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OCTOBER 1, 2012 THE NONPROFIT TIMES www.thenonprofittimes.com 1

THENONPROFITTIMESTM

The Leading Business Publication For Nonprofit Management • www.thenonprofittimes.com • $6.00 U.S. October 1, 2012

BY PAUL CLOLERY

Donors who send in a check after receiving a directmail appeal are less likely to go online to checkout the charity than they were four years ago.That’s a reversal of three years earlier when a

spike upward was experienced between 2005 and 2008.The national survey of adults showed that half of donors

who make a gift as a result of a direct mail appeal do not doany Internet research about the organization before writingthe check. That’s an increase from 47 percent during 2008.The 2008 number was a large upswing from 2005 when 61percent said they didn’t do Internet research.

The NonProfit Times contracted with Opinion Research Cor-poration (ORC) to conduct a national survey this past Augustto find donors’ reactions to charity appeals. The results arethe findings of a telephone survey conducted among a na-

tional probability sample of 1,015 adults comprising 503 menand 512 women 18 years of age and older, living in privatehouseholds in the continental United States. Interviewing forthis survey was completed during the period Aug. 9-12.

The polling shows how the Internet became more preva-lent between 2005 and 2008 while the new numbers aremore potentially telling about the mindset of the consumer.Various studies have shown a decline in new donors for thepast several years and brand loyalty to an organization ap-pears to keep many donors from needing more information.

Respondents to The NPT polling had several choices, first ifthey looked to the Internet for information and where theywent if they did want more information. In the latest polling,35 percent went to an organization’s website, down twopoints from 2008 but up from 19 percent in 2005.

Special Report, page 2

A Majority Of Donors Give WithoutResearch When Asked

S P E C I A L R E P O R T: E X C L U S I V E N P T R E S E A R C H

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2 OCTOBER 1, 2012 THE NONPROFIT TIMES www.thenonprofittimes.com

Online discussion groups were thesource for 14 percent of donors during2012, up four points from 2008 and 11points from 2005. Blogs came in at 9percent in the most recent polling, upone point from 2008 and up sevenpoints from 2005.

It’s quite a different story with the in-dependent ratings agencies. Less thanone-quarter (22 percent) of donors whogo online check in with a ratings agency,down two points from 2008 but up from11 percent in 2005.

The polling data comes at a time whentwo of three watchdog organizations arereporting greater usage of their sites.GuideStar showed a decline for 2011.Thus, donors who avail themselves of theBBB Wise Giving Alliance, Charity Naviga-tor and GuideStar might be making nu-merous visits.

For the years 2005, 2008 and 2011,the three largest information clearing-houses reported:

BBB Wise Giving Alliance2005 -- 2 million total2008 -- 2.3 million total2011 -- 3 million of which 750,000 were

unique visitors.

Charity Navigator2005 -- 3.2 million total (all unique)2008 -- 3.9 million total, 2.8 million

unique2011 -- 5 million total, 3.4 million unique

GuideStar2005 -- 7.6 million total2008 -- 8.97 million total2011 -- 8.35 million totalGuideStar declined to provide thenumber of unique visitors.

The NonProfit Times’ research showeda large spike in usage of the independentrating agencies such as the BBB, CharityNavigator and GuideStar between 2005and 2008, going from 11 percent ofdonors who eventually gave to 24 per-cent. The number ticked downward, astatistically insignificant 2 percent be-tween 2008 and 2012.

Rick Christ, a vice president and on-line fundraising specialist with the agencyAmergent in Peabody, Mass., doesn’t be-lieve the percentage of donors who saythey go to ratings agency websites. “I be-lieve that fewer people use ratings agen-cies than even indicate on this survey. It’sthe sort of thing a person thinks theyshould answer ‘yes’ to,” he said.

The more educated the donor, themore likely they were to use the Internetto locate information from third parties.Independent ratings groups were visitedby 33 percent of donors who had a col-lege degree. And, 48 percent of those col-lege-educated donors went to anorganization’s website.

Since one-third of donors with thedeepest pockets go to an organization’s

website, the question is why organiza-tions don’t do more with their sites.“Here’s a take-away from the numbers,”said Christ. “Why don’t more nonprofitscreate a page titled ‘(Org name) DirectMail Appeal’ so it shows up high onGoogle? They could post a photo of theouter envelope with links to their Form990, pie charts from the annual report, avideo showing the good work they do,and a donation form. The website homepage should have a graphic of the outerenvelope as well, linking to the DirectMail Appeal page.”

According to Christ, “these stats indi-cate that an organization’s website is theplace that people go to when they’re curi-ous about an organization that is solicit-ing them via mail.” The percentages trenddownward with age, but upward with in-come, education, and even the numberof people in the household.

When it comes to race, the largestchange was in the Hispanic segmentwhere significantly fewer turned to the In-ternet for information, compared to His-panics polled in 2005 and 2008. Thatnumber dropped from 59 percent in 2005and 60 percent in 2008 to 39 percent in2012.

Donors who self-identify as blackshowed an increase in use of the Internet,from 35 percent in 2008 to 50 percent in2012. Donors identifying them selves aswhite showed some bounce during thethree surveys, going from 63 percent to 46percent and then back up to 53 percent.

It appears donors are choosing sidesand staying put after they do. “Newdonor acquisition for most organizations

has been down for a long time,” saidChuck Longfield, senior vice presidentand chief scientist for Blackbaud, basedin the Cambridge, Mass., Target Analyticsdivision.

“Twenty years ago you could almostmake money and find new donors. Tenyears ago it was a break-even event. Nowit costs $100 to find a $50 donor. Organi-zations are losing money doing newdonor acquisition,” he said.

He said fewer people going to organi-zational websites means that they alreadyknow the organization, or have previ-ously given. “Most (organizations) are fo-cused on holding onto donors. Itcontinues to result in fewer new donors,”said Longfield.

However, he said the majority minimalchange in the nonprofit number from2008 to 2012 was statistically dead evendespite the explosive increase in Web use.In North America, there was 152 percentgrowth in Internet users between 2000and 2011, according to Internetworld-stats.com. North America is first in worldInternet penetration rates at 78.6 per-cent, even though it trails Asia in actualusers.

Even with that growth, donor popula-tions have been shrinking for the past fiveyears, primarily because of declines innew donor acquisition, according toLongfield.

Target’s most recent Index of Nation -al Fundraising Performance showed inthe first quarter of 2012, overall newdonor populations were flat. Year-to-date

changes varied by sector with some sec-tors experiencing large new donorgrowth, some remaining flat and the re-maining groups experiencing declines.

The index examines 80 organizations,including over 37 million donors andmore than 78 million gifts totaling morethan $2.4 billion in revenue. The sectorsthat experienced the largest declines inoverall revenue per donor were thosethat also experienced the largest year-over-year new donor growth, accordingto the report.

Participants in the index, combined,have not experienced positive year-to-year donor growth since the U.S. GulfCoast hurricanes in the third quarter of2005. These declines also continue to bewidespread. Only 44 percent of the or-ganizations in the index had positivedonor growth in the first quarter of 2012.

Two sectors in the index that appear tobe actively recovering from the recent re-cession are human services and societalbenefit organizations. They experiencedstrong performances especially aroundnew donor acquisition during the firstquarter of 2012, according to the indexresults.

Age was The NonProfit Times survey’sdominant indicator of determining thepropensity of mail donors to look up in-formation on the Internet before giving.“The older the donor, the less likely theyare to look up information online,” saidJeff Regen, general manager, nonprofitgroup, at database firm Merkle in Colum-bia, Md. “The falloff is particularly sharpfor the 65-plus where only 22 percentlook up organizations on the Internet be-fore donating, a drop of 13 percentagepoints from those 55-64 (35 percent). Bycomparison the fall-off from those 45-54(40 percent) to 55-64 (35 percent) is only5 percentage points,” he said.

Regen said the NPT research resultsreflect a broader behavioral shift be-tween the Baby Boomers who are justnow hitting 65 and the Greatest Genera-tion who are all older than 65. The shiftis in terms of donor expectations and de-sire for information.

He said that Merkle conducted a studyacross four nonprofits looking at the driv-ers of donor satisfaction and the relation-ship of donor satisfaction to donor value.Among the findings, 65+ donors were farless likely to search for information thanthose below 65 as we found. “Most im-portantly, the below 65 donors whosearched for information were much lesssatisfied and, therefore, less likely togive,” Regen said.

He said that donors 65 and oldershowed no sign of being interested in thetrustworthiness of the organization,showed little sign of establishing a rela-tionship with the organization, anddonors who felt they had a relationshipwith the organization had the samepropensity to give as those who did not.In fact, the older donors did not like

‘‘I believe thatfewer peopleuse ratingsagencies thaneven indicateon this survey.

--Rick Christ of Amergent


?Continued from page 1

Special Report, page 4

‘‘Twenty yearsago you couldalmost makemoney and findnew donors.

--Chuck Longfield of Blackbaud


OCTOBER 1, 2012 THE NONPROFIT TIMES www.thenonprofittimes.com 3


BY AGE 18-24* 25-34* 35-44 45-54 55-64 65+Look up 31 64 61% 31 54 61% 34 45 46% 27 40 40% 20 39 35% 8 21 22%

Organization’s Web site 28 60 53% 27 52 53% 25 34 37% 17 31 34% 14 31 24% 3 15 14%Independent rating organization 8 30 27% 11 26 27% 13 25 25% 14 24 18% 12 24 22% 7 13 13%Online discussion group 5 22 23% 6 17 23% 5 7 16% 3 5 13% 1 6 8% 1 4 5%Blogs 3 20 17% 4 11 17% 1 9 6% 2 6 10% 1 2 4% 2 3 3%

Do not look up 51 30 34% 56 42 34% 58 45 48% 63 51 52% 66 48 58% 74 60 70%Don’t know/none 18 5 4% 13 4 4% 8 10 5% 10 9 8% 14 13 7% 18 18 8%

BY HOUSEHOLD INCOME $25K $25-35K $35-50K $50-75K $75+ Dual**Look up 14 41 25% 21 49 43% 29 37 48% 36 50 45% 37 51 55% 29 47 NA

Organization’s Web site 12 40 18% 12 39 33% 20 34 36% 28 42 38% 29 39 45% 23 37 NAIndependent rating organization 6 21 18% 13 19 22% 12 19 23% 14 29 16% 18 32 27% 11 27 NAOnline discussion group 1 18 12% 3 14 22% 5 4 10% 6 16 11% 3 4 15% 4 9 NABlogs 2 7 6% 0 11 12% 3 9 12% 4 10 8% 2 7 9% 2 7 NA

Do not look up 69 46 66% 68 45 53% 61 51 48% 54 41 47% 55 43 41% 61 44 NADon’t know/none 17 13 9% 11 7 5% 10 11 4% 9 9 8% 8 6 4% 11 9 NA

BY EDUCATION H.S. incomplete H.S. grad College Incomplete College gradLook up 9 29 21% 20 39 39% 23 41 48% 35 53 53%

Organization’s Web site 7 28 19% 16 33 28% 17 36 38% 27 41 46%Independent rating organization 2 10 8% 8 21 21% 13 21 16% 14 32 33%Online discussion group 3 10 10% 3 8 18% 5 13 13% 4 8 13%Blogs 3 4 8% 1 12 12% 2 7 8% 3 6 9%

Do not look up 77 48 66% 65 51 53% 66 49 48% 53 40 42%Don’t know/none 15 24 14% 15 10 8% 11 10 5% 12 7 5%

BY RACE Black White HispanicLook up 28 59 42% 26 44 41% 23 30 48%

Organization’s Web site 26 52 39% 19 37 33% 18 21 38%Independent rating organization 5 31 20% 13 25 19% 7 7 31%Online discussion group 5 12 13% 3 8 12% 7 9 20%Blogs 5 19 12% 2 6 8% 4 9 15%

Do not look up 62 35 50% 63 46 53% 59 60 39%Don’t know/none 11 6 8% 12 11 6% 18 10 13%

BY GENDER Male FemaleLook up 26 46 47% 25 41 39%

Organization’s Web site 20 37 37% 19 36 33%Independent rating organization 11 26 27% 11 22 17%Online discussion group 4 11 16% 3 9 12%Blogs 2 9 11% 2 8 8%

Do not look up 59 46 46% 63 47 54%Don’t know/none 15 8 7% 12 12 6%

ALL RESPONDENTS 2005 2008 2012Look up 25% 44% 43%Do not look up 61% 47% 50%Don’t know/none 13% 10% 7%

2005 2008 2012Organization’s Web site 19% 37% 35%Independent rating organization 11% 24% 22%Online discussion group 3% 10% 14%Blogs 2% 8% 9%?When you receive

a mail solicitationfrom a charity,which of thefollowing placeson the Internetdo you look atbefore decidingwhetherto givemoney?

* 18-24 and 25-34 were separate categories in 2005 and 2008, but combined into 18-34 in the 2012 survey.** Dual income was not an option among responses in the 2012 survey.


4 OCTOBER 1, 2012 THE NONPROFIT TIMES www.thenonprofittimes.com

when the organization knew them, i.e.,they did not like significant personaliza-tion of communications, Regen said.

According to the NPT research, during2005 women outpaced men at not usingthe Internet at 63 percent versus 59 per-cent. That held true in 2008 and 2012, al-though it was a statistical dead heat in2008 at 47 percent of females and 46 per-cent of males not turning to the WorldWide Web for research.

Donors are making decisions based ontrust, whether it be people they knowmaking the ask or via the direct mail ap-peal. “They are making an emotional de-cision. Friends asking friends, it’s not asense of supporting an organization.They (donors) trust you (the asking per-son),” said Longfield.

Household size and education wereimportant indicators of whether a maildonor looked for information online be-fore giving. Only 27 percent of those in ahousehold went online versus 51 percentin a household of three or more. “This islikely driven by age,” said Regen. “Olderdonors tend to live alone or with theirspouse where younger donors often havefamilies. For education, college grads (53percent) were much more likely to lookfor information online than those with a

high school degree or less (34 percent) asexpected.”

Regen said that in the four organiza-tions examined by Merkle, donorsyounger than 65 were eight times more

likely to give when they received more in-formation from the organization; sixtimes more likely to give when they feltthey had a relationship with the organiza-tion and six times more likely to donate ifthey believed the organization used finan-cial resources wisely.

Household income also might play arole in the responses. In all three studies,donors who reported earning $25,000 orless annually trailed those in the highestearning levels by between 15 and 20points. The likelihood someone wouldhit the Internet for information increasedwith income across the board.

Results of any sample are subject tosampling variation. The magnitude of thevariation is measurable and is affected bythe number of interviews and the level ofthe percentages expressing the results.

According to ORC, the chances are 95in 100 that a survey result does not vary,plus or minus, by more than the indicatednumber of percentage points from the re-sult that would be obtained if interviewshad been conducted with all persons inthe universe represented by the sample.

Colleen Brinkman, chief philanthropyofficer, North Texas Food Bank in Dallassaid the results could be skewed bywhether the solicitation was acquisitionor renewal.

“Acquisition is a very expensive prop -o sition because we have to spend timeresearching for a list that matches a pro-file I want to reach. That’s very expen-sive,” said Brinkman. “My thinking is thatwith the economy nonprofits can’t affordacquisition mailing, so direct mail goesout to people who already support thecharity.”

She explained that the food bank hasapproximately 30 touch points with itsdonor base. “It’s very sophisticated. Foreffective direct mail, nonprofits send onetype to people who have given to them al-ready and use another strategy for peoplewho are new to them. One’s chocolateand one’s vanilla,” she said. “If this surveyreflects direct mail that is sent out torented or purchased lists, I would say theeconomy has changed that behavior, be-cause it’s very hard to get the attention ofa newcomer.”

Brinkman said her husband receivesapproximately 15 direct mail pieces perday. “We’re not Rockefellers, but he onhis own sends a number of gifts to chari-ties. So this morning I asked him the sur-vey question: If you’re interested what doyou do? He said ‘I always go online.’ Thatgoes against the survey finding. My hus-band might be more of a caring, judiciousdonor.” NPT


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Continued from page 2

‘‘Older donorstend to livealone or withtheir spousewhere youngerdonors oftenhave families.

--Jeff Regen of Merkle


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