I thought I would address the topic of bulk email as a tool for fundraising, as it seems to come up on an almost daily basis. First, let’s establish the goal of every fundraising campaign, and that is to ultimately sway public opinion into a favorable view using the cash you collect. So, the fundraising campaign is a tool to purchase advertising or other items and is not an end unto itself. Next, let us address the feeling people generally have when they receive spam email in their inbox. I don’t think that there are any positive feelings of good-will that come about from receiving this email. So, it would seem that the fundraising goal and the result of sending bulk email is one of opposites.
The only times where email is handy is when you have a “house list”, or a list of emails collected from past donations, volunteers, or those wishing to receive the message.
This couldn’t be illustrated more clearly than in Wisconsin's 2006 District Attorney race. One of the candidates decided to purchase 500,000 emails of voters in their state. Going against our advice (and the advice if everyone else) they sent out an email asking for support for the candidate as well as a contribution. This event had a significant result, as the pre-election polling showed a steep decline for that candidate afterwards, as well as some bad press: “Top Cop candidate breaks law to spam potential voters”. So even if the public opinion went down, and the press pointed and laughed, how much cash did that email garner for the campaign? The answer is quite predictable in that nothing was gained. There were probably several hundred replies to the email, and the vast majority of those involve gross depictions of male anatomy, action verbs, and impossible poses suggested by the recipient.
On the contrary, direct mail seems to be a solid channel for collecting donations and good will. Sure, it is much more expensive, but the results are compatible with the goal of the campaign. The only times where email is handy is when you have a “house list”, or a list of emails collected from past donations, volunteers, or those wishing to receive the message. In this case the cost to solicit this group is quite low, and the result is always positive.
So, if you feel the need to purchase or borrow an email list from another organization, do the math first to be sure you can pay the price of the backlash you will surely face.
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Written by Scott E. Detweiler.