Who Is Going To Win The Irish Fundraising Awards?

So the shortlist for the Irish Fundraising Awards was just announced. You can read it here - it's a great resource to get ideas, read real results, and just get inspired.

While I'm reasonably impartial, I have to say I'm delighted to see Tony Ward from Fighting Blindness shortlisted for an award. And I'm very happy to see Concern's Direct Dialogue team get shortlisted - I always thing face-to-face fundraisers are completely overlooked and undermined in our sector.

The whole shortlist is full of lovely people - many of whom I've had the pleasure to work with.

It should be a great night and I hope you're attending.

Now...to make it more interesting...I've launched the First Annual Irish Fundraising Awards Sweep.

Can you correctly predict the winners of the Irish Fundraising Awards 2015 from a selection of the categories? 

It'll cost you a €5 donation to enter! You can pay your fee here: http://www.oneinfour.ie/help-us/ 

Half of all entry fees will go to the person with the most correct guesses.The other half will be donated to the amazing charity One In Four.

You can enter here: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/3GJDHT2

And you can pay your entry fee here: http://www.oneinfour.ie/help-us/

Good luck!

Top Fundraising Blog Posts Of 2014

Like any good blogger, I'm shamelessly collating my top blog posts from 2014 in to a new blog post of its own. Not only does it give us an additional post to drive traffic to, it also bumps up traffic to the original 5 blog posts. Overall, 'clicks' are the drug of the modern world - it's a pathetic attempt at increasing visitors and views in a growing effort to monetise this blog and finally allow me to buy Fantastic Four #48.

So here are my most read blog posts of 2014:

1. Everything I Know About Fundraising In One Slide
"People Donate Emotionally. Keep It Simple. It’s Not About You. Make A Personal Connection. Ask. Transparency, Obviously."

2. Restorative Fundraising
"Think about whether you are doing something to someone, for someone, with someone, or not doing it at all."

3. #NoMakeUpSelfie - What Should Your Charity Learn From It?
"For every #NoMakeUpSelfie there are a million efforts that raised nothing."

4. GUEST BLOG: Why Everyone Loses Over the World Vision Controversy
"When charity becomes more about promoting an ideology than helping people, everyone loses."

5. The Obligatory #IceBucketChallenge Blog Post - Criticism of Criticisms
"You're allowed to find fun in everything as long as it's not at the expense of others. Jesus, otherwise what's the point of anything?"

A Look Back At Irish Fundraising In 2014

Well, I'm glad to get that year over and done with. What a nightmare. Here were the fundraising highlights of 2014:

CRC Scandal Spills Over
We'd hoped the scandals of 2013 would die down a bit, but the coverage continued in to the New Year and beyond. The newspapers revealed a €700k pay out to the retiring CEO and every charity suffered.

Rehab, Angela and Frank
More Rehab scandals which caused a further loss of trust in charities. Angela Kerins stepped down. Frank Flannery did what Frank Flannery does. And nobody paid much attention to the real numbers behind the Rehab scratch cards.

SEPA Deadline Extended 6 Months
The new direct debit processing requirements were delayed 6 months because nobody really knew what they were doing. We're still figuring it out, and Irish charities are still working out the costs of extra processing and an increase in rejected DDs.

Charity Regulator Announced
We got our Irish Charity Regulator. Yay! And then we slowly realised that it's going to take years to figure out what a charity is and how many exist. Fundraising sits down the bottom of the list, and the new regulator hinted that it might not be on the list at all.

1% Difference Campaign Results
The 1% Difference Campaign published some results and found that donations to charities had declined (not their fault, of course). The -50% Difference Campaign still simmers.

AccountingForCharities.ie
With good intentions, Ireland's first 'charity comparison website' launched. Of course, these comparison sites don't make any sense, and maybe that's why it hasn't taken off yet.

#NoMakeUpSelfie and Other Selfies
Charities tried to capitalise on the latest trend of taking a photo of your own stupid face. One of the campaigns worked really well and all the rest flopped. Nobody knew why but it gave us all something to blog about (like here). Isn't that what's really counts?

The Charity Regulator Board Announced
We got ourselves a Charity Regulator Board. And Alan Shatter resigned (loudly making a donation to a charity that doesn't publish their salaries)

New Face-to-Face Fundraising Code of Conduct
The IFFDR regrouped and relaunched. The priority was to rewrite the Code of Conduct for street, door, and private site fundraising.

Fundraising Site Costs Went Up
Costs begin to sneak up for on-line fundraising portals. The good news is Sponsor.ie stayed at 4% (with no registration or annual fees), and we even had a Fee Free April!

George Hook At The Irish Fundraising Awards
As Ronan Ryan put it: "This is one of those 'were you there?!'  moments in my fundraising career"

#IceBucketChallenge
Jonathan Waddingham invented the great phrase of Meme-raising to explain these campaigns that charities have little or no control over. But again, it gave bloggers lots of fodder to pretend they know what they're talking about (like here and here).

GoodCharity.ie
Working with Fundraising Ireland, The Wheel, Dochas and Whitebarn Consulting, we launched GoodCharity.ie. It was amazing.

IFC Holland, One In Four and CFRE
Although my personal life was pretty much a disaster, I was delighted to get to speak at IFC Holland (#TeamJohann), to start working with One In Four, and to achieve my CFRE.

#GivingTuesday
Whatevs.


Any other highlights?

Predictions For Irish Fundraising In 2015

I've had a rough year this year and really right now I don't have the energy or mindset to do my annual predictions for Irish fundraising - I'm circling the drain. But looking back at last year's predictions I would say we're in for more of the same. So here's a recap:


The Charity Regulator Will Disappoint Many
But many people think the regulator will somehow reduce what CEOs earn, get rid of 'chuggers', and eliminate some of the more questionable charities. They won't - it just wouldn't make any sense. And that'll leave a few people lamenting the Charity Regulator as 'another quango'. In fact, it's been argued that 'fundraising' doesn't even fall under the regulator at all.


SMS Giving Will Get MORE Expensive
The Data Commissioner put the kibosh on the opt-outs in any form which made the whole thing so much more expensive. And surely the '100% goes to the charity' can't last much longer?


Negative Media Coverage
Fundraising/chugging/salaries will receive huge negative, misinformed, one-sided media coverage in February, August and October.


Legacies Will Get Big
It's already started, but in 2015 we're going to really see legacy messaging drip-feeding through everything. You may as well just go update your will now and get it over with.


Cost Per Acquisition Is About To Go Nuts
More and more charities are finally getting round to recruiting regular donors, which is a great thing. But it's also going to put pressure on the public, on the suppliers and on fundraisers. Combine that with stronger regulation, stricter data protection rules and more large charities bringing their face-to-face in-house (and driving up wages to an unsustainable level) and what you'll see is an increase in your cost per acquisition.


What do you think we're going to see in 2015?

Are Direct Mail, E-mail, Vinyl and Bruce Willis Dead?

I keep reading that DM is dead. And now e-mail and Facebook are dead. Meanwhile, people bought more vinyl records this year than any time in the last 20 years.

What's going on?

Well maybe it's just impossible for things to die.

Tobin Aldrich wrote a nice blog post pointing out the DM isn't dying...it's changing. He also says he's “been hearing that DM is dead for 20 years.”

I don't think anything is dead.

Things don't die. They change. We get nostalgic. We might prioritise differently, we might budget differently. But to say anything is dead is probably nonsense.

I could make a VHS appeal work if I sent a good strong ask on a VHS tape to the people that still own VHS players. It would work.

When you read an article saying that something is 'dead', check who wrote it and see if they own a company that sells the thing they're claiming is 'next'.

The only thing that will die is each and every person that you love.

Happy Christmas.

10 Key Lessons From The Fundraising #AnnualLectures

I was fortunate enough to attend the second Annual Lectures, having won my place by writing this.

Here are, not so much 10 key lessons, but my 10 highlights from the day:

1. Pat Dade asked "What parts of humans are still chimps?" reminding me that so many of our actions and reactions make no sense. Or at least make no sense to modern, logical, tweeting us. And don't forget we share 50% DNA with bananas.
   He went on to point out that our whole society is falling apart - is that a few bad apples or is it because of what we're stuck working with?
   
   
2. Jacob Rolin declared that "Church, State, and Financial Institutions are dying." Beautiful.
   He also confronted our habit of thinking other charities - especially children's charities - are easier to fundraise for (I call it 'The Cause Is Always Greener'). He said, "We are all children's charities." Your charity is making the world better for the next generation.
   
   
3. Phil Barden explained a weak brand uses more energy in our brains. A strong brand uses less energy and allows us to autopilot and focus on survival. As humans we want autopilot. I think good fundraisers nurture a habit of giving...not flashes.
   "It is hardwired in us to attend to humans."
   
   
4. Jeremy Hughes said "There is no point in standing there and not rattling the can."
   He's 50 years a fundraiser. A fundraiser who became a CEO. And a delight to listen to.
   I'm going to steal his quote and use it for years, saying it to bookend any conversation on fundraising in a poetic way, whether or not it makes sense.
   
   
5. He also asked why isn't the first page of our annual reports about money and how it ties in to what we do? We should be proud that everything relies on and is tied to fundraising. Instead it's usually "Here's a bit about fundraising even though you don't want to hear it."
   
   
6. A couple of people quoted the Unilever CEO as saying "Unilever is the biggest NGO in the world, but because we make a profit we're sustainable."
   
   
7. Iain McAndrew explained that Cystic Fibrosis advertised for a 'Master Storyteller' as opposed to 'engagement' or 'marketing' person.
   
   
8. Ken Burnett lamented, "The biggest tragedy of most charity communications is that they're dull." His large collared shirt took out the eyes of the front row and he went on to explain that charities need to deliver Fast, Frequent, Fabulous Feedback. He knows what he's talking about.
   
   
9. Alan Clayton concluded that "People need to give...and we're fulfilling that need."
   He did what he does best: riffing on the audience's emotions like a Don McLean concert.
   
   
10. Richard Taylor of CRUK neatly surmised every conference (and life itself) by saying "It's worth remembering we don't know what we're talking about."

It's a bit of an injustice not mentioning Tony Elischer (King of The Quotables), and the rest of the legendary speakers. Great day.

Now get back to work.

What's Next In Fundraising?

This is the 500 word piece of writing that won me a place at The Annual Lectures.


I read recently that we only spend a couple of hours each day actually working. Who has time to fundraise? Between countless cups of tea, checking my phone, Twitter, reading blogs, watching videos and crying in the bathroom, really there is very little time.

The next big thing in fundraising - and in everything, really - is actually doing stuff.

Talking about what a mess we’re in, attending conferences and reading ‘67 Ways To Improve Your Productivity’ isn’t going to cut it anymore. We need to start actually doing this stuff.

I love fundraising conferences. Genuinely, they’re like little holidays for me. But it strikes me as odd that year after year some of the greatest fundraisers in the world are telling rooms of people that we need to thank our donors. That we need to look after them. But when I mystery shop charities it still feels like someone didn’t get the memo.

We’re coming away from these sessions feeling invigorated and inspired, but then life, love and True Detective gets in the way. Are we to blame? Are we choosing an easy life over working - I mean really working - to do all the stuff we know we should be doing?

You know picking up the phone is more effective than sending that e-mail so why don’t you do it? You know handwriting a letter to a major donor will do more for you than reading yet another article on donor retention, but you don’t do it. Even this sentence...this one here...that you’re reading...right now...it’s unnecessarily long and really doesn’t tell you anything...shouldn’t you have used this time to ask someone for money?

I actually blame digital for some of this. Even though I’m young (at least according to the Annual Lectures) I think digital fundraising is overhyped. It’s a method, not a motivator. And as long as humans are born and raised with physical contact and human love we are always going to thirst for it. It will always trump digital.

Instead, this new media has made it really easy, really convenient, to not communicate like humans. While we try to keep up with the latest revolutionary, innovative fad (“This will change everything!”) we move further and further away from giving humans what they require. All because it promises to be easy, to fix all our problems, and save us from having to actually do this terribly difficult thing called ‘fundraising’.

What’s next in fundraising? Let’s be brutally honest and admit we haven’t implemented half the classic stuff we should have. Let’s continue to learn what works from each other and from the greatest minds in fundraising. And then let’s actually do it. Let’s do it now, with the same level of urgency we impart to our donors.  We have to...there are so many people relying on us.