There's an onslaught, and you're part of the problem
People are busy. They receive far more appeals for their attention than they know what to do with. Most of the time they respond by ignoring you. Don't take it personally. It's not because they hate you. It's because they're paying no attention to you at the moment your communications item presents itself for consideration.

Witness your own behavior. Most of us have a domestic ritual: standing over the trash basket while we sort the mail. We sort into three piles:

1. "Stuff I can NOT ignore, or something bad will happen to me." Bills go into that pile.

2. "Stuff I can SAFELY ignore, and NOTHING bad will happen to me." That's everything else, pretty much. That pile goes straight to trash, except for...

3. "Stuff I could be interested in. I'll save that for a second look." Very few things end up here. Most that do relate to our material comfort and status, such as catalogs of home furnishings, electronics, and clothes. Your nonprofit's donor newsletter, your appeals, and other communications can, if they work hard at being interesting, find a place in this pile; but not every time, and not with everyone.

You're selling feelings, especially hope
So...what do you have that's so wonderful, to compete with luxurious sheets, gadgets, and the new fall line?

Nonprofits sell a feeling. It's the warm feeling that a donor has done something beneficial, useful, important, good, and proper by engaging in a philanthropic act.

Fundraising is a great business. Unlike commercial operations, you carry no inventory. You can store a universe of hope inside a #10 envelope.

And hope is what gets you into the third pile. Selling the feeling of hope. Hope is a narcotic. Hope is an anti-aging drug. Hope lifts everything, including a sagging spirit. It restores diminished expectations. Hope can repair a broken heart. You'll never go broke selling hope.

You're selling a feeling of importance, too
"No one starts the day," writes George Smith, one of the UK's most successful fundraising direct mail writers, "with the intention of making a charity donation. And no one says to their partner, 'Honey, the appeal mailings have arrived.' A routine charity appeal has to fight its way through torpor."

Which you can do, he goes on to say, if you create the sense that giving to you will make someone feel they've done something important. "Fundraisers cannot presume on this perceived importance," he cautions. "They have to create it."

You can't let up on this job. Every communication with donors is a chance to re-emphasize their vital importance to the mission.

In 1936, Dale Carnegie published the book that would make his a household name, How to Win Friends and Influence People. In it, he put to everyday use the ideas of Dr. Sigmund Freud and philosophers like John Dewey and William James. Carnegie lists eight things that "almost every normal adult wants," among them sexual gratification and health. "But there is one longing," Dale Carnegie wrote, "almost as deep, almost as imperious, as the desire for food or sleep which is seldom gratified. It is what Freud calls 'the desire to be great.' It is what Dewey calls the 'desire to be important.' Here is a gnawing and unfaltering human hunger; and the rare individual who honestly satisfies this heart-hunger will hold people in the palm of his hand...."

You, fundraiser, can be that "rare individual." Make your donors feel important, and you will hold them in the palm of your hand.

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Adapted from Keep Your Donors, by Simone Joyaux and Tom Ahern, published in Nov. 2007 by Wiley/AFP.