The Family and Children’s Council, of Black Hawk County, Iowa, for example, sends bookmarks it makes by laminating copies of posters schoolchildren drew after they heard the council’s presentation on child abuse.

‘Welcome Packages’

‘Many charities in recent years have started to stay in touch with new donors by sending “welcome packages,” which can include newsletters, membership cards, and information on special offers and discounts. Mal Warwick, a Berkeley, Calif., fund-raising consultant, says that such packages help “make people feel more loyal and more a part of the organization.” Such packages, traditionally sent by large national membership organizations, such as the American Association of Retired Persons and the National Rifle Association, are becoming more popular with smaller groups. They are usually sent at bulk-mail postal rates and follow a letter acknowledging a gift that is sent by first-class mail.

For the National Aquarium in Baltimore, the welcome package is only the beginning of its new thank-you process. The aquarium mails to its 30,000 members, each of whom has given $40 or more, a package that includes: a membership card; a “Dear Member” list of benefits, including free admission and discounts on purchases at the aquarium’s store; a decal; and a calendar of special events.

The aquarium also has created a collection of different thank-you letters that are sent based on the size of the gift received. The letters range from a printed form letter from the development director to a more personalized typed message signed by the museum’s executive director to letters with handwritten postscripts. Donors of large gifts receive at least two thank-you letters, sometimes more, from top aquarium officials.

The aquarium has even redesigned its stationery, so that donors who give large amounts will receive their thanks on paper that is thicker and has a splashier and more distinctive logo than donors who have given small amounts. The goal of the carefully orchestrated process, says Anne E. Peebles, senior director of development, is to continuously encourage people to give more.

Tardy Responses

No matter how high-quality the paper or how well-written and warm the letter is, consultants and charity fund raisers warn that a few simple errors can kill the best thank-you note. One is getting the donor’s name or the size of the gift wrong. This tells donors that “the gift is not really significant because the organization didn’t take time to learn how to spell my name,” Ms. Vandeventer says.

Even without those errors, Cornell’s Mr. Dunlop says an inappropriate personal touch can put people off. A donor once complained of receiving a birthday card from someone in the development office whom he didn’t know well. “While the donor recognized the card was genuine, he thought it was misplaced,” Mr. Dunlop says. He was careful to make his Thanksgiving calls to donors with whom he had developed a personal relationship.

By far the most common problem is not getting a thank-you out fast enough. If a letter goes out weeks or even months after a gift is received, the charity looks incompetent, and the donor could be discouraged from making another gift, says G. Douglass Alexander, a fund-raising consultant in Atlanta.

Late letters are more common than many charities realize, Mr. Alexander warns. The company recently tested 100 charities that had promised to send letters out within 48 hours of a gift. Most of the charities did not meet that turnaround. In fact, the average response was 17 days. Some groups didn’t acknowledge a gift for months, and one letter never arrived at all because the charity had not paid its postage bill.

To ensure a speedy reply, some charities are experimenting with e-mail acknowledgments, particularly to recognize donations made online. Many send back automatic electronic replies that acknowledge each gift instantly. However, other charities are concerned that the donor will feel put off by an automated thank-you.

Online thank-you notes have worked just fine for the Marine Toys for Tots Foundation, says Maj. Bill Grein, a retired marine who is the charity’s chief fund raiser. Major Grein says he initially had doubts about replacing a postal letter with an e-mail version but was reassured by the response when he sent an electronic thank-you to the more than 500 online donors in last year’s campaign. “A lot of folks e-mailed back and said, ‘It was my pleasure, keep up the good work,’” he says. For the occasional online contribution of more than $500, he says, the foundation also sent a written thank-you letter.

Ideally, all online donors should receive both an instant online acknowledgment and a later follow-up in the mail, according to Nick Allen, an online giving consultant in Berkeley, Calif. “While it is fresh in people’s minds that they gave you a gift, you want to cement that relationship,” he says.

Mr. Allen says charities should also consider sending welcome packages online, which could contain hypertext links to information on a charity’s programs, its e-mail newsletters, and other Internet resources. It could also include an invitation to join a monthly giving program, in which a set amount would be deducted from a donor’s bank account every month and sent to the charity, he says.

Asking for Additional Gifts

While all charities agree on the need to thank donors quickly, they differ greatly on whether to include a second request for money with a thank-you note.

Dawn Veillette Diana, annual fund manager at the Hartford Stage Company in Connecticut, says such an approach doesn’t work for her group. The theater company solicits the same pool of donors each year, she explains, and some have told the theater they don’t want to be asked for money as part of the thank-you letter. When it comes to sending an acknowledgment, “My feeling is that if you’re going to thank someone, you thank them,” Ms. Diana says. “It shouldn’t be, ‘Thanks, but we’d like to have more.’”

Other charities, however, disagree. Mr. Warwick says that including a business-reply envelope along with a thank-you note is usually, but not always, a good fund-raising technique. But he cautions against including a specific request for money in the thank-you letter itself.

A fund raiser for a chain of nursing homes says she always encloses a return envelope printed with suggested donation amounts should a donor want to send an additional gift. Miriam Schey Imerman, of Trinity Continuing Care Services in Farmington Hills, Mich., says she includes the envelopes even though she gets only a few donations in response. She explains: “My philosophy is never pass up an opportunity to offer an opportunity.”