Some things are simple. Here’s a short list from Copyblogger of The 5 Most Persuasive Words in the English Language:
- You
- Free
- Because
- Instantly
- New
You can use these words in fundraising. They work.
Filed under Future Fund Raising Now by on Dec 29th, 2012. Comment. 
Roy Williams raises a great point at Mountains and Molehills.
The “molehills” he’s talking about are the logo, colors, and design standards you use in your fundraising:
Customers who buy from your competitors aren’t choosing your competitors because they have better logos. Your problem is something else entirely.
Customers care about things like products and procedures and policies that might affect them. They care about your offers and assurances. They care about the experience you create for them.
Design is a part of that experience, but a very, very small part.
Design matters. Terrible design that’s unreadable and confusing will chase away donors and kill your revenue. But the best design in the world won’t take you anywhere if your fundamental call to action is not interesting to your donors.
If someone tells you they can change everything with a new logo, color palette, or design scheme, you’re talking to a designer — not a fundraiser.
Filed under Future Fund Raising Now by on Oct 31st, 2012. Comment.
Email marketers are a good source of handy information for us fundraisers. They’re always testing and studying with their huge email files. That’s where this post, 5 New Email Marketing Tips Based on Recent Studies, from Totally Uncorked on Marketing gets some handy new tidbits:
- Send your e-mail marketing at the beginning of the week when open rates are higher.
- Test personalizing your e-mails — it may have a negative effect on open and click rates.
- Email more frequently than once a month. (Emailing infrequently is the likely path to shrinking your list.)
- Keep email subject lines between 28-39 characters.
- If a large part of your recipient list uses mobile devices, try keeping email messages in the 50KB range to ensure they load quickly.
There’s backup behind each of these. Check them out.
Filed under Future Fund Raising Now by on Aug 26th, 2012. Comment.
If you’re looking for quick, easy, and cheap improvements to your direct mail packages, check out this post at the Direct Creative Blog: 12 fast direct mail tests for cheapskates.
- Change your outer envelope.
- Test a new letter.
- Remove your brochure.
- Include a stand-alone reply form.
- Insert a lift note.
- Strengthen your offer.
- Offer something free.
- Add a time limit.
- Highlight your guarantee.
- Build a package around your self-mailer.
- Mail your print ad.
- Try the two-step.
Think of them as cheap tests. Or just as good ideas.
Filed under Future Fund Raising Now by on Jun 20th, 2012. Comment.
Search engine optimization is something that every website owner, small business owner and blogger should know about. It is a technique that helps search engine spiders find you quickly on the Internet. Using the advice written in this article will help you on the road to success on the Internet.
You should be wary of illegitimate SEO companies when you are looking to hire one. There are many companies that will use practices that are frowned upon by the major search engines which can result in harming your search rankings. There are also many companies that offer false promises and try to scam you for your money. Be wary of companies that guarantee success and dig in to find out whether they do honest legitimate work.
Linking over and over again to and from the same site is considering link spamming and you want to avoid it. Your site will look like a spammer to the engines and will create the impression that you are paying for links. Even if the engines don’t flag your site as spam, they will only include the first link or two in their ranking system.
A good idea to improve search engine optimization is through the creation of a ‘link to us’ page on your website. If you offer logos and keyword rich links to your visitors you will soon find that some of them will begin to link to you. This is a great way to improve your search engine status.
In addition to submitting your website to the business category section of a search engine’s submission site, also submit your website in the geographical location portion of the submission site. This is where you can choose the region of your physical location. This does not count as double submission. What it will do is index your website for regional search results as well.
Increase Search Engine Rankings
Increase Search Engine Rankings
Look through old emails and comment boards to find ideas for new posts. Turn every question you ever answered in an email into content on the site. Remember that the way to increase search engine rankings is to constantly create new articles. Your emails probably provide plenty of topics that readers want to know about.
Look through old emails and comment boards to find ideas for new posts. Turn every question you ever answered in an email into content on the site. Remember that the way to increase search engine rankings is to constantly create new articles. Your emails probably provide plenty of topics that readers want to know about.
If you want to increase website traffic without spending money, choose internet marketing strategies that minimize expenses. Blogging and article marketing rely on generating content to attract traffic. Search engine optimization (SEO) is a comparatively, low-cost strategy to increase search engine rankings, without paying for the boost outright.
No matter how knowledgeable you are about the subject. These tips should help you to boost the page rankings of your website. As you follow the advice in this article, you’ll gain a better understanding of search engine optimization and how it affects your site. Soon, you’ll be telling others what they can do to optimize their sites.
Take a look here to get more information and facts on increase search engine rankings
Filed under Chris Stoddard by on Apr 29th, 2012. Comment.