There are four major constituencies approached by fundraisers: contributors, and 3 classes of prospects (business, people, foundations).

For business contributions, businesses are almost always addressed to business offices. For people contributions, individuals are almost always addressed at home addresses. Foundations are always addressed to the institutional office (the business office).

In marketing terms, donors (contributors) are the same as customers for a direct mail operation or subscribers for a newsletter or magazine. For all three, including fundraising, response is the name of the game, and direct mail is just one of the players.

Direct Mailing Lists for Fundraising from the General Public

There are two basic factor implicit in any fundraising operation: An appeal to a given psychographic profile (how the individual sees and reacts to life, and to some extent what that lifestyle is) and discretionary income (dollars that can be expended as the individual sees fit, beyond what he/she perceives to be the necessities of life).

Some fundraising, for given objectives, must operate for the most part within a distinctly limited province. A college seeking to build a new football stadium needs to obtain most of such support from current donors, alumni, season ticket holders, and local businesses.

Some fundraising, with ethnic requirements, must operate primarily within that ethnic group; just as political fundraising must tap into its own segment on the political spectrum from conservative to liberal left.

It should be clear that until the objectives of the fundraising operation, and the constraints within it must function, are known, any discussion of fundraising lists and list sources would be specious. Before one starts, at least the following must be known:

1. Objective

2. Probable market segments

a. Internal

b. External

1. Psychographic factors

2. Affluence factors

3. Constraints and limitations

a. Religion

b. Color

c. Locality

d. Other

3. Type of donation required

4. Size of donation (or range) desired

5. Area to be covered

6. Budget

7. Anticipated yield per thousand piece mailed

Fundraising Classifications

Fundraising, and the specific lists that pertain to them, can usually be categorized within ten major classifications:

Education

Cultural (Arts, Civic: Local, Civic: National/International)

Religious & Ethnic (Minorities, Religions)

Civic & Political (Local, National, International, Governmental, Armed Forces)

Energy

Recreation

Children

Animals

Health (Disease, Disabled, Hospitals, Sight)

Disaster (Violent, Endemic, Population)

The top political lists of interest for political parties are:

Congresspeople

Congressional staff

State legislators

Political commentators

Business columnists

Presidents of major corporations

County party Chairpersons and treasurers

Political consultants, fundraisers, and campaign directors

Governors and mayors

Foundation presidents

Registered voters

Newly registered voters

When considering the use of your political list, here are some qualities endemic to political donors:

The first of many qualities of a donor is empathy; a sympathy with the program, cause, or politics that are espoused.

The second quality is having a history of giving. Someone who has given to a particular persuasion in the past, especially if recently, is more likely to give to another similar request.

The third quality is an ability, through disposable income, to write a check.

Fourth is a desire to participate, even in some minor way, in the political process.

There is no solid way to estimate the total number of Americans who vote with their money instead of their minds, but the total is in the millions.

Acquiring the best donor and non-profit mailing lists possible is an important part of a fundraising campaign, but not the only factor. There are four core lessons every fundraising effort needs to understand:

Create a Budget

One of the most difficult roles in fundraising is to obtain a given budget to fit a given objective. While used relatively rarely, one way to solve this is to establish the budget for fundraising as a portion (or percentage) of the expenditures by the institution for educational activities. When fundraising is thought of this way, it plays an important role in what educational activities will be entered by the institution.

Measurement is based on the number of dollars received against the number of dollars expended. It is relatively rare to breakeven on this basis on fundraising appeals to prospect lists. The usual report for annual fund drives usually shows a cost to buy a new contributor. This cost, if modest, can easily be amortized in the next fundraising effort as the new donors know the charitable operation and are already favorably inclined to have the organization continue the work it is doing.

Eliminate Atypical Donations from Projections

Atypical donations need to be recognized and eliminated from future projections. In reviewing test data for fundraising offer, it is usual to examine:

1) Number of dollars of response per thousand pieces mailed.
2) Number of donations received per thousand pieces mailed.

Utilizing such data to evaluate whether or not to continue with a given source or list the number of responses is a safer criteria than the number of dollars. It isn’t uncommon for a fundraising effort to elicit twenty donations of $5 to $15, and one donation of $100 or $200. The latter increases the total dollars received markedly but there is no guarantee that in a future continuation other donations of this size will be realized.

Donors Don’t Ask Enough

The owners of donor lists rarely ask them for further contributions often enough. Donors like to receive mail from the social services they support. For every one fund raiser who is concerned about mailing to donors too often, there are ninety-nine that do not mail the donor list often enough. The average donor can be found on a number of other donor lists and these organizations repeatedly ask the donor for help.

Not All Donor Lists Are the Same

Donor lists consists of current, old, former, and deceased donors, in effect, cells of donors with distinctly different characteristics. There is a need to differentiate them and to learn to cultivate them differently.

With many list providers out there claiming to have the political list data campaigners need, many candidates or their managers don’t know what to ask in order to truly evaluate their list supplier.

The following questions should be asked to your list provider and answered to your satisfaction:

What is the source of the names I will be using?

When were they compiled?

When (if at any time) have they been updated?

What guarantee of delivery can I count on?

What proportion of duplication should I expect?

What is the cost of each list segment? Of each phone list?

What are the qualifications of the list supplier?

What other political campaigns has the list supplier been involved with

Call us at (866) 517-1776 to learn more about our Political Mailing List data.

All of us at American Heritage Data Corporation wish you a safe and happy holiday season. We are excited about what lies ahead for us in 2008 and look forward to contributing to your direct mail and telemarketing campaign success! Hope to hear from you soon…Happy New Year!

Over the past few years, political parties have increasingly recognized the power of databases in the use of their political campaigns. More recently, as the 2008 Presidential campaign heats up, they have realized the critical value in a more sophisticated use of political data. But is a more complex approach enough?

American Heritage Data offers tips to maximizing the success of your Political List.

Know Your Audience

Traditionally in the past, political parties would simply target neighborhoods where the majority historically voted in their party’s favor. This practice proved inefficient because it didn’t account for neighborhoods where the divide was not as easily discernable and ran the risk of doing more to turn out the opposition’s vote. Hence, they have moved away from simple targeting of groups to a more developed approach in order to reach as many of their supporters regardless of community.

Ask yourself, “Who is it that I am targeting? Are these groups the right ones? Are they likely to come out to vote?” The advantage of data-based targeting is that political field operatives can hone in on precisely the voters they wish to reach.

American Heritage’s database contains over 220 million active US consumers and 13 million active US businesses, including information on millions of registered voters. Whether you are trying to raise funds for your campaign, rally your supporters and constituents, or sway the swing voter, we are sure we can create the right Mailing List and Telemarketing List for your campaign.

Really Know Your Audience

When it comes to a detailed assessment of your target audience, there is no such thing as too much information. The more qualified data you have, the more these sources of information will cross-reference, providing a better picture and allowing for more informed decisions.

Discovering other attributes about your target provides an incredible flexibility for personalized messaging to individual voters and households, using information about the churches they attend, kind of magazines they receive, their charitable contributions, their views on contentious issues, and their voting histories. This personalized approach complements a campaign mix that may include television and radio; mediums that typically use mass messaging to target and reach large audiences.

American Heritage’s political campaign data specialists can help you build a detailed profile of your target market. We have one of the largest databases of Specialty Lists available anywhere with demographic, psychographic, and lifestyle characteristics, including Voter Lists. With thousands of categories, we can help you to target difficult to reach business segments including decision makers, professionals, executives and more.

Make Sure Your Data is Accurate

Harold Ickes, a deputy chief of staff in the Clinton White House and an adviser to Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.), was quoted in a March 2006 Washington Post article as saying that out-of-date voter information is “worse than having no database at all.” He couldn’t be more right!

Making sure your list order contains accurate information is essential. How do you know if your data is correct? Be certain to work with a reputable data company with experience serving the political sector and that has an outstanding quality assurance infrastructure.

The knowledgeable List Consultants at American Heritage Data have experience from a variety of political areas and can work with your campaign managers to find the best approach to reach your campaign objectives.

We also understand the importance of current, reliable political lists. The work doesn’t end after the vote is in! Our databases constantly undergo list hygiene processes, and have gained a reputation within the direct marketing industry for unparalleled list responsiveness. This ensures optimal list quality for any election cycle.

Call one of our List Specialists at (866) 517-1776 to learn more about our Political Mailing Lists!

Introducing a New Target Market… Don’t believe us?

Are you looking for a new target market or audience to pitch your product and services to? Is your audience that was once your market niche no longer producing what it has in the past? Guess what? Our professional list advisors can help. There is a market out there that is overflowing in population and wealth.

Does AARP or American Association of Retired Persons mean anything to you? The AARP is an association that is dedicated to enhancing the quality of life for all as we age. Between the 1940s and 1960s, the United States experienced a monumental increase and an unusual spike in birth rates, a phenomenon more commonly known as the baby boom. Currently, these baby boomers are potentially a greater segment than any other audience or market you’ve ever reached out to. They want to spend their earnings and savings on their quality of life.

Baby Boomers are transitioning into retirement with considerable wealth, and this group has emerged as a prime target market segment for many organizations. How do you reach the baby boomer community? With our MAIL LEADS!

Micro segments within the baby boomer market segment will be targeting health/wellness, insurance, automotive, travel, tools to get equity out of long term investments, wealth transfer, reverse mortgage, etc.

We can help you massively expand your clientele base, especially with this target market, with first-class and superior mail leads, sales leads and business lists. Having made a significant mark and being in the industry for over 15 years, we have helped our customers, both large and small, solve their sales and mailing lead problems with leads and lists that achieve particular marketing goals. How do we do it? With our database boasting over 220 million consumers and over 15 million businesses, we have access to the most responsive, economic and privacy-compliant mail leads and marketing databases available. No matter what your product, service or target market, we can provide all the current, accurate telemarketing and mailing leads you will ever need.

Direct mail leads are a valuable and cost-effective way to tell your customers who you are, and what your business has to offer. Get to know mail leads, and this will ensure that your customers will get to know you.

Purchasing mail leads and using these leads for your campaign offers your clients a chance to learn about your business and the products and/or services it has to offer. By doing so, you will cultivate long-term business relationships, build and increase brand recognition, drive traffic to your web-site, and be able to achieve so much more.