These Guys Are Stupid, And I'm Being Charitable
Why do some organizations still solicit funds the way they did in the 1960s? You need to take a smarter marketing approach, or you'll waste money like they do.
BY HOWARD
TULLMAN, GENERAL MANAGING PARTNER, G2T3V AND CHICAGO HIGH TECH
INVESTORS@TULLMAN
I'm still getting about two bucks a month in cash from stupid,
misguided charities that insist on sending me actual money in the mail. I get
half dollars, a few very clean dollar bills, and a two-dollar bill or two at
least once a quarter from the knuckleheads who are running the marketing
campaigns for these clueless organizations--typically asking for help for vets,
pets, and orphans.
These idiots are still selling tonnage to suckers instead of
data-driven targeting. They're basically dumping their clients' dollars down
the drain. Sadly, most of the traditional charities still using the mail are
run by tired old managers from pre-digital times who don't know any better and
frankly don't care to rock the boat or change the ways they've
"always" done business. To these people, tradition is just a
convenient excuse for resisting change.
Never mind the decks of cheap playing cards, the tiny pairs of
socks and gloves, the dozens of pens and notepads, and, of course, the zillions
of calendars and greeting cards sent from October through December. I'm talking
about real U.S. tender, and plenty of it. I'll leave the math up to you, but if
an average non-responder like me - never having given a dime to any of these
clowns -- is getting $20 or $30 a year, it's pretty clear when you consider
mailing costs that millions are being wasted annually on these pointless pleas.
The charities apparently have no one in management able or
willing to ask whether these mail spampaigns still make any economic sense, if
they ever did. I used to feel bad about the stories of mail carriers dumping
loads of mail in garbage cans rather than delivering it. Now I feel that
they're just saving me a trip to the trash because I've long abandoned asking
anyone to send me anything important by snail mail.
How can the marketers defend this approach of sending millions
of misdirected missives? Their strategy starts with the assumption that an
unsolicited and unwanted gift somehow confers an obligation on the recipient to
reply, respond, or act in any particular manner, other than to laugh at the
squandering of allegedly precious charitable funds. And please don't tell me
that they wouldn't do it if they didn't ultimately bring in more money than the
mailing costs because I'm not sure that even the morons in charge can count.
This is a classic example of the old adage about knowing you're wasting half of
your advertising and marketing dollars, but not knowing which half is being
wasted.
In fairness to the charities, we've seen just as much waste and
stupidity in the digital marketing world. Online advertisers are being sold the
idea that by having random third-party firms create channel-stuffing content
and other promotional pablum-- instead of useful, valuable, and authentic
material -- they can cost-effectively attract and redirect indiscriminate
eyeballs and generate substantial numbers of leads and site traffic. The
emphasis, in case after case, is on the volume of eyeballs instead of actual
attention and focused engagement. The vendors then justify and support this
crappy content with metrics based on clicks instead of cash results. It was a
short-lived scam, which has now largely run its course. There's only so many
times you can spam me with protein supplements, vitamins, cure-alls and diet
compounds before it all gets lost in the clutter and totally ignored.
The context of an attempted conversation and solicitation--
especially in the glutted and noisy digital world-- means far more in many
cases than the content, even if it's well-crafted and actually valuable,
because if the target isn't listening, it doesn't matter what
you're saying or selling. Millions of dollars have been
frittered away on content campaigns that disappear into the ether. That said,
if the material itself is so bland that it could as easily have been written by
ChatGPT, had such a tool existed then, you'd have still been wasting money.
Turns out that it's very difficult to outsource your business's basic selling
propositions unless the prospective partner doing the work invests heavily in
the research necessary to learn enough about your business to be almost as good
as you are in telling your story.
To make matters worse, there hasn't been any useful tracking for
the clients of the reach, response, and results of the tons of commoditized
content being launched into space, or of the ROI -- which should have been the
point of the entire process. No leads, no prospects, no sales, and no outcome
data -- nothing but noise. The last several years have seen hundreds of these
counterfeit content marketing startups come and go, and the single shortcoming,
which they all seem to share, is the absence of any substantive measurement
tools to accurately report real dollar and cents results. You can't manage what you can't measure. And
eventually, almost everyone catches on and no one re-ups. Client and customer
churn in the industry was constant and there were no "second sales."
The post-pandemic
emphasis on profitability and demonstrable results has helped to wash out many
of the pretenders and even some of the otherwise viable players who failed to
adapt to the new demands of the marketplace by streamlining and automating critical
parts of their businesses. The survivors have changed their pitches -- from
conceptual to concrete-- and they're leading the charge with proof and use
cases.
If you're still looking for a outsourced solution in this area,
and if you're a business without a boatload of marketing and writing talent
already on board, make sure you ask for answers upfront.
The clear winners should be able to show you success stories and improvements
in four or five critical categories. Not every one of these metrics will be at
the top of your list of objectives, but each of them is making someone's
business grow and prosper.
The basic buckets, where you should see baselines and then a
record of clear improvements, are the following for almost every business: (1)
direct lead generation; (2) referred traffic leads; (3) social media traffic
leads; (4) organic traffic leads; (5) exposure, redirect and shared blog and paper
publication; and (6) website/domain authority and links-- referrals and
keywords. Each of these areas and metrics is its own world of data, processes,
measurement, and relative weight, which will vary by company and concerns. But
each is worth examining, understanding, and discussing carefully before you
choose a managed services vendor for any outsourced marketing.
Trial-and-error solutions or DIY attempts to deal with the costs
and complexities of these matters aren't smart bets for most SMBs. Look for a
one-stop, experienced partner who has assembled a comprehensive set of
integrated solutions and used them effectively and efficiently for others. Lean
on and learn from someone who's already been there and done it.