Every week you receive hundreds (if not thousands) of emails, text messages, instant messages, phone calls, and pieces of direct mail. Take a second to consider all of that communication. What sticks with you? What do you immediately delete, discard, or dismiss?
Now put yourself in the shoes of your volunteers. They too are overwhelmed with messages. So, how can you make your organization stand out?
Direct mail is making a comeback – and VolunteerHub can help in your effort to convert volunteers to donors.
Stand Out With a Handwritten Note to Convert Volunteers to Donors
You may be surprised to learn that “snail mail” is now one of the most effective tools you can use to connect with volunteers – especially handwritten notes. Few people take the time to send written communication, as it requires more effort than email. However, this is precisely why your message will stand out.
What should you write about? Service anniversaries, birthdays, and post-event thank you notes are excellent opportunities to send a handwritten note. This personal touch keeps your volunteers feeling connected to your organization, to your mission, and to you. It may require a bit of extra effort, but the reward is well worth the time.
Mail Merges Don’t Have to Be Difficult
Once you have written your letters, it’s time to do the most time-consuming step of the process: tracking down volunteer addresses. Luckily, VolunteerHub can quickly generate a “User Roster” report in CSV format, which includes mailing addresses. And, since VolunteerHub regularly prompts your volunteers to update their own information, you can always rest assured that the information is accurate.
Within minutes, you can be printing mailing labels (instead of digging through handwritten files).
Increase Donations with Direct Mail
Thanking volunteers is certainly a worthy effort. But what about converting volunteers to donors with direct mail?
As nonprofits move the bulk of their communication to digital formats, direct mail still offers an opportunity to draw attention to your donor cultivation efforts. Direct mail is especially effective when combined with a dedicated landing page on your VolunteerHub site.
For example, let’s imagine that your corporate sponsor has provided you with its entire employee mailing list. The goal is to engage employees and encourage them to volunteer for the first time. Your corporate sponsor is also paying for the cost of the direct mail campaign.
Smart volunteer coordinators would set up a dedicated landing page with the corporate sponsor’s logo and messaging that appeals to employees. Then, based on the same branding, a well-crafted letter would be created that encourages readers to visit the aforementioned landing page.
Once volunteers have signed up and started contributing their time, it would be possible to develop segmented direct mail campaigns that thank them for volunteering and also solicit financial contributions. As your volunteer list grows, so does the opportunity to convert more volunteers to donors.
The Missing Link for Successful Direct Mail Campaigns
VolunteerHub helps organizations manage their volunteers, cut out excessive administrative tasks, and generally makes life easier for coordinators. In addition, it can prove especially useful for sending direct mail campaigns to convert volunteers to donors. For more information about how VolunteerHub can help, schedule an assessment of your volunteer engagement programs.
