5 Common Mistakes in Nonprofit Newsletters

Do you feel like your nonprofit newsletter has gone stale?

Or, maybe you feel like it is simply a waste of time and money?

If so, take a good hard look at your last several newsletters. If they include one of these five common mistakes, your newsletters are probably underperforming.

• Treating the Newsletter Like a Newspaper

Repeat after me: “Our newsletter will not be a listing of recent events at the organization!”

The primary purpose of a nonprofit newsletter is not to inform the reader. The newsletter’s primary purpose is to FIRE UP the reader about what your organization is accomplishing BECAUSE OF donors.

You should, in fact, feature some recent events that have happened around your organization, but you MUST make a connection back to the donor.

Ask yourself, “If I am a prospective donor, why would this story matter to me?” 

A comparison is regularly made between fundraising and sales. The comparison is not perfect - there are key differences between the two.

But, if your nonprofit is selling anything with its fundraising efforts, it is hope.  Hope that a greater impact can be made in the realm in which you serve. 

For example, your donor prospects want to see more local youth strengthened in their faith, but they lead busy lives and can’t spend the time to do the work themselves.

That’s why they support your Catholic school, so that you can make that difference in the world.

Your newsletter should reflect just that. Your messaging should be:

Elementary students are growing up in an environment that strengthens their faith and catechizes them well because YOU [the donor] support this school. And with further support, more of that impact will happen!

This is going to resonate with your readers far more than “New textbooks purchased for science classroom.”

• Too Much Text

This may feel counterintuitive - the whole point of a newsletter is to explain stories, right?

I was recently talking with a friend who does not work in the fundraising world, but who gives to a number of different nonprofits.

One thing he said really caught my attention:

“I have to admit I am not the best supporter. I receive newsletters from all the organizations I support and I enjoy them, but I only ever scan through each one quickly, I don’t think I’ve ever actually read the articles completely.”

Far from being unique, THIS IS THE NORM AMONG YOUR READERS. 

Research has shown that almost all of your supporters are doing this - skimming the newsletter, rather than reading it carefully.

Your super fans might read everything, but they are the only ones. They are going to support you either way.

Knowing this, we need to put together our newsletters in a way that captures the attention of the rest of your supporters.

Less text. 

More of:

• Pictures
• Captions
• Headlines
• bolded section titles
• bulleted lists, and 
• pull-out quotes.

• Inconsistent Branding

When a reader glances at your newsletter in a stack of mail, can they tell it is from you right away?

Your colors, logo, fonts, and other branding elements need to be consistent from one communications piece to the next.

Create a style guide for your communications, and stick to it across all of your communications.

• No Call to Action

Newsletters are not typically a place to make a strong financial ask, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t let readers know how to get involved.

Never assume that the reader will make the connection between what your organization needs and how they can help.

If you are organizing a service project, let the reader know how they can volunteer.

If you are showing progress to date toward a fundraising goal, let the reader know how they can contribute.

• Not Tracking Newsletter Results

Tracking the analytics for direct mail newsletters is not as simple as for digital communications, but it should still be done.

It takes months to see the full results from one newsletter.

It takes years to have enough data to start drawing strong conclusions.

So start tracking now.

A few of the metrics I like to track include:

• Cost per dollar raised (total newsletter printing and mailing cost divided by total revenue received due to the newsletter)
• Cost per piece mailed
• Number of gifts received
• Percent of givers (the number of gifts received divided by the number of newsletters mailed)

Here are a few takeaways that I learned when I started tracking my newsletter and appeal letter performance:

• Switching from a four-page newsletter to an eight-page newsletter caused us to lose money on each newsletter mailing, as opposed to breaking even or coming out slightly ahead
• The later my end-of-year mailings went out, the less money we received in December donations 
• Trying a very different type of feature story in one newsletter caused the donation response to almost double

Test, measure, and work to constantly improve on your organization’s newsletter.

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