Too many messages?

I sat down to draft a direct mail piece the other day and thought, "what a lucky time to be writing a letter." We have so much to write about: a special fundraising campaign, a challenge grant from our board of directors, new donor benefits, and a final chance to upgrade before our next season. On top of that, many donors are up for renewal in the next few months. No shortage of messages here!

So I included all this exciting news in the letter and do you want to know what I ended up with? A letter so chock full of unrelated messages that it was a convoluted mess. The messages I listed above are great motivators for a potential donor, but putting them all into one letter just dilutes them.

So I recalled some guidelines I had developed from past instances of this same situation.

1) Figure out what your strongest message is, and focus on it. For a renewal letter, I believe that reminding a donor of his or her last gift is always the most significant (it's the one that gets the best results, at least). If it's an aquisition mailing, figure out what message is the most relevant. The letter I wrote the other day was an acquisition letter to subscribers. Since they subscribe, I know they value the art form. Therefore I chose to focus the letter on the campaign for artistic excellence, and I didn't cloud it with other ideas. I can always mention the new benefits in a future letter to those who do not respond at this time.

2) If you have a message that is really easy to understand, sometimes adding it as a P.S. or splicing it across a response device is enough. Our board challenge grant made a relevant P.S. to the campaign-focused letter. It didn't require a lot of space to write about, since it's a simple piece of information. I put it in bold, navy blue ink so it stood out. But keeping it out of the copy itself kept the letter more focused.

3) There is no reason to include any message that won't make the mailing more successful. If your letter contains one or two really strong reasons for the person to donate, it might be best to exclude all other messages. I'll use the example of a donor renewal mailing. If I am asking a person to renew last year's gift, I might also say that this is a good time to act because our board of directors challenge grant will match their donation. But this might not be the time to mention the campaign. After all, a campaign in this instance is just a fundraising tool. If these individuals are likely to donate without having that piece of information, maybe it's not necessary to mention it. To say, "Renew your donation while supporting our special campaign, and having your gift matched" sounds confusing. I think it even sounds cheap -- like, "donate now, and get a free toaster!" It's just too needy. Compare it to simply, "Renew your donation now, and our board of directors will match it!" The second message is so much simpler, so much stronger. True, it does not mention the campaign, but it will probably make for a more successful letter.