Direct mail is without doubt the most heavily tested communications medium in the world.

In America alone, over the decades, fundraisers and other marketers have spent untold billions of dollars on direct mail tests. Serious direct mailers (i.e., the ones that make good money at it) see every catalog, fundraising solicitation, and special offer as an opportunity to increase response and income, by testing something. The smarter your tests, the more money you make. (If you're interested in the methodology of testing your fundraising solicitations, read Mal Warwick's book, Testing, Testing, 1,2,3.)

Why do we care? Because over these decades of testing, the direct mail industry has reached a consensus on what motivates people to respond to fundraising appeals.

The primary motivator: Emotion.

Seven emotions, actually: fear, guilt, greed, exclusivity, anger, salvation, and flattery. If you're learning this for the first time, welcome to the big leagues.

The exact number goes up and down a bit, depending on the expert. World-class ad man Herschell Gordon Lewis listed only the first four in his 1984 hardball classic, Direct Mail Copy That Sells! "Of the four," he writes, "Fear is the most potent. In a skilled surgeon's hands, Fear cuts through the layers of fat around a reader's brain, jabbing and needling until, trembling with the unquenchable desire built on frustration, the recipient of your Fear message grabs his pen or his phone to soothe his fever." (Wow! To hear the news reports, you would think that the Republicans invented fear just in time for the 2004 presidential elections. It's actually the oldest trick in the book.)

Individually and in concert, emotional triggers can move mountains of response. You might think, "But they sound so negative!" Don't be alarmed: each emotion has a powerful, positive flip side.

People in my workshops will ask, "But what about love? Love is an emotion. Shouldn't love be on the list?"

It is on the list...between the lines.

You love freedom, and you're afraid it's being stolen from you (so you support the ACLU). You love the wilderness, and you're angry that timber and mining lobbyists seem to have their way in Washington (so you support the Sierra Club). You love the comforts and pleasures of your life, and you feel guilty that every year the number of homeless children rises in a city near you (so you give to a shelter).

Love is all around, when you're talking about the emotions.

Another common objection: "I don't like being manipulated. And I certainly don’t want to manipulate anyone else, no matter how worthy my cause."

Using the emotions knowingly is not manipulation. People already have these emotions: fear, anger, etc. What your organization provides is a productive way to discharge (i.e., relieve, do something about) powerful emotions that pre-exist in (and trouble) the donor.

Let's be clear: the biggest problem you'll encounter in fundraising isn't that someone falls prey to your magical, Svengali-like powers of persuasion. Your biggest problem will always be inertia. INERTIA!!! You get up on your soapbox, make your plea, and no one does a thing. That's real life. Most of the people you're trying to move, won't act. But when you use emotions wisely you can overcome some (never all) of that inertia.