How To Write An Appeal Letter That Brings in Your Funds

With a solid appeal letter we raised more than $11,000 US in 11 Days.

I tell my 12 year old, “I’m going to raise US$11,000 in 11 days,” and he tells me wryly, “It’s not impossible but that letter you’re writing is going to have to be very effective!”

When I tell my friend I’m going to try to raise her the US$11,000 she needs, though she doesn’t say it, she isn’t convinced I can do this in the short time left either — and I have no reason to believe I can. I’m not at the centre of a wealthy or even large network and I’m no social media genius. In fact, I sometimes go for months without a tweet or a Facebook status update and my guesstimate is that I only interact with about a 100 people online regularly — if so many. As for Instagram, I don’t even have a profile pic, far less followers!

But the worst-case possibilities for my friend are dire. Without this $11,000 I can see the risks to herself and two daughters hurtling towards them like the oblivion of a black hole. They’ve spent the last year emerging from a very difficult period. They’ve been fighting — and keep fighting, all sorts of psychological, social and financial demons. I’ve been with her on email and WhatsApp, supporting wherever I could over the last few years — but at this juncture, no words of advice or encouragement can manifest urgently the hard cash of US$11,000. My friend is one of the kindest, most loving human beings I’ve met on the journey of my life — and she doesn’t deserve the horrors she’s been subject to over the last 20 years of so. That things could be several times more difficult for her is an unbearable thought for me. I fear the current situation could overwhelm, setting her and her girls back another five or ten years — making bad matters worse, as financial problems often spawn others. She’s already done all she can. Now I must step in — just as she would for me if it was me in need.

To raise the $11,000, I need to communicate what she and her daughters need and connect with people who might want to help.

My unplanned first draft

Friend #1 volunteers to help me circulate my appeal but wants me to send it by WhatsApp, because that’s how she works in her circle of influence. I write the first draft of my WhatsApp appeal from my heart, appealing to the religious community that both my volunteer Friend #1 and my friend in need belong to. My main message is just under 350 words — but including the donation contribution details, the full appeal is two and half screens along my 4-inch long phone screen.

My message builds a picture of my friend’s good character and her kindness to me and others over many years. I summarise her crisis, make it clear that this crisis was caused by a third party, show that she’s exhausted her own efforts and emphasize her capacity to carry on, once we help her over this hurdle.

At the end of Day One I’ve sent my WhatsApp appeal out to just one person. Only ten days left, and so far I have two contributions, mine and Friend #1’s. We’re under 3% of the target sum and I know I need a differently worded appeal to move beyond friend #1’s WhatsApp circle and into other spaces.

Writing an effective appeal takes effort

What if there’s a right or wrong way to write an appeal? And what if I’m unknowingly getting it wrong? I need to shoot for a 10/10 appeal because 5/10 might not cut it.

I message a friend who’s worked many years in the charity sector. I tell her what I’m up to and that any advice on do’s and don’ts will be welcome. I send her the unplanned first draft that Friend#1 has been circulating and she (Friend#2) steps in selflessly, voluntarily and enthusiastically to nurture my letter writing process. Rather than rush into frenzied begging, I work on that letter, with my friend’s expert advice (and another friend — Friend #3’s — contradicting advice, as a useful counterweight), to get it right. It’s all of 36 hours before the letter is ready to set sail from my corner of the internet in the wee hours of Day Three. And by then we’ve realised that US$11,000 is a conservative target because it assumes some uncertain money is coming in! We raise the goal to a less naïve US$12,300 with 9 days left.

But then guess what! We raise more than US$12,300 in 7 days!

How? Notice I started off with ‘I’ but switched to ‘we’. That’s a big key to how we did it, but an effective appeal letter was the first key. The appeal letter is the thing scrutinised before a decision to contribute is made — but it may not be scrutinised at all, because people often scan appeal letters quickly, intentionally deciding to dismiss the appeal or look more closely, based on that first scan! So, for many potential contributors, your letter has one rapidly fired shot.

Let’s use a few fictitious scenarios to look at the ‘how-to’ of writing an effective appeal letter.

Headliners!

A headline must get the attention of target contributors — but it mustn’t be misleadingly dramatic or the reader will feel duped, disrespected and unamused. Fundamental to the appeal’s success is the currency of trust. Don’t burn it.

Imagine the task of raising US$300,000 over two weeks for a six year old little boy with leukaemia, in need of chemotherapy and hospital care.

(i) You could use a question like, ‘WHAT WOULD YOU BE PREPARED TO GIVE IF YOUR SIX YEAR OLD NEEDED CHEMO URGENTLY AND ONLY YOUR GIVING COULD SAVE HIM?’

(ii) Or a strong statement, ‘LITTLE LUKA WILL DIE WITHOUT URGENT CHEMO BUT HE NEEDS YOUR HELP TO AFFORD IT.’

Which headline works better? Though a question can be very effective, the statement works better because it’s crisp and blunt, clear and simple. The question above tries to build empathy immediately by asking what if this were your child? For some readers this headline would be an immediate put off: It’s not my child. Why are you trying to mess with my emotions? Yet it would work with others. From beginning to end, be conscious that your appeal letter is a story meant to persuade with sincerity, not manipulate with guilt. You’re aiming to draw readers into the story, not make them defensive. Weigh the impact of your words on the persuasion vs manipulation scale. To counter your inevitable bias in this process, get feedback from a mix of other minds. This helps you to choose a headline that’s more considerate of the way different people will respond. The purpose of your headline is to motivate the reader to carry on reading. Focus on this purpose. You can build empathy later. You can never draw in everyone, but you don’t want to be turning them away in droves either.

Compare (ii) above with (iii) below:

(iii) LITTLE LUKA CAN LIVE IF HIS FAMILY CAN RAISE US$300,000 FOR CHEMO AND HOSPITAL CARE. CAN YOU HELP?

You need to be comfortable with the way you frame your appeal if you are going to devote energy to getting eyeballs to read it. So, if ‘will die’ is too jarring for you, ‘can live’ works just as well. ‘Might live’ is just as honest but sounds more pessimistic. There are no words to please every reader but to circulate the appeal and ask others to join you in doing this, you need to have faith in the value of the story you’re telling.

Though it’s important, don’t sweat over your headline at the beginning. After writing the main appeal you’ll have more perspective on what headline will work best. You may not finalise it with confidence till your very last edit.

The importance of Credibility and Meaning.

Essentially, you know why you want to raise these funds. You understand the circumstances, the backstory, the threats to well-being, all the possible outcome scenarios. Because you know all this you’re motivated. But what do friends and strangers need to know to be motivated to help?

In your rough plan, write down the points that will build the story in the minds of your readers. Include the right factual details to ensure the story you’re building will make sense. Built-in credibility is key because appeal readers don’t have time to email you for clarity or fill-in where your story has holes. They want enough information from your appeal letter to decide whether to contribute right away, schedule a contribution when they have time or money (tomorrow, next week, next month) or dismiss the appeal entirely. They also don’t want to share an appeal that makes them look like undiscerning suckers to friends who start pointing out holes in your appeal story!

Yet for your important points to build a meaningful story they must connect with the reader’s feelings too. It’s the bits that stir our emotions that make the difference between an interesting story and a meaningful one. Something has meaning when we can relate to it, when our minds can make more of it, when we can fit it into other stories we own. These stories we own could be as close as the personal or as broad as the political, but if they chime and reverberate on a note that means something to us, we’ll be moved to take action.

So weave the facts and emotive factors together.

Consider the scenario of raising £10,000 for community training and resources for a kitchen garden communal grow-and-share-our-own-food project with 100 initial participants.

We could list the benefits of this project as: increasing availability of fresh fruit and vegetables, supporting mental health by reducing loneliness, increasing a sense of purpose, improving exercise, fitness and immunity while bridging the generation gap and building friendships and a sense of community.

Or, much more effectively, with permission from community members we could bring their aspirations to life:

· Emelda’s looking forward to meeting the people in her neighbourhood much more often. “The loneliness since I lost Juan-Luis last year is something I don’t want to get used to.”

· Eric’s physiotherapist recommends gardening and though he hasn’t yet picked up the habit on his own, he’s signed up to be part of this. “I’m more of a social man. If I can have a laugh and a conversation, I’ll be planting and digging and not even know it!”

· Sarah and Benjie have forty-five years of kitchen gardening experience between them which they can’t wait to share! “We’re gonna grow more than we can eat! A huge part of the joy is in giving more than half of your harvest away!”

· Hana’s grandchildren spend every summer with her and they are super excited.

“Can we plant strawberries and cucumbers? Can we plant trees too? We want peaches, plums, apples and apricots …”

· Louise hopes this training and experience will open the way for her to start her own business teaching others. “I believe community farming will be critical to ensuring real food security with the coming crises that climate change will bring.”

· Christos took early retirement since his stroke 15 years ago. He no longer drives but can navigate his community with mobility aids. “Another year indoors and I’ll go mad. How many games of cards and backgammon can one person play? I’ll be down every day, keeping an eye on the kids and watering the plants!”

Sharing the figures

Show any progress that’s been made and simplify the numbers wherever it helps.

The community has raised £4678.00 of the £15,000 needed through BBQ’s and raffles. That means for every £100 needed they already have £30. But with just 2 months to go they could use your help to raise the remaining £10,322.00.

Or consider this example where the challenge is raising £500,000 to support a non-profit specialising in healing therapy for under 25’s who’ve been victims and witnesses of violent trauma.

Government contributions to the cost of running The Love In Crisis Healing Project every year are just 15% of what’s needed. Pledges from large private donors cover another 35%. That means half, (50%) of the £1Million we need, must be raised from ongoing grassroot community campaigning like we’re doing now. Every year, supporters of our work from all over the country make it possible for Love In Crisis to keep going. On average, for every 10 donations we receive, 8 are between £10 and £50. Every donation, large or small, really counts!

Conclude with calls to action.

Ask for contributions and show them how they can make these. Ask for the appeal to be shared and show them why that’ll make a difference. And because every donation really counts, make it as easy as possible to contribute.

When we raised $12,300 US in 7 days, we used a Facebook fundraiser, three accounts in three different countries (only because friends willing to act as fund collectors happened to span three countries), Zelle in the US to avoid wire transfer fees on individual donations and Paypal in the UK for the same reason. We pointed out to US contributors that while giving through Zelle would be free, using our Facebook fundraiser would mean their donation would be subject to small fees. (Many used Facebook anyway and I’ll discuss why in a further article). We didn’t encourage contributors to do a wire transfer as those are inconvenient and incur costs for both giver and receiver — but gave enough information to allow wire transfers if contributors preferred them. We collected cash directly from older friends who lived within driving distance but weren’t used to moving money online.

And because every donation really counts, you’ll be sure to ask your readers not just to give but also to share the appeal.

Don’t assume if they felt moved to give, they’ll feel moved to share. For some it’ll be the opposite. Having contributed money, they’ll feel they’ve done enough. The nudge to share is actually necessary! Using another scenario, here’s a way to frame your ‘please share request’ logically so it doesn’t seem like a routine robotic ask:

Consider raising £3000 to pay airfare, ticket and expenses for 15 year old Tania who’s been selected to attend a prestigious robotics camp in The Netherlands.

Consider that Tania’s trip can be fully funded in two weeks if we can just raise £214 every day for the next 14 days. That’s less than 12 people every day giving an average of £20 each. We can do this! Please share this appeal for Tania.

Suddenly, sharing the appeal becomes a way to ensure that the goal is reached and from the givers’ point of view, sharing makes it more likely that their contribution will help hit its target and their intention in giving be fulfilled. Sharing now becomes something they want to do for their ends, not yours. ‘Credibility’ and ‘Meaning’ again. Surely we can find 12 people daily willing to give £20 if only we ask enough people to take a look at the cause …?

Now you have your first draft, look back and see if you’ve built as much of that critical currency as you can: trust.

Why should they trust you? Who are you anyway?

Whether you are raising funds for yourself or a friend or a local volunteer organisation, appeal readers want to know who you are and why this cause matters to you. If you are vague or indirect, they might miss connecting with you altogether.

Just as in a marriage or any other significant relationship, trust isn’t something you take advantage of and then abuse. You’ll need to work on that trust throughout your fundraising (more about that in my next article).

For your contributors, one thing that can’t be settled by a quick look at the progress bar on your fundraising page is the question of whether funds raised will be well used or misused.

Your letter can assure contributors that there’s a way to find out. Is your charity effort annually audited? Say so. Do you have a web presence? Under GDPR regulations (and because you are polite and considerate), you won’t be collecting emails and update donors without their explicit permission, so if you don’t have a simple web presence to help with follow-up, it might be worth creating one. If your fundraising will be ongoing over several months or years, use web tools that invite donors to opt-in, to being continually informed, including about future fundraising efforts. People want to help but here it comes again: they’ll be more likely to help if they can feel confident that their money really served your cause.

Should you include a photo? I hesitated to include a photo. I felt a photo stripped my friend of her dignity by exposing not just her story but her identity. Having to tell her story publicly was bad enough. A few people might recognise her name but so many more people might recognise her face. I didn’t want to expose her children this way either.

If you’re raising funds for someone in poor health or whose situation has been caused by circumstances that are unpleasant or devastating to share publicly, hesitating to share a photo reflects your sensitivity to the fact that despite this age of social media oversharing, our human egos still need some privacy to thrive.

Yet there’s evidence that a photograph makes appeal readers more likely to give. It’s easier to empathise with someone when you have a photo to connect with. It’s certainly easier to trust an appeal that includes details (at least a first name), a photograph (possibly one in happier times past) and a location (at least a city, town, county or state). Because you’re giving the reader the security of knowing they can check given details against some kind of public record, your transparency signals that you are genuine.

Make sure you have buy-in and clear permissions for using personal details, including photos — and that you’ve explained how and why details will be used. You might know their phone number but what if they prefer to link their Zelle account with their email and keep their phone number private? You may have two emails for them but which one did they want you to use? Get it right.

Deciding to delete the fundraiser, once fundraising was wrapped up made exposing the personal (including the photo of herself and her daughters she sent for the fundraiser), somewhat more palatable, both for my friend and for me.

If you don’t edit you could be taken for a scammer!

Your appeal needs to be a quick and easy read, so layout, editing, concise writing and ditching details that aren’t essential or effective will be critical.

· Too long — they won’t read it.

· Too short on details — they won’t believe it.

· Too many errors — they’ll think you are a scammer.

· Contradictory, confusing or ambiguous — they won’t be sure if they can trust you. Are you a bad writer or is your story just full of suspicious holes?

· Poorly laid out — they might dismiss it before committing to the harder work of working through your poor layout.

· Remember, bullet points reduce bulky details, improve layout and reduce word count.

Have people who don’t know much about your fundraising project review your appeal before you publish it. If possible, choose people whose work or life includes regular reading and writing, even if your work does too. They’ll notice things you haven’t. But choose these people carefully. You’re asking for a critical eye, not a pat on the back.

I had five critical readers, four of whom knew something about the backstory to the fundraising effort but not all the details. One was Friend #3. She intended to help me raise the money but was counting on me to have a message that would work for her and those she would approach. She helped me see that the header I had chosen reflected a bias in my own assessment of the case — which being peculiar to me — wouldn’t resonate with most people.

Using our ‘Love In Crisis’ fundraiser scenario, imagine using the header:

EXPOSURE TO VIOLENT TRAUMA IN CHILDHOOD IS THE STRONGEST PREDICTIVE FACTOR FOR COMMITING VIOLENCE. CAN YOU HELP ‘LOVE IN CRISIS’ BREAK THAT CYCLE?

That FACT expressed in the header is what moves me most to want to help in scenario four. But that might be peculiar to me — and there are just too many long words in that header!

Compare with: ‘LOVE IN CRISIS’ NEEDS YOUR HELP NOW! WE SAVE KIDS TODAY FOR A BETTER FUTURE TOMORROW. THE CRISIS IS NOW. LOVE CAN’T WAIT.

Imagine both of those headings above a photo of twenty-five under 18’s posing outside the Love in Crisis building for a group photo. Register your feeling using one word each time. Which header works better?

My critical readers helped me see where I was pressing the emotional buttons too uncomfortably hard, which details I could drop and what key questions in their minds I’d left unanswered.

Critical readers are there to show up your blind spots so your appeal readers can see everything you wanted them to see.

Novel writers joke that the first draft is always rubbish and the work of writing is re-writing. When I marvelled to Friend #2 that this appeal had taken so much time to write, she informed me that in the charity sector sometimes getting a message right can take two weeks — so don’t sweat the eight hours or so that might go into getting your letter right!

You might be short on time to raise funds but that’s why you need to take the time to get your positioning right and take accurate aim. If time is limited, consider that you only have a few arrows in your quiver. An appeal letter that hasn’t been well thought out is like sending your arrows out blindfolded.

Thank you for reading and best of luck fundraising!

Edited March 21st 2020: In this article I share all the amazing and unexpected lessons I learned on the steep learning curve of my fund-raising journey!

https://readmedium.com/connection-community-love-in-action-3175a72271be

And a special thank you and shout out to Friend #2, Yolanda Jansen. Yolanda Jansen is the founder of silver mango, an international boutique consultancy that helps create genuine expressions. She is also the Chair of Chapel & York Netherlands Foundation, supporting cross-border fundraising and philanthropy.

Thank you, Yolanda, for co-creating with me! For showing up with your experience and talents, concern and commitment and helping to make that crucial difference!