Direct Marketing Magazine November 2018

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Truly touching The Big Shift the donor

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vol. 31 • No. 10 • November 2018

The Authority on Data-Driven Engagement & Operations

2019 federal election prediction ❱6

Parties apply smarter marketing and fundraising

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Vol. 31 | No. 10 | November 2018

2019 federal election prediction: smarter marketing and fundraising

EDITOR Brendan Read - brendan@dmn.ca PRESIDENT Steve Lloyd - steve@dmn.ca DESIGN / PRODUCTION Jennifer O’Neill - jennifer@dmn.ca Advertising Sales Mark Henry - mark@dmn.ca CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Jason Egbuna Liz Attfield Steve Falk Nicolas Beique Rebecca Martin Kimberley Blease Paul Parisi Sharon Brown Stephen Shaw Anja Bundze Michael Edwards

Customer Centricity

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The path to customer centricity

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Truly touching the donor The benefits of blending digital and mail personalization

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Are Canadians less charitable?

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Can smaller NFPs compete with foundations?

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Integrating offline and online channels How to improve donor acquisition and renewal

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The Big Shift The old brand-building model is dead. A next generation planning model must start with what the customer wants: and that will take a big shift to get right.

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Enabling e-commerce with digital payments Smaller Canadian companies may be missing out

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Why merchants can ignore the cryptocurrency hype (for now)

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Content is Queen in engaging high value donors!

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Customer Centricity

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The path to customer centricity M

Rebecca Martin is CMO at Calabrio (www.calabrio.com).

arketers are constantly looking for new ways to connect with customers and earn their loyalty. A recent report by Calabrio highlights just how much change marketers face every day: 81% of chief marketing officers (CMOs) say they have experienced digital disruption in the past 12 to 18 months compared to 59% of CEOs1.

To manage this shift, and meet growing customer expectations, companies are collecting oodles of customer data. But, while decision-makers are hungry for insights, having access to data and leveraging it to make informed decisions are two different things.

What’s the problem? Our recent report reveals it starts with mentality: 68% of decision-makers avoid a major change initiative because of an “if ain’t broke, don’t fix it” mindset. But in a high stakes world, that approach prevents organizations from delivering the innovative experiences customers want and can even alienate them in the process. And companies that fail to prioritize the customer experience will fall behind: IDC estimates that enterprises will spend over $2 trillion in 2019 on digital transformation efforts2.

To get a return on that digital transformation investment marketers must be customer-centric. And that requires a new approach that captures the right insights to get to the heart of what customers want.

However, as omnichannel strategies become the new normal for marketers, they should rethink how they’re using analytics: even if it’s uncomfortable.

Widen the scope Data is everywhere, but many decision-makers haven’t looked beyond a few specific points. In fact, our report shows 63% of CMOs admitted to relying too heavily on just one source of data, while 39% of decision-makers look at revenue numbers and 35% rely on social media insights to make decisions.

Revenue numbers don’t indicate what customers want on a day-to-day basis and offer no guidance on which changes to make to keep customers happy. Social media interactions often only show customers when they’re really happy—or very angry—and marketers can’t base strategies off of these polarizing insights.

While these sources are a start, they simply don’t tell the whole story. Marketers must use multiple data sources to gain complete views of the customers ❱ DMN.ca

across all points in the journeys. From there they can understand how consumers buy, what they want and whether the companies are doing enough to earn their business: and they can do it before revenue numbers dip.

Leverage analytics Analytics is a great way to turn data into insights.

According to our report, many organizations are overwhelmed by what it takes to deploy analytics: 24% of decision-makers say it’s too complicated, 20% think there are too many sources and 19% simply don’t find it valuable. However, as omnichannel strategies become the new normal for marketers, they should rethink how they’re using analytics: even if it’s uncomfortable.

Customers interact with companies via e-mail, web, phone and other channels, which means companies have to connect those disparate sources and turn subsequent data into insights that matter. To capture the power of analytics, it is imperative for marketers to move away from solutions that aren’t delivering and utilize new technology that gives them the insights that matter.

Heed customers’ conversations A broader view of data points and robust analytics solutions are building blocks toward a customercentric strategy, but they aren’t enough. 59% of business leaders admit that they have led unsuccessful change initiatives, and 22% said it’s because they didn’t deliver what customers wanted. And it might be because they didn’t ask: only 12% of decision-makers rely on contact centre data. That means they’re missing out on insights from the best place to capture the true voice of the customer.

When customers interact with contact centre agents, they’re telling them what they prefer, require and areas where the organization can improve. And, unlike social media, this feedback isn’t just given when customers are highly emotional or unhappy. In those everyday conversations companies have the chance to build meaningful relationships: and marketers the ability to analyze interactions to understand customer sentiment. From there, organizations can deploy effective training strategies to ensure that agents are well-versed in brand knowledge and messaging and make strategic improvements across the entire customer journey.

There’s one thing that’s constant for marketers, and that’s change. Though it can be hard to navigate change with massive amounts of data pouring into an organization, with the right mindset and tools, marketers can extract insights from the noise and use that knowledge to drive real business change. When all of this is combined with robust contact centre insights and a data-driven team of agents who are empowered to delight customers along the way, companies win.

1 Calabrio, “New Study Reveals Reliance on Too Few Data Sources; Organizations Likely Missing Opportunities to Meet the Real Needs of Customers,” study, March 2018.

2 Joseph Pucciarelli, “4 things successful CIOs know about digital transformation”, CIO, April 18, 2018.

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2019 federal election prediction: smarter marketing and fundraising

By Michael Edwards

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he next federal election is just a year away, but you’d be forgiven to think that we just had one. That’s because in recent years Canadian political parties have adopted a more continuous election cycle akin to that of our neighbours to the south.

It used to be that when a party would win a majority government, they’d dive right in to governing with the prospect of the next electoral contest but a speck in a distant horizon. The traditional ebb and flow of politics and governance was the result of pragmatism. Unlike the glossy and well-funded political parties in the U.S., Canadian parties run on shoestring budgets and within stringent spending confines.

It’s the bane of many political operators, but arguably a sound ❱ DMN.ca

asset and quality of the Canadian tradition of good government.

The emergence of continuous engagement through digital channels has shifted this paradigm. Continuous metrics and real-time feedback on content and policies have morphed political operatives into hyper-sensitive data scientists. In turn, this shift has fueled greater demand for ever more cost-efficient ways to acquire, sustain and convert supporters: who are the lifeblood of political movements. Without an efficient acquisition strategy, parties will find themselves bereft of members, donors and volunteers who are crucial to their success in “getting out the vote” in local ridings.

With more data in hand, political parties have become more nuanced in how they approach the broad coalition of support they need to be successful at election time. Parties

are becoming less dependent on traditional regional structures and traditional demographic targeting.

Instead they are more focused on targeting voters based on interest and support of specific policies and positions.

A hybrid digital + traditional channel approach Interest and audience-based targeting has opened the door for significant growth in list building at reduced costs. Canadian political parties have begun to develop a hybrid approach to supporter acquisition, which grounds itself in the Internet game.

Digital channels have proven to be more cost-efficient than telemarketing and direct mail because parties have realized that online they can persuade voters, acquire support and generate revenue simultaneously. Being able

to reach a broader audience exposes undecideds and non-supporters to persuasive messaging while also providing actions for otherwise unknown supports to self-select and join the campaign.

Parties use this self-selection to narrow the voter pool and prioritize and/or segment caller and mailing lists for traditional solicitation activities. In practice, this means digital exposure through marketing activities augments the traditional research process to figure out who a party should and should not contact directly.

The modern Canadian political party has adapted to the digital age by creating more flexible databases that merge online and offline support. This melding of tactics has created a continuous campaign cycle that culminates at election time instead of beginning.

When the writ drops and parties November 2018

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Fundraising are able to spend meaningfully on marketing, all of the tracking and lead generation activity they have done prior to the actual campaign allows them to operate with unprecedented efficiency.

As we turn our attention to the 2019 federal election race, we will see smarter and more targeted political parties who prioritize efficient acquisition above all else.

We will also see greater innovation and the result of drastic changes in how parties operate come to light.

Here are four key developments you can expect to see all four major political parties doing today in preparation for the 2019 election: 1. Anchoring in digital basics.

Each political party will no doubt attempt to pursue at least one or two “innovative” new tactics. They need to try new things in order to evolve.

However, at the end of the day, you should expect to see impeccably executed lead gen ads (social and native) coupled with targeted landing pages and automated e-mail marketing programmes dominate the bulk of acquisition strategy.

Expect also for parties to use Facebook and its tools to their fullest extent. Facebook is an oasis for political marketers because so much of the electorate lives there and products like lead ads and lookalike audiences dramatically drive down exposure and acquisition costs. Cheaply acquiring support improves overall cost per acquisition and cost per dollar revenue metrics.

Larger audiences make it easier for teams to get their message out and verify they are reaching

the audiences they need to win over in order to fare well on election day.

2. 1:1 messaging + Messenger ads. Emergent platforms and services like Hustle are changing the game for political parties.

Dubbed former U.S. Democratic party presidential candidate Bernie Sanders’ “secret weapon”, 1:1 SMS/text platforms enable supporters to engage other supporters with prescribed asks and encourage greater political participation. This creates more authentic engagement in a structured manner that aligns with parties’ broader strategies.

Messaging is king and you can expect to see parties take greater advantage of Messenger ads, artificial intelligence (AI) chatbots and real-time response across social channels as ways to convince and convert potential supporters.

3. Building social and socially augmented databases.

Political parties are building and integrating sophisticated social listening and data scraping capabilities to bring in social data into traditional databases.

Platforms like NationBuilder have risen in political circles because they empower campaigns to supplement lead scores with social media and e-mail marketing engagement.

Parties are using social media to target and acquire individual supporters at the micro level while simultaneously developing a greater understanding of trends and preferences at a macro level to influence traditional direct marketing tactics.

Sophisticated parties are going

beyond this by working with data agencies to use information generated to create even more sophisticated voter archetypes and targeting profiles, which feed into offline tactics like calling, direct mail and even door knocking strategies.

“Closing the gap” between online and offline strategies is paramount to success, including driving the financial viability of campaigns that need to generate fundraising dollars to support larger digital video and television buys in the final weeks of the election.

4. Micro-targeting and microinfluencing. Adaptive targeting is a pillar of success for modern political parties.

Winning campaigns know their audience(s) and masterfully test and measure messaging against them. We can expect to see a continuation of this trend with even greater importance placed on issue targeting as a way to keep specific individual voters engaged.

Expect custom direct mail, targeted voice endorsements and segmented e-mail campaigns to bombard mailboxes and inboxes across the country with unprecedented volume and sophistication.

Parties know that reaching people is not enough. They must reach individuals on specific issues that matter to them in order to win the vote, turn supporters into donors and “get out the vote” on election day.

Micro-influencing will enhance this in the 2019 election cycle. Expect to see micro influencers endorsing

parties and those endorsements filtering their way through a plethora of direct marketing products to solidify support and get supporters to donate, volunteer and commit to vote.

Final thoughts The 2019 federal election won’t feel fundamentally different from elections in the past and maybe that’s the point. Political parties have seamlessly enhanced “how” they go about prospecting, marketing and acquiring support.

The underlying strategies are enhanced and more sophisticated and new methods of marketing have emerged, but live alongside more traditional marketing tactics.

For the direct marketer with an interest in political strategy, the key is to watch how political parties blend traditional and digital tactics to create a more cohesive and targeted strategy, which centered around the individual. Arguably the largest shift will be the continued gravitation toward more measured and cost-efficient direct marketing approaches at the expense of more traditional awareness and volume advertising.

Michael Edwards is the digital and creative director at Sussex Strategy Group (www.sussex-strategy.com), a Canadian government relations and public affairs agency. He is an experienced campaign practitioner and his campaigns have won awards in Canada and the U.S. Michael is also an adjunct-professor at Seneca College, teaching a course on digital government relations. He is an active member of the Canadian Marketing Association (www.the-cma.org).

Michael can be reached by e-mail at medwards@sussexadrenaline.com.

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November 2018

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Are Canadians less charitable?

By Anja Bundze

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ow charitable are we?

As one of the biggest seasons for charitable asks and donations approach, NLogic started to wonder what the overall Canadian donor market looked like and who these charitable Canadians were. So we looked at our latest RTS survey of over 40,000 Canadians and the accompanying chart portrays the answers.

Are Canadians more giving than they claim?

According to NLogic’s RTS survey, 72% of Canadians said they made a monetary donation to a charity in the past year; 35% of adults said they donated more than $100 per year. Based on Canada Helps’ The Giving Report 2017, only 33% of Canadians actually claimed a donation on their taxes, which is down 3% from 20101.

Are Canadians not donating as much as they say or are they just not claiming all of it? Our guess is that it’s probably a little of both and the actual percentage of Canadians that made a monetary donation is somewhere in between.

The report also cited an overall annual decrease in donations of approximately 3% over the past three years from higher income families2. Why is that? According to The Insurance & Investment Journal, Canadians are less charitable and being more conservative with their money compared to ten years ago for the following reasons: ❯❯ Volatile markets; ❯❯ A slow growth economy; and ❯❯ High debt levels3.

Looking at NLogic’s survey results, Canadians 65-plus continue to be the most charitable, with 56% of them regularly or occasionally participating in volunteering work compared to 47% for all adults. This older age bracket also provides the largest ❱ DMN.ca

average charitable donations of approximately $243.

How competitive is the market?

Chimp Technology recently reported that there are over 86,000 registered charities in Canada with at least as many unregistered charities competing for Canadians’ dollars. With overall low barriers to entry and decreasing support for social programmes from the government, more charities are popping up giving Canadians much more choice about where to donate their time and money4.

Combined with greater scrutiny, charities need to work that much harder for every donor dollar. But how can these charities continue to get noticed? Based on NLogic’s commercial tracking data, there has been a 26% drop in TV advertising by charities in the past year along with a decline in overall public service announcements (PSAs). Have they moved to social and online?

Perhaps. But wherever Canadian charities are, they need to recognize that as the competition continues to grow the funding pool doesn’t seem to be keeping pace, and finding creative, cost-efficient means to increase donations and donors will be critical.

Anja Bundze is director, marketing, NLogic

(www.nlogic.ca). Prior to joining NLogic Anja spent over 10 years at a boutique advertising agency where she led the strategic development and communication planning of several national multi-media campaigns for B2B and B2C clients. Anja joined NLogic in 2014 to head up their newly created marketing department, where she has managed everything from their rebranding initiative and product launches to social campaigns and ongoing client communication.

1 CanadaHelps.org, “The Giving Report 2017”, November 9, 2017.

2 The Giving Report 2017, ibid.

3 Andrew Rickard, “Canadians less generous than they were ten years ago”, The Insurance & Investment Journal, October 13, 2016.

4 Lisa Manfield, Chimp Technology, “Canada’s Charitable Sector Is Growing, But It Needs More Support”, blog.

November 2018

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Can smaller NFPs compete with foundations?

By Jason Egbuna

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he not-forprofit (NFP) landscape continues to change, and one of the growing focal points is the growth of corporate foundations. As NFPs work to obtain valuable donor dollars, they know that they are in competition with corporate foundations that typically have more resources at their disposal and brands that are easily recognizable.

So, the question begs to be asked, within this changing landscape are there additional factors contributing to an imbalance? Are these organizations becoming more similar every day? Are there changes to regulations or legislation that affect how NFPs and corporate foundations are running their businesses?

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Politics playing larger role?

The one legal factor that might come into any Canadian fundraiser’s mind is the recent precedent set by the Ontario Superior Court of Justice, in the Canada Without Poverty v. Attorney General of Canada case.

In this ruling, reported by TaxEd International it was decided that “…non-partisan political activities constitute charitable activities for the purposes of the Income Tax Act…provided that they are carried out in furtherance of an organization’s charitable purposes. Accordingly, a registered charity may devote significantly more than 10% of its resources to such activities, contrary to longstanding Canada Revenue Agency (CRA) policy.”1 With this legal ruling are politics

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going to start playing a bigger role in the NFP world?

I caught up with Landon French, formerly the president of Canadian Jumpstart Charities and who is now the president and CEO of Together We Stand (TWS) (www.twsfoundation.ca) TWS is an NFP founded by Rick and Lillian Ekstein to recognize, thank and pay tribute to Canadian military families during the holiday season.

The last time I spoke with Landon we discussed corporate foundations and how Jumpstart operated as one of the Canadian leaders in its area. His new challenge with TWS presents a perfect opportunity to gain insights into how both sides of the NFP world view some of the same issues: through a different lens.

When I asked Landon about the biggest difference between moving from Jumpstart to TWS, without hesitation he said “resources.”

While TWS has been generously supported by the Eksteins, has corporate sponsors and an honorary council featuring highprofile Canadians, the fundraising machine cannot be compared to Jumpstart, which has corporate ties to Canadian Tire. As he puts it, TWS is trying to keep their organization small in order to get the most “bang out of their buck”.

With the structure being completely different between the two organizations, I asked whether there were any parallels.

Did their strong connections to Canadian roots and Canadian families provide any similarities?

Landon advised that the essential principles are the same in that they want to be completely transparent and accountable to their donors. He also noted that it was important to understand the legislation around NFPs and how to effectively operate within the governing rules.

As governance came up in the discussion, we shifted the conversation towards the changing political landscape. With a new

provincial government in Ontario, I wondered if Landon foresaw any impact for TWS or any corporate NFPs. While he stayed clear of talking about recent changes at Queen’s Park, he said that he didn’t really see any sort of impact on the horizon, that it would pretty much be business as usual, especially since they are federally regulated for tax purposes.

Landon was careful to mention that, while he essentially operates as a one-man-show, the organization relies on legal experts regarding that side of the business.

But he takes the overall stance that if Ontario gets stronger, that can only be a good thing for TWS and its donors.

I asked Landon for his insights on how the Canada Without Poverty v. Attorney General of Canada ruling might affect charities in general and whether he sees it having any impact on TWS and its current or future work. Once again, the political landscape did not seem to be a big concern for Landon, stating that he had “…not been following it that closely as [they] are not in the business of political activities.”

Donors wanting to make a difference As we moved away from politics, I asked Landon what changes, if any, he saw corporate NFPs having to make in order to remain as successful as they have been in the Canadian landscape. His vision of the future was insightful and optimistic. He continues to see people make an impact on issues with deeper causes and he thinks that donors will really start to focus on smaller areas where they can have more of an impact and make more of a difference. He says that there will be a continued, if not more narrow focus on the cause and benefit of where people are giving, once again focusing on overall impact.

So, in moving from a large Continued on page 21 November 2018

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Fundraising

Integrating offline and online channels How to improve donor acquisition and renewal

By Liz Attfield

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or many years Canadian non-profit organizations have been facing declining performance in direct mail acquisition. The reasons are multifaceted. They include the aging of the typical direct mail donor, list fatigue and sometimes stale creative.

Charities have also had to deal with increased costs on all fronts, including steadily increasing postal rates.

All of these factors have led to many charities de-investing in direct mail acquisition, which inevitably leads to shrinking donor files as attrition takes its toll when replacement donors cannot be found in sufficient quantities.

Going beyond direct mail Some charities have been experimenting with channels beyond direct mail in their quest to find new donors. But methods like digital advertising and e-mail campaigns have often proven disappointing because even if new donors are found through them organizations are finding it extremely difficult to renew these donors through those same channels.

We have started to see a new trend emerging: charities are beginning to see that integrating appeals across several (even all) channels is leading to increased performance in acquisition and retention.

We have long known that a significant number of prospects who receive direct mail appeals are choosing to respond not through the traditional means of reply envelopes but rather by going online to make donations using their credit cards. In fact, our experience shows that as many as 20% of online gifts can be traced to a direct mail appeal received by those donors.

This phenomenon often leads to two different erroneous conclusions. First, response to November 2018

direct mail appeals is often underreported. Second, online gifts are assigned to some catch-all online appeal category, ignoring the fact that they were prompted by a direct mail appeal.

The leads have said that they care, so the telefundraisers offer them the opportunity to really show it by committing to monthly support.

On the other hand, we are beginning to see that even

Let’s face it: our grandparents are embracing digital technologies in increasing numbers.

Perhaps the latter also explains why online donors are often difficult to renew: we aren’t speaking to them through the most effective channel. Keep in mind though that accurately attributing gifts to the activity that prompted them is one of the biggest technical challenges facing charities that want to integrate their appeals.

traditional direct mail can be strengthened by adding e-mail communications, both alongside the appeals themselves but also as an important and cost-effective channel for stewardship.

Let’s face it: our grandmothers and grandfathers are embracing digital technologies in increasing numbers. What’s important is that the messaging they see in the e-mail and online should match that of the direct mail pieces they are still responding to. Too often, charities have allowed their online and offline activities to operate in silos. This is no longer acceptable if charities want to really harness the power of integration to meet (and surpass) their fundraising objectives.

Liz Attfield is vice president, strategic services with Stephen Thomas Ltd. (www.stephenthomas.ca), a full-service agency specializing in providing branding, marketing and fundraising services to the non-profit sector.

How integration can work Charities that are committing to integrating their messaging and brand expressions across multiple channels are finding that the different channels can reinforce each other.

For instance, some organizations are experimenting with digital ads on social media platforms, mostly Facebook and Instagram.

At first, these platforms yielded disappointing results, but now charities have begun to take a more patient approach: not asking for money directly but seeking “hand-raisers” instead. These are people who click through the ads and indicate that they support the charity’s cause by completing a form that includes their name, e-mail address and telephone number.

By doing so, they invite the charity to re-contact them through either channel, i.e. By e-mail or telephone.

Charities are also finding encouraging success at contacting these warm leads via telephone with a monthly giving proposition.

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Content is Queen in engaging high value donors!

By Kimberley Blease

O

f all of the insights we have gathered on high value donors over the last 20 years, the most important is this: if you want people to do more with your organization, YOU have to do more. One of the ways you can accomplish this is by creating great content.

Everyone in the not-forprofit sector aims to build real relationships with their donors, as opposed to transactional ones.

They want donors to feel that they are playing key roles in the organizations’ missions and are making a difference, as opposed to just being people who give money. Fostering this relationship is especially important with high-value donors who give more than average and are actively engaged with the organizations year after year.

Delivering engaging communications, stewardship and solicitations is a combination of great strategy and integrated channel use, as well as targeted and inspirational messages. But what role does content play in bringing all of this to life?

Your content is unique to you: which makes it special. And makes it royalty amongst marketing methods. It is an accumulation of the stories, the images and the information that makes your organization what it is. It expresses and supports the “WHY”: the most important element in not-forprofit communications. Why you?

Why now? How are you different? ❱ DMN.ca

Competition in the not-forprofit sector is intense and other charities are fighting for market share and working just as hard as you are to “find their people”. With charitable contribution remaining relatively flat here in Canada, in order to grow you either need to earn more share of donor dollars or create completely new ones.

Luckily for you content can help you achieve both!

What makes great content?

Great content is about rich information, amazing storytelling and making use of video and photography to make your message expressive and meaningful. We encourage organizations to get serious about content collection and management. When you have built a great roster of content, these assets can be shared and repurposed between all areas of the organization. Focus specifically on assets that come from major gift proposals, marketing and communications, annual reports and newsletters. Why do you ask?

Simply because they are the key drivers in donor support.

One important thing to remember in building content, as my friend Derek Humphries recently reminded us at the Ireland Summer School Conference: people are not content. People are stakeholders, beneficiaries, patients, students, care providers and survivors. They are not faceless: they are the people or families with stories and with lives that have been impacted by your organizations or your cause. You

are the curator and the keepers of these stories, so handle them with respect and care.

One of the most wonderful parts of building an amazing experience for high-value donors is your ability to offer more content to them in the form of behind-thescenes or insider information. The full story, so to speak. We have never used content more than we are right now to offer donors more information that will bring them closer to the cause, inspire them to give again or donate more through formal leadership programmes.

What we have done is taken all of the important lessons that we have learned in major gift fundraising and applied them to donors who are high value in our annual programmes. We call this “the trifecta” and it includes monthly donors who care enough about us to give every month and often sustain that giving for seven plus years, mid-level donors who are giving and investing much more than the average and of course, our legacy donors and prospects. These are people who really love us and care deeply for our causes.

All of these donors deserve the very best we have in content and storytelling. It is important that roll out the red carpet for them in the information we share and enrich their donor experiences.

When this happens, they respond in spades.

Executing on “big content” Creating and marketing with “big content” is not for the faint of heart! These videos, e-mails, direct

mail packages and stewardship engagement pieces take work and investment in time to collect, curate, build and share them.

But finding great stories and content should not be a challenge every time you want to build a communications piece. If it is, you need to focus more resources on building a story and content bank.

And you need to go above and beyond in the collection of this content. Plan for it to be used in multiple ways from the outset.

The great news is that investing in content is helping to differentiate the organizations that are making it happen and inspiring donors like never before.

We are seeing it in average gifts, in cumulative giving, in lifetime giving and in overall revenue growth in these key areas. In other words, we are seeing real results!

In short, people love great big content! They are often surprised by the depth of the content and they are excited about the journey and the experience that it provides.

They feel important when an organization cares enough to provide the right stories, rich information and amazing videos and pictures that allow them to connect on another level. That’s the power of great content: and that’s why it’s key in delivering a real, high-value donor experience!

Kimberley Blease is executive vice president and donor journey champion at Blakely (www.blakelyjourney.com). She has a specialization in the areas of health care and mid-value giving and leads the legacy marketing team for Blakely.

November 2018

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Truly touching the donor The benefits of blending digital and mail personalization

By Steve Falk

P

ersonalization is back on the agenda.

I’m not talking about cold, hard data-driven strategies, but rather the touches that make

the experience of relating to an organization as personal, trusting and genuine as possible: despite digital interfaces and algorithms that automate interactions.

Like driving in today’s vehicles.

Have you gotten into a car lately that knows who you are from the key fob you carry? It then adjusts the seat height and angle and steering wheel to suit you perfectly! If all cars don’t do this soon, will we feel unwelcome?

Looking at existing practices The other day I checked into a hotel and there was a message on the glowing TV screen when I entered the room that said: “Steve Falk, welcome to the ___Hotel. We hope you enjoy your stay.”

Nice touch or, is that the kind of stuff that is cute, but maybe becoming a bit too overt, common and underwhelming on the personalization front?

I’ve been underwhelmed before.

I once helped someone direct a $10,000 in-memoriam gift to an organization that forgot to thank the donor in any way.

That interaction was way underpersonalized in the extreme.

But let’s assume that you have the basic principle of gratitude and thanks in hand. Your approach to personalization is still a moving target. Just as you settle in on a strategy new technologies and expectations appear that can suddenly make it the wrong approach.

There’s nothing more fundamental to the fundraising sector, based upon the act of giving, than a good approach to expressing gratitude. So maybe it’s

❱ DMN.ca

time to have a look at how you are doing that. Maybe what worked last year is not keeping up with current expectations and trends.

Should you be reaching out with social handles, SMS/text and phone calls with video embedded (yes, they can even personalize a video now) in an e-mail? There’s also the question of when a full onboarding package is appropriate and what it includes. And, at what levels and frequency do you do take each of these steps?

Our personal experience with giving We suffered a family tragedy a few years ago. My sister’s 18-year-old son, Ben Kuyt, died suddenly from a brain aneurysm while attending Nipissing University in North Bay, Ontario.

Ben was really enjoying university at Nipissing and he’d won a few awards for his good humoured and generous participation in campus life.

Among the many ways that Ben gave back at school, we learned, was his tradition of taking a group of foreign students into Algonquin Park, where he loved to canoe and camp. He wanted them to get a taste of northern Canada during their short stay here.

To continue that legacy The Ben Kuyt Algonquin Experience Fund was started with the help of the Continued on page 21 November 2018

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The Big Shift

The old brand-building model is dead. A next generation planning model must start with what the customer wants: and that will take a big shift to get right.

By Stephen Shaw

“Because I think it may be of some help to you in putting through our recommendation for additional men for the Promotion Department I am outlining briefly below the duties of the brand men.”

N. H. McElroy May 13th, 1931

H

is three-page memo became legendary. It ignited a revolution in marketing that changed the way brands were managed. Written by a junior Proctor & Gamble (P&G) promotion manager by the name of Neil McElroy, the memo drew attention to the lack of corporate support for products other than its flagship brand Ivory.

McElroy proposed a new organizational model that would put dedicated marketing teams in charge of each brand, which he referred to as “brand men”.

His recommendation gave birth to brand management.

And it helped P&G become the heavyweight champion in consumer goods manufacturing.

The P&G formula for brand domination: “Find out what consumers want and give it to them”. P&G also pioneered the heavy use of mass media— initially, radio “soap” operas, later daytime TV commercials—to make its brands instantly recognizable household names.

Most companies eventually adopted most elements of the P&G planning model: 1. Start by segmenting markets according to demographics, attitudes or usage.

2. Find a product solution for a latent or niche consumer need, identified through market research.

3. Differentiate the new product through brand positioning.

4. Build top-of-funnel market awareness through mass media campaigns.

November 2018

The marketing planning model behind that process has remained largely the same ever since. As Forrester Research points out in a recent report, “Despite the drumbeat of inexorable change, marketing planning remains stubbornly old school. Most approaches to planning were created in and for a different age; they linger as a vestige of TV and paid media1.”

Mark Pritchard, the chief brand officer for Proctor & Gamble, apparently agrees. Speaking at Cannes this past June, he stated, “Mass disruption is the biggest challenge facing the marketing industry today”, warning that “Brands must completely reinvent in order to survive.” Looking to the future, he said, “We’re reinventing marketing to be a force for good and a force for growth.”

Why has P&G suddenly become an advocate of marketing transformation? Mainly due to time-starved connected consumers with negligible attention spans who have zero tolerance for commercial interruptions. In short, wasted ad dollars.

P&G is now determined to shift from “mass blast” to “one-to-one marketing”, effectively ending the “Mad Men” era.

“This new transition to one-toone marketing is going to be a big shift”, Pritchard admitted. A big shift because no one—not even P&G—has figured out what a next generation planning model looks like.

Keeping up with the Joneses When McElroy wrote his memo, companies worried mostly about getting the distribution channel to carry their products. At the time, marketing was a lower echelon function, doing the bidding of sales. Looking after advertising was its main function.

But as brand management gained broader acceptance, marketing grew in stature and credibility, especially in the

immediate post-war period, when a pent-up demand for consumer goods was unleashed through mass advertising. For better or worse, marketing served as an unwitting agent of social change: “Buy now, pay later” became a way of life. A burgeoning middle class, feeling affluent, buoyant and acquisitive took advantage of easy credit to live the dream or at least the dream as portrayed by advertisers: a big house in the suburbs, a fancy car and the latest material comforts. Brand advertising made “Keeping up with the Joneses” a social norm: “conspicuous consumption” a sign of social status.

As consumer product demand accelerated, the purview of marketing expanded. Brand marketers took the lead in identifying target markets, working out pricing tactics, figuring out channel strategy, estimating product demand and streamlining the flow of goods from production lines to the distribution network.

Proven methods and practices were codified in academic literature, marked by the publication of books such as Jerome McCarthy’s Basic Marketing: A Managerial Approach in 1960 which introduced the concept of the 4Ps, and Philip Kotler’s Marketing Management: Analysis, Planning and Control, published in 1967, which stressed the importance of creating “pull”

demand. By the end of the 1960s the elements of the classical marketing model were pretty much in place, and they remained that way through the next decade or so.

The rise of CRM By the late 1980s, however, that model was showing signs of wear and tear. For one thing, there was a growing infatuation with addressable media, in part because PC-based technology made it affordable to reach customers directly through mail and outbound calling. Up until that time database marketing was limited to continuity publishers and catalogue companies whose direct-to-consumer model justified the higher media cost-per-order.

With the rise of personalization technology, marked by the arrival of high-volume imaging systems powered by new relational databases, data-driven marketing became popular with banks, credit card marketers, retailers, the gaming business and every other industry that could link purchase transactions to customers.

Around this same time the rapid spread of cable TV had drawn audiences away from the broadcast networks. Mass media was beginning to lose its appeal.

An increasing share of the A&P (advertising and promotion) budget began to seep “below the line” into direct marketing. As media fragmentation intensified, the idea of “integrated marketing” DMN.ca ❰

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Feature

came into vogue, promising to optimize the media mix according to relative sales contribution.

When CRM systems first appeared in the early 1990s, it became that much easier to collect customer data through sales and service applications. Suddenly marketers everywhere were armed with the newfound capability to target customers more precisely, knowing where they lived, what they liked to buy, how often they bought and their sociodemographic profiles, extracted from large compiled consumer databases. As companies began to recognize the disproportionate value of repeat customers, thanks to customer information systems, the concept of relationship marketing gradually evolved into a management ethos.

A visible beacon Just as all this was going on there was a powerful reform movement taking place in the parallel universe of branding.

Up until the 1990s branding was strictly a creative exercise, used to distinguish one product from another: a name, a logo, a tagline, a value proposition, a “how are we different” statement.

But there was a growing realization that a brand was much more than the public face of a product: it had inherent equity, a value that went far beyond the sales numbers. There was stored value in the ability of a brand to command a price premium—in the current and future loyalty of its customers—in the consumer confidence it evoked and in its cultural impact. A brand could, in fact, assume a master identity ❱ DMN.ca

which symbolized the vision and values of the company.

Brand building was critical, not just because it created product awareness, but because it was the key to business coherence. Without a strong master brand identity, a business could easily stray off path, unsure of why it mattered to anyone. Branding became a way to create an intangible asset worth far more than the balance sheet or share price might suggest: a visible beacon for the business.

The end of “business as usual” Apart from the emergence of customer databases in the 1990s, and fresh thinking around the meaning of a brand, marketing orthodoxy had not yet been seriously challenged. That began to change in the early dotcom years (1994-2001) when the seeds of marketing anarchy were laid.

As a first wave of opportunists sought to commercialize the Internet, every business began scrambling to put up a web site or launch an e-commerce storefront.

By the end of the 1990s the “digerati” had begun to promote the revolutionary potential of the medium, exuberantly declaring an end to “business as usual”.

The Web was not just another channel to sell stuff, they preached, “it is a place where we humans get to talk with one another in our own voices about what matters to us” wrote Rick Levine, Christopher Locke, Doc Searls, and David Weinberger in The Cluetrain Manifesto.

As web design evolved from static to dynamic page building through the early 2000s, the idea of a true “market conversation”

became feasible. The rapid spread of social networking sites, blogs, review sites and user forums set in motion a dramatic shift in power from brands to a savvier consumer population. The abruptness of this change left most marketers frozen in time, their web sites still resembling “brochureware”. It also stifled their creative use of social media: a branded Facebook page became a sanitized bulletin board instead of a vibrant community for brand fans.

As the realization sunk in that this “social web” had snatched control of the brand away from them, marketers began to favour the concept of customer management as the most viable way to build long-term relationships.

Traditional transaction-based loyalty programmes were flimsy “barriers to exit”, creating a false sense of security. What was more important was creating an emotional connection to the brand. Something that would give customers a reason to believe in the brand beyond the product.

Instead of pumping up the volume on paid media, brands needed to grow through “word of mouth” (earned media), capitalizing on the goodwill and advocacy of existing customers. The goal was to build customer equity—a predictable stream of assured revenue based on securing the brand commitment of customers—also known as lifetime value, a financial formula cribbed from direct marketing. The epitome of commitment: a willingness to buy regardless of enticements to switch.

The mobile revolution The arrival of the iPhone in 2007 changed the digital landscape dramatically, igniting the mobile revolution. Many people were now

living digital lives. Time spent on the Internet began to eclipse TV viewing. The path to purchase became asymmetrical. The buying funnel was no longer recognizable: more like a maze, resistant to “shock and awe” campaigning.

Where do you aim your media artillery when your target population is spread out everywhere? Battling over share of voice was no longer a sensible strategy, or very affordable. Not when the “voice of the customer” trumped brand messaging.

As mass audiences began to drift away from print publications and “appointment” TV viewing, opting instead for streaming video and social media feeds as their sources of content and entertainment, budgets began to “follow the money” online. They went to where customers were now spending most of their screen time, much of it on their phones, texting and scrolling.

Brands were suddenly naked, no longer able to hide behind their “advertised specials” in the face of price transparency. And just being “good enough” sentenced a brand to market anonymity, making it a low-cost supplier. To just get noticed, never mind encroach on people’s time, brands needed to find natural entry points into their lives: compelling reasons to initiate the conversations. Simply talking about the functional benefits merely earned a brand the right to be considered, not short-listed.

True engagement meant giving people a sense of belonging to something bigger than themselves: becoming integral to their lives in some way, culturally, socially or functionally. And that meant marketers had to define a clear brand purpose—a reason for existence beyond making a

November 2018

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Feature profit—fully aligned with the worldview of their core customers.

The marketing turning point Marketing is finally at a turning point, in desperate need of a “one to one” planning model.

While digital transformation is deservedly at the top of the change management agenda, simply because of a growing mismatch between people’s expectations and their actual online experience, marketers know it will take more than digital technology to make a difference.

The new competitive battleground is experience design: that is, making it as easy as possible for customers to interact across all channels, giving them what they need, at the time they need it, in the context of the moment. The catch, of course, is that there are so many more ways for people to connect today, using their PCs, tablets, smartphones, home appliances and now even their digital watches. Designing a unified experience—never mind a memorable one—puts huge stress on the internal workings of companies which remain siloed in their thinking, slow to pull together a single view of the customer, held back by the glacial pace at which IT moves and suffering from an obsession with quarterly returns.

The front end of marketing planning—namely, segment identification, value proposition development, product innovation, demand forecasting—will always remain the strategic pistons that keep the production lines rolling.

But the “go to market” end of marketing, from brand identity development to advertising and promotion to communications planning, is crying out for reinvention.

Today people are more resistant to advertising than ever—more likely to buy on the advice of their social circles—more knowledgeable about their options —and insistent on a fair value exchange. The shopping malls are empty for a reason: people can find what they want instantly, starting with a Google or Amazon search and they are conditioned to expect delivery the next day. Latency has been stripped almost completely from the buying journey.

November 2018

Competing online has become a slugging match. Brands need to escape the gladiator ring and find a higher order expression of the value they create.

Value creation is at the heart of the new marketing model, along with having a distinct social purpose. Nike’s bold new rallying cry, “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything” is an inspirational lesson for brand marketers everywhere: take a stand – in order to stand out. People prefer brands which have an authentic

at the top of the Net Promoter Score leaderboard. That reservoir of customer goodwill—earned by keeping promises, not making them—is far more sustainable than advertising can ever hope to achieve.

The old marketing model rarely thought about what happened after the sale. Marketing always figured their job was done at the sound of the cash register.

Yet Amazon would never have succeeded if Amazon’s Jeff Bezos treated his first orders as just

credo. Social activism is now a tie-breaker. If a brand is truly close to its customers and understands their values—as Nike does with the Millennials, as Patagonia with its outdoor enthusiasts, as Unilever with the women who buy their beauty products, as USAA with its military members—there is almost no downside to embarking on a social crusade. People today distrust corporate double-speak. They are troubled by corporations dodging their societal responsibilities (witness the rise of the “gig economy”) which is why brand trust has become the purest test of reputational strength. Marketing must lead the way in “humanizing” the corporation by making the wellbeing of customers (and society in general) a prime directive, as Philip Kotler, the “Father of Modern Marketing”, urges.

orders. He was creating lifetime customers. And that was his vision way back in 1994 when he started the company.

Getting the customer experience right in an omnichannel world is hard work. It takes a commitment to eliminate the pain points. To rewire processes. To understand what customers want and how they feel each step of the buying journey. It takes attention to detail. And a willingness to break down operational barriers.

That job belongs to marketing, not customer service. Because marketing should be solely responsible for managing the endto-end relationship. Otherwise no one is ever fully accountable.

For that reason, the new marketing model must be organized around the successive stages of the customer lifecycle, from initial discovery and exploration to continuous engagement. Repeat customers are won or lost by the degree of attention they receive over time. No matter where and when an interaction occurs, the experience should be seamless,

Road to reinvention According to Forrester Research, “customer-obsessed” companies have the highest revenue growth, the highest customer satisfaction and the highest employee satisfaction2. They’re

personalized and relevant. By never confusing messaging with conversations—by delivering value with every interaction, by providing personalized treatment based on relationship history and by complying with the wishes of customers—brands can create an experience customer will want to talk about and share.

Finally, the old marketing model was never truly rooted in an understanding of customers because it lacked the tools to make insight a proprietary advantage. Marketers are playing catch-up today, trying to connect their engagement platforms with systems of insight. Giving customers a compelling reason to reveal their true selves—to share their aspirations and goals, to talk about what matters to them—is the first step on the road to reinvention. It becomes the start of a reciprocal relationship where the conversation is enriched by knowledge of prior interactions and not guesswork. Where customers never have to re-introduce themselves, never have to endure advertising messages masquerading as content, never have to “unsubscribe” in order to escape a promotional barrage and never have to scale a wall of apathy in order to get a compliant resolved. Done right, a reciprocal relationship encourages an unfiltered conversation ripe with possibilities. Marketers just need to tattoo themselves with a single motto: “Always Do the Right Thing”.

The biggest marketing challenge today is not coping with channel complexity: It is the shift in mindset from the brand as the focus of strategic attention to putting the customer at the centre.

A new planning model organized around the customer lifecycle is the answer. But getting that right will take much more than a simple three-page memo.

Stephen Shaw is the chief strategy officer of Kenna, a marketing solutions provider specializing in customer experience management. He can be reached via e-mail at sshaw@kenna.ca.

1 Joe Stanhope, “Forget Everything You Think You Know About Marketing Planning”, Forrester Research, blog, September 10, 2018.

2 Keith Johnston, Sharyn Leaver et al. “The CustomerObsessed Enterprise”, Forrester Research, report, June 25, 2018.

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Payments Processing

Enabling e-commerce with digital payments Smaller Canadian companies may be missing out

By Paul Parisi

E

-commerce plays a key role in today’s highly digital and highly global marketplace. The opportunity to grow one’s business through digital solutions, tapping consumers and business decisionmakers who are buying products and services online, is vast.

Today 80% of Canadians shop online1. According to PayPal Canada’s 2017 SMB Landscape Study, businesses that do sell their goods or services through e-commerce make on average $175,000 or more in annual revenue than their offline counterparts. Yet the same study found that only 17% per cent of Canadian businesses sell their products on services online2.

Consequently, Canadian small midsized businesses (SMBs) continue to lose out on revenue to competitors. That’s particularly disheartening considering that retail e-commerce sales in Canada will reach approximately CDN $57 billion in 20183, with spending going to businesses in the United States or overseas.

Other countries have recognized the potential of e-commerce driving SMB sales that ultimately boosts their economy. According to a FedEx study, Global is the New Local: The Changing International Trade Patterns of Small Businesses in Asia Pacific, in the Philippines eight in ten businesses use e-commerce platforms, which accounts for 52% of their revenues and includes $1.4 billion bought by foreign buyers. Meanwhile 20% of China’s retail sales happen online4. In comparison, only 3% of Canada’s retail sales happen online5.

Moving to e-commerce But it’s not too late. Now is the time for Canadian SMBs to embrace e-commerce. E-commerce involves accepting online digital payments and using payment solutions providers to process them, but ❱ DMN.ca

also includes the full customer experience and fulfillment of the product or service. Digital payments acceptance can make a material difference for organizations as it helps them reach customers domestically and globally who prefer the convenience of transacting online or through mobile devices.

The prospect of moving to an online digital payments system for many SMBs can seem daunting, though it needn’t be.

Choosing a payment processor is a big decision, so it’s important to research carefully and look for a solution and provider that can meet volume demands, technical needs and budget.

Avoiding common pitfalls To maximize the return on investment, there are several common mistakes businesses must avoid when choosing payment solution providers.

1. Don’t assuming “lowest rate” means “lowest overall cost”.

While considering various payment options remember that “the lowest rate” does not necessarily translate to the lowest overall cost. Read the fine print, as certain payment options come with hidden fees, including everything from cancellation and withdrawal costs to batch-processing and payment card industry compliance fees. Businesses must do their due diligence when evaluating providers. Ask about contract terms and termination fees as well as monthly costs, processing limits and minimums and any other expenses.

2. Not giving customers a full range of payment options.

Today’s customers expect more options than ever, and not just in products and services. They expect to be able to pay online with a range of options, and if your payment processor imposes limits on what you can accept,

you might see an increase in abandoned shopping carts on your site. Another PayPal study showed that 25% of online customers abandoned their transactions because a site didn’t offer their preferred payment option6.

3. Ignoring security and fraud protection. Data breaches have hit retailers large and small, and customers now demand the best protection possible to lower their risks of card fraud.

As you evaluate vendors, look for a payment gateway that’s backed by a secure and reliable payment processor and for a vendor that offer services to help you proactively prevent fraud.

They both can help protect your customers and your business.

4. Going DIY (do it yourself) with setup and support.

Setting up multiple payment options can take a lot of time and effort if you’re not well versed in payment gateways and online checkout details. Finding a payment card processor that can

deliver easy setup along with your account and backing that up with technical support is crucial.

Every moment of downtime potentially lowers sales. You need a processor that understands those challenges and can deliver round-the-clock support for payment-related problems.

Although searching for the right payments processor can seem like a big task, thorough research and knowledge of best practices can help you find the solution that fits your business and help you grow it through enabling productive and profitable e-commerce.

Paul Parisi is president of PayPal Canada.

1 Canada Post, “Get to know Canada’s booming e-commerce market”, December 12, 2016, web site.

2 PayPal, “Less than one in five Canadian SMBs accepts online payments”, May 9, 2017, web site.

3 eMarketer, “Ecommerce in Canada 2018: eMarketer’s Latest Forecast, with a Focus on Grocery”, report, January 25, 2018.

4 Benedict Brook, “Chinese giant’s warning to Australian retailers”, NewsMail, August 21, 2018.

5 Canadian Press, “E-commerce accounts for less than 3% of retail sales in Canada: StatCan”, Global News, December 21, 2017.

6 PayPal, “People are 54% More Willing to Buy When a Business Accepts PayPal” October 16, 2018, web site.

November 2018

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Payments Processing

Why merchants can ignore the cryptocurrency hype (for now)

By Nicolas Beique

B

itcoin and cryptocurrencies have been a hot topic lately. Often heralded as being the currency of the future, everyone from digital enthusiasts to casual investors describe cryptocurrencies as disrupters to the traditional banking system and that they will provide consumers with a radically new marketplace for transactions.

But this hype has not translated to a significant shift in how consumers want to pay for goods and services. Nor has it resulted in an increase in merchants, whether e-commerce and/or bricks-and-mortar, who are concerned about their ability to accept cryptocurrencies to keep customers happy.

Consumers and merchants not convinced As a payment provider that works with and responds to the market needs of thousands of merchants across North America, this indicates two things to us.

First, that merchants are not yet convinced that cryptocurrencies have been adopted on a wide enough scale to warrant the investment in being able to accept them. Second, that consumers do not yet have an expectation that they should be able to complete everyday transactions using cryptocurrencies.

Cryptocurrencies will probably have an impact on payment processing at some point in the future, but right now we can confidently say there is not enough demand to warrant taking on the added complexity and risk of accepting them. At this time, the inquiries we do receive regarding cryptocurrencies are Bitcoin exchanges that are looking for traditional payment processing for credit cards, so their customers can purchase cryptocurrency using Visa or MasterCard.

The adoption of cryptocurrencies will also be stalled until the federal government develops November 2018

guidance regulations for digital currencies. Currently Canada does not recognize cryptocurrencies as legal tender and it does not expect to have regulations in place until after the next federal election.

Why not crypto?

So why aren’t merchants asking for the ability to accept cryptocurrencies? Crypto seems to have a lot going for it: it’s a trendy currency, people are investing in it and professionals in the payment industry agree that crypto will disrupt the payment industry eventually.

Ultimately, aside from the lack of market demand which we’ve already discussed, there are just too many unknown variables related to accepting crypto that merchants currently do not feel comfortable taking on the risks associated with them.

Volatility. Currently, the crypto marketplace is quite volatile, which makes it difficult to establish a proper valuation for the currency in exchange for the goods that customers may want to purchase.

The market also has the tendency to fluctuate between exaggerated highs and lows, sometimes within the same day. This becomes problematic for a merchant because if they were to accept one price in the morning using, say, Bitcoin, and the currency were to drop in value dramatically before the end of the day, the merchant may not feel that they received a fair price for the goods that they sold.

Long processing times. Unlike credit card transactions, which are confirmed almost instantly, processing transactions using cryptocurrencies takes time.

Transaction times will vary depending on the currency used and the network that it is being processed on. Currently, settlement times take at a minimum several minutes, and in some cases up to 30 minutes or more if there is a high volume of Bitcoin transactions on the network.

It will take time for cryptocurrencies to improve their efficiency in this area to the point where they are comparable with Visa and MasterCard. Once you comprehend waiting 10 minutes for a simple transaction to process at a drive-thru, the problems become evident.

Security. Each payment type has different risks that merchants need to be aware of, which also applies to cryptocurrencies.

There have been multiple news stories of cryptocurrencies being hacked because they are traded on an unregulated marketplace with few options for recourse.

Those who are familiar with the cryptocurrency space may accept these risks and are more likely to know which steps to take to help protect themselves. However, merchants who are less familiar, or who haven’t dealt with cryptocurrencies before, may be less comfortable with taking on those risks.

Instability. Because cryptocurrencies are so new, the market has yet to establish which one will ultimately win over the marketplace. The changing popularity of the different coins, and the potential addition of new ones, add to the market fluctuations and volatility. Consumers and merchants alike also have little recourse if they encounter issues with their transactions.

Cryptocurrencies will still need some time to become more mature, and as a result, more stable before they become mainstream.

For now, the traditional payment methods of credit cards, debit cards

and even mobile wallets remain the primary ways consumers purchase goods and services from merchants. If and when the market begins to demand the acceptance of cryptocurrencies on a widespread scale, then merchants and their payment processors will respond accordingly. Until then, keep an eye on the market to see where it might be headed, but rest assured that despite all the hype, you’re not missing out on sales because you don’t currently accept cryptocurrencies.

Nicolas Beique is founder and CEO, Helcim (www.helcim.com). He is leading his team to deliver the next evolution of what merchants should expect from their payment processor.

Helcim is a payment processing company that lets businesses accept credit cards and run their entire merchant operations from a cloudbased, all-in-one merchant platform.

DMN.ca ❰

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Can smaller NFPs compete with foundations?

Continued from page 10

corporate NFP to a new traditional NFP, what’s next for Landon French and TWS? According to Landon, “so many things” as they are still very new. He believes that Canadian military families deserve recognition and physical and emotional breaks and TWS is exploring how they can help these families get through the holidays alone or with young children to raise. But in order to do this, he wisely says that they will “…

continue to listen to them to hear what they need” and from there, they’ll “see where Canada takes [them].”

Jason Egbuna is the manager, direct marketing,

leadership giving at The Princess Margaret Cancer Foundation. He has carved out a niche in healthcare fundraising. Jason is a member of the Canadian Marketing Association’s (www.the-cma.org ) Not-for-Profit Council.

1 Nicolas Simard and Taj Kudhail, Fasken, “Canada Without Poverty v. Attorney General of Canada”, analysis, TaxEd International, August 11, 2018.

Truly touching the donor Continued from page 14

Nipissing University advancement team. Thanks to the generosity of his friends and family, a new group of students from around the globe load in a bus and head into the forest in his memory each fall.

When I last gave, there was a Donate Online service, so I paid

with a credit card and received an instant form e-mail thanking me. It had a couple of small typos and was underwhelming in its formulaic approach. A bit like the hotel welcome.

I think we’ve lowered the bar when it comes to the automated

stuff. Maybe we are not expecting much so we don’t ask much of it.

But fortunately, my sister was also notified of each gift and she wrote a nice thank you note to me and everyone else who gave to that fund in memory of her son.

Connecting with donors via personalized cards Certainly not every organization can hand write a note to every donor, but the standard had been set for this one and it was consistent. The physical card certainly carries with it an impact that e-mail cannot replicate. Yes, it costs money. But maybe the benefits justify the costs in some cases. The cards often stay around the house for a few days, if not weeks, and maybe make the mantel or fridge for others to see. All the time they are building engagement with your donors and maybe with a wider audience.

With workflow automation, most donor software can trigger the thank you e-mails but now it’s also possible to trigger the printing and mailing of printed cards within hours of receiving gifts (full disclosure, it’s something my company does on behalf of organizations).

Bringing in more variables than

just first and last name and gift amount are also advisable. Like if you know they support dogs rather than cats, then use dog images.

Personalization is more powerful the more you know about your donors, so asking a few questions along the journey also helps build that profile.

Your personalization strategy should consider different bands of gift and the responses you’ll make i.e. $1-25 get A, $26-$50 get B, and so on. Timeliness is also so important, but not in the way you might expect. The instantaneous e-mail reply almost works against itself as it’s almost too timely.

Some organizations have even delayed their thank you e-mails by a few days to make them appear more personalized.

So, thank you [First Name] [Last Name], thanks for reading this missive about gratitude. I hope it inspires you to give regular and ongoing thought to the ways you personalize the experience of your donors.

Steve Falk is president of Prime Data, Inc.

(www.primedata.ca). He is also host of a bi-weekly YouTube Vlog called Growth A to Z Series.

// 22

Excellent Execution

The Heart & Stroke Lottery’s winning formula T

Sharon Brown is vice president, consulting services at Environics Analytics.

here aren’t many lotteries where everyone comes away feeling like a winner, but the Heart & Stroke Lottery has found a way. Even though this feel-good lottery operated by the Heart & Stroke Foundation has had great success in the past, the charity felt it could benefit from a new data-driven approach to target and engage past and present ticket buyers.

The Heart & Stroke Lottery, which is now in its 20th year, is one of the largest charity events of its kind in Ontario. Since its launch it has raised more than $242 million for heart and stroke research.

While the lottery’s one in two odds of winning is already a tempting proposition, the Heart & Stroke Foundation has long known that favourable odds aren’t the only thing driving sales. The challenge has been how to apply that knowledge to grow the lottery and keep ticket buyers coming back year after year.

Focusing on lapsed ticket buyers To address this fact, Heart & Stroke has been increasing its focus on using data and analytics to gain insights into who buys tickets and why they buy them.

The early work helped the charity find messages that would resonate with their target audience, explains Stephanie Warner, director at the Heart & Stroke Foundation who oversees the lottery. But the insights they had couldn’t predict which long lapsed buyers could be convinced to buy a ticket again nor where to acquire new buyers.

According to Heart & Stroke, the ability to re-activate long-lapsed buyers was an important factor in the overall success of the 2018 Lottery.

Winning back previous ticket buyers was a priority for the charity. With more than a million past ticket buyers in its database to appeal to, the charity needed a better way to identify these prospects in order to get the most out of their marketing budget. To assist with this task Warner approached Environics Analytics to develop predictive models as well as other tools to help retain core buyers, win back lapsed customers and identify high-potential prospects.

Environics Analytics developed a win-back model to identify long-lapsed lottery buyers who were most likely to buy a ticket again but weren’t being reached through previous campaigns. The Foundation tested ❱ DMN.ca

the model in the lottery’s first direct mailing of the winter 2018 campaign. This mailing targeted five different groups of prospective lottery buyers, ranging from loyal to previous buyers who hadn’t bought a ticket in more than five years.

In the case of lapsed buyers, the Foundation used a classic test and control methodology to evaluate the performance of those buyers. In this instance, the model ranked lapsed buyers and the best prospects were then targeted by the campaign. The number of tickets sold to those prospects were compared to sales from a random sample selected from the same lapsed audience.

Strong purchase and response rates The results are impressive. The newly developed winback model helped to double purchase rates among those who had not bought in more than five years.

According to Heart & Stroke, the ability to re-activate long-lapsed buyers was an important factor in the overall success of the 2018 Lottery.

New acquisition was another challenge for Heart & Stroke. Unaddressed mail, an important part of historical acquisition campaigns, was almost dropped from the Foundation’s playbook due to recent poor performance, but a new acquisition model helped make it viable again.

Environics Analytics built a new acquisition model to rank geographies with the highest potential for new buyers. Using this model in combination with an analysis of existing ticket penetration rates it prioritized the targeting of unaddressed mail. With the new targeting strategy, Heart & Stroke Foundation saw a five-fold increase in response rates helping to restore this channel to profitability.

Throughout the campaign, the Heart & Stroke Lottery’s marketing team was able to monitor the results almost in real time. Environics Analytics created a suite of Tableau reporting dashboards and tools that allowed the charity to track ticket sales, visualize progress by target segment and ticket type and run “what if” queries to uncover important insights. This gave Heart & Stroke the information it needed to adapt and adjust its tactics over the course of the campaign. “Without this work we would not have been able to achieve this success,” says Warner.

Overall, the lottery sold out six weeks early. This is no small feat. By closing ticket sales early the organization was able to reduce how much it spends on marketing, which improved its overall efficiency of the lottery. Because of this, the Foundation realized a 54% increase in year-over-year profit.

By taking a more data-driven approach, the lottery is developing new ways to re-engage past ticket buyers, generate new interest in their lottery to sell it out faster than ever before and, best of all, generate additional funds to invest into groundbreaking heart and stroke research. That’s a win for everyone.

November 2018

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