NEXT LEVEL FUNDRAISING
Engage donors through handwritten direct mail, that feels personal and heartfelt
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RELATIONSHIPS AT SCALE
Direct mail makes up 92% of revenue received from donors, yet traditional letters don’t engage, feel personal or get opened. Donors churn when they don’t feel thanked.
Build relationships with donors through hyper-personal handwritten letters. Benefit from 99% open rates, and a 346x multiplier in response rate compared to standard direct mail.
USE CASES
HOUSEFILE RENEWAL
Your past supporters are the best place to get started. Plan new initiatives and appeals, knowing 99% of your donor list will open a handwritten envelope.
GIFTS & IMPACT
Reduce donor churn by making them feel appreciated. Thank them for their contribution, and share key details on their impact. A handwritten message goes a long way.
PROSPECT LISTS
Acquire new donors to add to your housefile through handwritten marketing. Resonate through storytelling and simple visuals. Send a handwritten card with a real stamp, cutting through the noise.
Young Lives vs Cancer delight fundraisers
Resulting in a 10.7% renewal rate from fundraisers YOY who were sent a handwritten letter, with $213,500 raised from those repeat runners.
Challenge
YLVC came to Scribeless looking for a better way to connect with donors and fundraisers at scale. They’d written cards by hand in their office in the past, but weren’t able to produce at volume.
Solution
With Scribeless, YLVC were able to build out processes to scale handwritten marketing. This has allowed their team to focus on new campaigns, which have seen great feedback and return from donors.
Campaign details
Company background
Young Lives vs Cancer is a leading UK cancer charity for children and young people. The roots of the organization can be traced back to 1968, with the establishment of the Malcolm Sargent Cancer Fund for Children3.
The charity’s mission is to provide comprehensive support to young cancer patients and their families, addressing the financial, practical, emotional, and social challenges that come with a cancer diagnosis.
Donor fatigue is causing real concern for charities like YLVC. According to research from the Fundraising Effectiveness Project, donor retention rates dropped from 43% in 2010 to just 38% in 2019. This indicates that nonprofits are struggling to maintain long-term donor relationships.
Ease of campaign creation and management
Most charities are attempting to write cards themselves to donors, or are relying on traditional direct mail. Either way, their expectations of direct mail are weeks of planning, email conversations, proofs, and meetings, to get mail out of the door.
YLVC spent less then an hour processing their last Scribeless campaign.That included:
- Creating their handwritten design through our template editor; uploading brand assets, selecting the card size, handwriting style, and layout.
- Uploading data via CSV through our easy to use upload tool.
- Adding a card to the account and accepting quote.
handwriting realism
Donors fatigue due to a lack of communication. Personalized communication, like a handwritten thank you card, builds a 1:1 relationship with that donor. The handwriting needs to be realistic to convince donors, and build a personal connection.
It was very important to YLVC when moving over to Scribeless, that the handwriting was realistic. Upon receiving samples, their team were very impressed, and couldn't tell the difference. That's because we've spent over 5 years building and refining our handwriting technology.
Analysis and summary
YLVC came to Scribeless to save time, and found with that saved time, their team could produce outcomes far above expectations. A 10.7% supporter return rate on running the London Marathon, with $213,500 raised from those supporters, has left the YLVC team delighted. We are looking forward to working with them on many future campaigns.
“We are continuing to use Scribeless as our supporters really, really love the cards! Reading the responses, it was like Christmas had arrived here at the office 🙂”
SARAH MANION
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