Expert advice

Television fundraising - not just for big budgets

Fundraising | Derek Humphries | 13 Oct 2009

TV is not just for the big guns, small charities can find it a value for money fundraising mechanism too. Derek Humphries offers tips on how to get the most bang for your buck on the box.

I’ve never met a good cause that doesn’t have great stories to tell. And stories are fundraising gold. Like any gold, a bit of excavation and heavy lifting can be required to unearth a strong narrative seam. But once you find the stories that represent the heartbeat of your cause you need to cherish them and deploy them effectively.

All charities have the chance to convey their mission, vision, their need, and the importance of support in ways that are dramatic, emotive, and compelling. And in the past few years I’ve seen that this can be done wonderfully effectively across the world through TV.

And the great news is that you don’t have to be a huge charity brand to make use of TV. ‘TV is expensive’ is a lazy sound-bite. And I find it’s quite untrue when one looks at the return on investment, lifetime value, and low attrition rates of TV-recruited supporters.

Two quick examples

The Born Free Foundation is a relatively small, UK- based not-for-profit.  Among its great work, it rescues captive animals and where possible releases them back into their natural habitat. Their animal adoption drtv campaign is a rare example of using humour to introduce a fundraising ask, and a great example of a well-focused fundraising product. While the creative works well, much of the campaign’s success relies on what you can’t see: effective response handling and upgrading at the call centre. Careful scripting and call handling meant that respondents were buying multiple-adoptions as well as then signing up to monthly giving.

If Born Free is relatively small, WSPA is the opposite – a major international animal welfare cause working closely with 900+ member organisations worldwide. Starting with the UK success of its Eyes ad, WSPA has successfully adapted a number of creative treatments to run in countries across Europe, North America, and Australasia.

Of course, this is effective in a number of ways. It’s cost-effective as it avoids the great wastage of trying to re-invent the wheel in each country. And of course it ensures consistent global brand-literate fundraising which becomes increasing important in this world of fundraising sans frontiers.

Just like all forms of fundraising, drtv will be more effective if it is driven by fundamental fundraising principles:

• Is the need clear? Of course you will want to let people know how their money will make a difference. But do avoid dedicate too much of your ad to ‘the solution’. Without a clear need, people won’t give.
• People give to meet a need more than to support an organisation. So make an ad to inspire donations, not to educate people about your cause and organisation.
• Urgency always helps.
• So too does authenticity: many causes can make an effective ad using existing footage. This doesn’t need to be of fabulous quality – emotional engagement is more important

 
So far, so relatively obvious, but what about the specifics of creating a strong drtv ad? It’s a tough challenge to juggle imagery, voice-over, music, captions, an effective call to action… and all of this within 60 seconds! The following should help:

• Quality not quantity: you don’t need days of footage to make an ad. It will be a few seconds of powerful footage that make or break it.
• Scripting: use words when you need them, but not merely to describe what people are seeing. Keep the voice-over succinct. And remember, this is the spoken word, not written prose. And when writing ads for international usage remember that English is more compact that most other languages. So, for example, 60 seconds of spoken English can become 80 seconds of German or Italian.
• Soundtrack: neglect it and you have missed a big opportunity for emotional engagement. But be wary of a soundtrack that is too intrusive or that drowns out the voice or overwhelms the imagery. You need to be especially careful when using tracks with strong lyrics as these need to be co-ordinated very closely with the voice-over. A recognizable track can be powerful, but can also take a long time and tenacious negotiation to secure. Even if the recording artist agrees to you using a track, the decision rests with the publishing company. As an alternative, composed music is an option and can be written specifically to work with your creative concept. Or maybe consider a sound-bed to give an aural texture to an ad.
• Voice-over: you will need a credible, engaging voice to do justice to your script. A celebrity supporter is an option. Of course, a celebrity won’t work just because they are a celebrity. It needs to be the right celebrity, with the right voice. Alternatively, there are many professional voiceover artists available. 

Getting your ad on air

Don’t laugh, but some causes have made ads before considering if they can be aired. Different countries have different legislation or guidelines in terms of what can and can’t be screened, and which day-parts it can be screened in.

In the majority of countries the decision rests with individual channels, whereas in the UK, we have probably the most structured regulatory regime in the world, via Clearcast.

Whether you are dealing with Clearcast or individual channels, try to see them as the people who will help you get on screen, not a necessary evil. Including them early can save a massive amount of wasted time and money.

Media and time lengths

Many people are surprised that it’s not advisable to run a drtv ad with a phone response mechanism in prime-time tv. The reason is simply that most countries will not have a call centre equipped to manage extreme spikes of response. So daytime media tends to be much more cost-effective.

Whatever approach you take to media, you need to remember that drtv is a direct marketing channel so there is a need to test, learn, roll-out, test, learn, roll-out.

So what might you test?

• Time lengths: the most cost-effective time-lengths tend to be 60 and 90 seconds. Start by testing these. And then go longer or shorter to assess the optimum time-length for the best ROI. This relates to short-form drtv (up to 120 seconds). In some countries there is also the opportunity to try mid-form (180-300 seconds) and long-form (effectively 15-30-minute responsive programming).

• The ask: how much are you asking for and with what frequency?

• Response channel: do you want people to respond by phone, via sms, or by visiting your website. Which works best for you?

• Media: channels on which the ad is aired

• Creative: the overall concept

• Response handling: you might test different call centres, or differing scripting within those call centres.

A portfolio not an ad

Ideally you will work towards having a portfolio of effective ads, not just one ad that you run and run until it burns out. A portfolio approach means you can rest ads, bring back or refresh old ads, and keep the viewing experience fresh.

Derek Humphries is director and strategist at DTV

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