Evolutionary Philanthropy

Welcome to this edition of Beat Behind Each and Every Product, where we, cover the latest products and features in our platform at Click and Pledge.

And our mission here, it's always the same. It's really focused on one thing.

Helping you. Yeah. Helping you become a more effective fundraiser and, you know, maximizing every single interaction you have with your community.

Exactly.

And today we are diving deep into a framework, a concept really, that we believe is well, it's indispensable for truly strategic fundraising.

It is. It's an analogy that we've borrowed from the world of, biological research and it completely reframes how you should look at the entire life cycle of your donor relationships.

We're talking about evolution.

That's right. The core insight, it comes from a geneticist, Theodosia Stobzanski. He famously said something that became the central tenet of modern biology.

Which was?

Nothing in biology makes sense except in the light of evolution. You know, if you take away concepts like adaptation and natural selection, the whole biological world just becomes a bunch of random confusing details.

Okay, so we're taking that exact framework?

J: We are. We're adapting it it to establish what we think is the essential principle for successful nonprofit work, which is nothing in fundraising makes sense except in the light of understanding the individual donors' evolution with your organization.

I love that.

It's not just a clever line, it provides the logic, you know, the indispensable logic for your entire engagement strategy.

It really does because it immediately implies that if we ignore that timeline, if we just neglect the donors history, we're basically engaging in what we call nonsense fundraising. We're sending out messages that are frankly doomed to fail simply because they're completely disconnected from that donor's reality.

That's it.

So, over the next few minutes we're going to unpack that. We're going to define what donor evolution looks like, what the measurable stages are, and how prioritizing this tracking lets you eliminate those common nonsensical mistakes that cost you time, budget,

and On donor loyalty! That's the big one.

The critical part.

So when you think about that original biological insight, without understanding those historical processes, you know, adaptation, selective pressure, all that biological features seem totally arbitrary.

Right. And think about it this way, this is what makes the analogy so powerful. Why does a modern whale still have tiny little vestigial leg bones deep inside its body?

Or,

and this is a really urgent one today, why are some strains of bacteria now completely resistant to our best antibiotics?

Those features only make sense when you understand the organism's past. Its environment, the pressures it adapted to over millions of years. Evolution gives you the narrative.

The underlying logic.

Exactly, the cause and effect. Without that framework, biology is just a collection of trivia. With it, it becomes a coherent story of adaptation and survival.

So now let's take that powerful lens and apply it directly to the donor in your We recommend you start viewing each donor as a unique entity.

Almost like an individual organism or a specific species within your community.

Right. And they carry their own unique genetic code. And that code is measurable data. It's their past interactions, their giving history, what motivates them, their communication preferences, all of it.

And if you ignore those differences, if you treat all donors as if they're identical,

everyone.

You're fundamentally ignoring their history, you're ignoring their current stage of adaptation, and that's a really costly error.

We can't stress this enough. We recommend never falling into that trap of thinking one size fits all. The individualized data is the key. That unlocks their evolutionary story.

And donor evolution, it's not a static list of stages. It's a dynamic ongoing process. It's about how that donor adapts and changes in their relationship with you. It's constant movement.

And it's driven by these selective pressures and environmental factors to keep the analogy going.

Yes. So what are these pressures in the fundraising world? Well, they're highly measurable. A selective pressure could be the quality of your communication. Did that recent email campaign actually resonate or did it just feel like a nuisance?

And the environmental factors could be things like the observable impact of your work, your stewardship efforts, maybe a big change in financial capacity.

Or just getting too many irrelevant, poorly timed appeals.

So we need a map, a kind of a phylogenetic tree for our donors.

I love that. A phylogenetic tree.

Because we recommend tracking specific stages of adaptation. A donor almost never leaps from a first time $10 gift to a major gift overnight. It's a traceable progressive path.

And that's what our fundraising command center is built to do to track that path.

The journey usually begins when they are a small gift, first time donor. You can think of them as a nascent species. Yeah. Just establishing their little niche in your ecosystem.

A single small test donation.

Exactly.

And the next crucial adaptation is when they become a recurring monthly Now they've successfully adapted to a stable niche. They've incorporated your organization into their predictable budget.

That shows a huge behavioral commitment. And we recommend celebrating that adaptation explicitly with them. After that, we often see diversification. This donor might start coming to events, maybe they volunteer, maybe they become a social media advocate for you.

They're expanding their role beyond just a financial transaction. We suggest tracking that participation data right alongside giving data to see that shift.

Then there's the fourth stage, increasing their giving capacity. They're moving from mid level to high end gifts.

This is successful adaptation and growth. It's often stimulated by a personal life change or maybe receiving a highly personalized impact report that just affirms their investment. They are thriving.

But we also have to track the the bumps in the road, the moments of environmental volatility.

Lapsing and being reactivated.

Right. They experienced some kind of shift, a competing priority, maybe poor stewardship on your part that led to a temporary extinction from active giving.

But with the right reactivation campaigns, they can readapt and reengage, and often with renewed loyalty if you handle it correctly.

And the ultimate goal, the sort of highly evolved specialized form of the donor is the major gift or the legacy gift giver. They're fully integrated, deeply committed, they are a stable specialized species in your base.

And if you're monitoring this specific path, every single interaction you have with them makes sense. You know the why behind their current status.

So let's talk about what happens when you don't do this, when you ignore this history.

Well, when we fail to look at fundraising through this evolutionary lens, our efforts become fundamentally incoherent. They stop making sense to the donor.

Because the organization is acting like their past history just doesn't exist? And this disconnect, it plays out in really specific, measurable, and highly costly pitfalls that we recommend you actively work to eliminate.

Let's start with the most obvious one.

The Problem of Irrelevant asks. This mistake is. It's pervasive. Imagine sending a $5,000 major gift solicitation to a donor whose entire history is one $10 donation from two years ago.

Or the other way around asking a dedicated recurring donor to make an one time gift appeal that completely ignores their stable monthly commitment.

It just breaks the narrative of their evolution. It's jarring.

Then there's the issue of poor segmentation. If you treat all your newly adapted donors the same as your first time event attendees, you're ignoring the species specific adaptations they've already made.

Which leads to generic communication. You're not speaking their language.

Right. And maybe the most frustrating error of all.

Missed opportunities.

Yes. Not recognizing that a loyal volunteer who just got a promotion at work suddenly has increasing capacity.

Or failing to acknowledge a small gift donor who has attended four of your last five events. Because you weren't tracking their behavioral evolution, you missed the perfect moment for a deeper connection and a larger, more sustained ask.

Wait, can we just pause on that biological analogy for a second? Sure. Earlier you mentioned donors going extinct. That sounds a little harsh, doesn't it? Mean, does a donor who skips one annual appeal really qualify as an extinct species?

It does sound harsh, but it really speaks to the ultimate When we say go extinct, what we mean is they exit your active donor population attrition. When you send a generic thank you that fails to acknowledge their specific history or your appeals ignore their demonstrated evolutionary stage, you are actively creating a hostile environment for them.

So they disengage.

They disengage because the relationship lacks context and meaning. And they go extinct from your database, that failure to nurture the relationship. That's why tracking their evolution is so critical.

And this brings us to the enlightenment, the massive benefit that comes when you fully understand the donor's journey.

Their origin, their current motivations, their engagement history, their potential. Suddenly, communication, every request, every stewardship touchpoint makes profound undeniable sense.

Because you're speaking to their specific adapted needs.

And understanding donor evolution is inherently predictive, isn't Just like a biologist can predict how a species might adapt to a changing climate.

Understanding your data allows you to anticipate their next evolutionary step. We can then purposefully guide them toward deeper engagement and long term loyalty.

Instead of just waiting passively for them to move on their own. So what does this all mean for your strategy? We suggest you shift your focus completely. This evolutionary analogy moves fundraising away from being a static transaction just getting that one donation, to nurturing a dynamic, ongoing, evolving partnership.

And that shift transforms fundraising into something far more strategic, personalized, meaningful.

And, critically, a much more successful endeavor.

So we want to leave you with one final thought to consider today.

Take a moment to assess your own database. How much of your current donor communication is still generic, treating a major donor the same as a first timer?

And what specific data points, not just donation amounts, but event attendance, communication preferences, volunteer hours? Could you start tracking today in your fundraising command center to immediately begin seeing your donors as these unique, evolving partners?

For more information about this and all Click and Pledge products, make sure to visit clickandpledge.com. You can request a one on one training or a demo there.

And it doesn't matter if you're a client already or just curious about our platform, just ask us and we will gladly get together with you to chat.

And please remember, the ability to track this essential donor history segmentation data is absolutely free. It's already part of the Connect platform in our fundraising command center.

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