Here’s the story that wasn’t told
The important fact is that all Nonprofit organizations need to raise money which is essential to their success and all the good works they accomplish. InfoCision supports their missions by carrying the majority of the costs of fundraising for them. We do NOT keep the money raised. Nothing could be further from the truth! Each charity has an annual budget goal to raise a certain amount, let’s say X million dollars. On average an organization will budget 25% of the total raised for administrative, fundraising and other marketing costs. The remaining 75% is always used by the organization for the critical programs and services they provide so well. InfoCision is paid out of the budget for fundraising, plain and simple. We bill the client for our costs, then pay all our wonderful 4400 employees, for facilities, phone bill, technology, mailings, etc. and as a business strive for a 10% margin…although in the economic climate of the past few years, we have struggled to reach this target.
For 30 years, InfoCision has partnered with the largest and most reputable Nonprofit organizations in the world. If the calls we make for charities were unsuccessful for them and, if they were unhappy, we would not be able to continue representing them, nor would they want us to.
The campaigns mentioned in the report were all designed as donor acquisition appeals to breakeven upfront. Without proactively attempting to acquire new members, any charity will ultimately lose its membership through normal attrition and in time may no longer exist. Once a new member has been acquired, all their subsequent contributions will provide significant net return to the client over time and more than pay for the initial cost to bring them on. All our neighbor to neighbor campaigns recruiting volunteers provide a much needed educational and outreach mission where for example, diabetes tests, cancer prevention or the signs of a stroke information kits are distributed out to millions of families to help them be aware of risk factors and improve their overall health. There is no initial net return anticipated from these types of campaigns because it’s all about engaging new donors and getting educational information into the hands of people who need it.
Think about all the research and all the good being done by the world’s leading health organizations to fight disease…Leukemia, Heart, Diabetes, Cancer…we help all these causes. Without telephone prospecting bringing on new donors and volunteers, the mission could not be accomplished. For-profit businesses roll out new customer acquisition types of campaigns all the time, such as free giveaways of sample products. Consumers don’t question this strategy even though it drives up marketing costs. Stores use what’s called loss-leaders to get people through their doors. They’ll take a loss on say a gallon of milk in hopes the consumer will purchase other marked-up items in the same trip and, become a regular customer because of their shopping experience.
Charities do many different types of fundraising campaigns each year. Isolating just one individual campaign’s report filed with a state attorney-general gives a distorted and confusing view. To find out how much a nonprofit organization commits to its core mission, review the Nonprofit’s Form 990 filed each year with the IRS, which provides a comprehensive summary of the way an organization’s uses all the funds entrusted to them.
InfoCision’s message is honest and clear. Any deception comes from the reporter’s story. This type of irresponsible journalism seeks to hurt those valuable national charitable organizations who do so much good…they are our clients and we are proud to be their partner.
If you would like a more detailed explanation of how the fundraising process works, check out the fundraising series, where I go into greater depth and shed some light on the subject of professional fundraising.