Fundraising Letter

The key to many a successful fundraising campaign is writing a good letter. This may sound intimidating at first, but fundraising letters contain many of the same elements as any good sales letter.

Writing a fundraising letter is not that difficult. However, you need to know what works and what doesn't before you invest your time composing your donation request.

Fundraising letters have some general rules of thumb:

1.    Keep in mind whenever you are asking for money that you are providing a service.
2.    Tell people what you've done and what you plan to do to achieve progress toward your goals.
3.    Longer letters do better:

• a) You can address all concerns and potential concerns
• b) There are different kinds of readers - Long letters are OK for all of them:
  • - Those that throw unopened envelope away - the length of letter is irrelevant.
  • - Those that read only beginning and ending - the length of letter is irrelevant.
  • - Skimmers can pick up more points from a longer letter
  • - Passionate readers love long letters

4.    Make your fundraising letter compelling
5.    Paragraphs and bullets should be no more than 3 sentences or items; break longer ones in half.