Brilliant Spillover, or Why do People With no Fundraising Experience Think they Know Best?

Why is it that people who have no experience in fundraising and marketing think they know best when it comes to writing appeal letters?

That’s the question I discussed with a fundraiser friend recently.

He is working as consultant to two non-profit organizations. In each one, the executive director has nixed appeal letters he’s written for them.

For one director, they were too long—she doesn’t like to read long letters.

He showed her research proving that longer letters get better results, but it didn’t matter.

As a busy corporate executive, she doesn’t have time to read long letters. Shorten it!

For the other, the letters were too donor-oriented. He wanted more information about programming.

My friend tried to explain the average donor makes a decision from the heart, not the head. But it didn’t matter for him, either.

As a programmer, the director wanted more details. That's what interested him. .

For both executive directors, the problem was they wanted the kind of appeal letters they liked—not the kind their donors would respond to.

I’m sure these aren’t unique situations. Many other non-profits have the same dynamics and experience.

It drives marketers and fundraisers nuts. Why do we invest all this time, energy and training to craft good appeal letters, if our bosses, or colleagues, say no?

What makes them think they know better?

After all, when it comes to programming fundraisers don’t tell their program colleagues what to do.

So why should programmers have the final say when it comes to fundraising?

I can think of a few reasons for why we got into this situation.

One reason is we all get appeal letters, and we know what we like.

Another reasons is what a former fundraiser called “brilliant spillover.” 

Because they are good at one thing, such as programming or running projects, they assume they are good at others—including fundraising.

As my friend put it:

"It’s the kind of thing that leads some people to presume that their brilliance and expertise in an unrelated area, such as international project management, automatically makes them experts on communications and fundraising. 

"It rarely does. People should concentrate on what they're hired to do, not try to do other people’s jobs."

Finally, it’s because they forget they are not the target audience for the appeal; they know too much.

It’s hard for them to remember that the average donor rarely, if ever, thinks about the need, country, cause or project at hand.

And if they do, they have minimal knowledge about it.

What most donors want to know is: Will my donation make a difference? Will it solve a problem? Will it change a life? 

Most don’t care how that happens. That’s what they trust programmers to do.

I’m not saying programmers and executive directors shouldn’t be involved in helping draft appeals; they should.

They need to know that what’s being sent to the public is true, and doesn’t misrepresent the issue or situation.

They need to feel comfortable with how the need is being described so they can stand behind the appeal and support it.

But they should not be the final say on what is written. 

They need to respect the wisdom, experience and prowess of their fundraising and marketing colleagues, just as fundraisers should respect their ability to run programs.

Otherwise, let's let fundraisers have the final say on programming decisions, and see how the programmers like it.

Also check out my post about why IDS students should take marketing and communications courses.