If you’ve ever tried to manage a mailing list, you likely know how quickly it can become outdated. From one year to the next, workers change jobs, businesses and individuals move, and phone numbers and email addresses change. In fact, 17 percent of Americans change addresses each year, and that doesn’t include the number of contact name changes and moves that impact businesses on contact lists.
Mailing lists for school fundraisers are no exception to this. As an organization reaches out to its list of trusted donors, getting communication to the right person is essential. Whether school fundraisers are conducted by email, phone, or traditional mail, there are real-world repercussions for using an outdated contact list. Here are a few ways bad fundraising lists impact your organization.
Expense
School fundraisers generally have limited budgets for marketing and administrative costs. Each major mailing can cost hundreds of dollars in postage, especially if a school has a sizable list of potential donors. By cleaning up your mailing list before dropping your mailing off at the post office, you can ensure each postcard or letter gets to its intended target without being routed back to you for re-mailing.
Productivity
Even if volunteers handle the hard labor of stuffing envelopes, creating email blasts, and making phone calls, someone on the fundraising committee is responsible for overseeing the process, providing lists and making sure shifts are assigned. A sloppy contact list wastes a volunteer’s time, cutting into his ability to be effective and potentially leading to burnout. If a volunteer makes ten phone calls, only to find eight of the numbers are incorrect, that volunteer is less likely to tackle the eleventh call with enthusiasm.
Lost Income
The goal of school fundraisers is to raise as much money as possible. An ineffective mailing list hampers the ability to raise those funds. Even if the right address or phone number is listed, the wrong name could start a conversation on the wrong note, potentially offending the person on the other end. School fundraisers are much more effective if the donor feels as though he or she is personally connected to the school and the community. By knowing the correct name of the person who controls donations at the other end of a call or mailing, you’ll enjoy much more success in your efforts.
Cleaning up a contact list for school fundraisers may seem like an arduous task, but it doesn’t have to be. Numerous tools are available that can spot duplicates and pinpoint errors. Businesses can also use the U.S. Postal Service’s National Change of Address directory to track down changes of address throughout the country. Even taking a few extra minutes to verify contact name and information on an organization’s website could make the difference between a “return to sender” and a donation.
School fundraisers can dramatically improve their success by regularly updating mailing lists and ensuring contact names are correct. While it may seem easier to pull the same list each year, many fundraising coordinators find that this method is largely ineffective, resulting in wasted time and money.
