Fighting the Curse of "We've Always Done It This Way"
Part II: Acknowledgements 

Krystina Lucido Wales
Director of Donor Relations & Stewardship
GMBC HealthCare

Changing the mindset of a traditional organization whose donor pool is built on majority older-generation individuals can be difficult. The value in new ideas and approaches must be carefully thought out and qualified.

After much best-practice research and codifying of quality examples, I was given the green light one year ago to implement, essentially, an overhaul of our organization's standard acknowledgement process.

The department was the victim of "we've always done it this way." However, on the cusp of a major campaign, it was important we solidified a strong, streamlined and effective stewardship strategy that relied on a combination of automation and customization.

I relied heavily on findings from Penelope Burk's book, Donor-Centered Fundraising, which gives high-quality and relatable examples from actual donors on preferences and perspectives.

The forthcoming tactics might seem obvious to some but were revolutionary to our organization.

In September 2019, we began differentiating online gifts versus offline gifts in our acknowledgements. Gifts made online received an automatically-generated receipt, whereas in the past we were batch downloading gifts made online and mailing receipts. In addition, each online gift received an automatically-generated thank-you message at the time of their gift, customized depending on the fund selected.

In her book, Penelope advised each appeal tie to a specific, restricted priority because "an unrestricted ask limits measurable impact and forces fundraisers to rely on selling the brand.” As a stewardship director, I found this tactic especially meaningful because in the past, when our annual fund director created appeals, it was difficult to subsequently create meaningful, customized stewardship if the designations were open-ended. By having the fund directors select a designee to prioritize, it allowed both parties to strengthen storytelling, asks, acknowledgements and future reporting.

Customized, handwritten thank-you notes from me became part of our acknowledgement process five years ago, but had been sent in conjunction with a standard, form acknowledgement letter. Even though those letters were slightly customized based on fund designation, they were formal and did not allow for donor-by-donor customization. It began to feel like overkill to send multiple communications designed to accomplish the same goal—thanking the donor and making them feel good about their gift. Handwritten notes give the flexibility and closer personal touch we were looking for. Beginning last year, we eliminated the form thank-you letter and kept the handwritten thank you. The response has been positive.

For online gifts, I began sending customized email messages from my personal work email. Alternatively, offline gifts receive a handwritten thank-you note from me if they are below $10,000, which is our organization's major gift threshold.

Gifts more than $10,000 do not receive handwritten thank-you notes, but instead receive typed letters signed by our president and CEO. Because these letters are drafted for each donor by the relationship manager, they are highly personal, which meets the qualifications we were aiming to accomplish with this new process.

Overall, the changes to the acknowledgement process were seamless and effective. We received zero pushback from donors, and the adjustment even allowed for online donors to respond in real time with their own appreciation or by sharing their story.

When the pandemic hit, the stability of our acknowledgement process came in handy. We created a HealthCare Workers Fund for donors to support the frontline, and our ability to readily acknowledge those gifts and create monthly impact emails and messaging became essential and worthy follow-up.

Though it took some coaxing to expand our program and try new things, the results have been encouraging and special for donors. In the end, our goal is to ensure they feel heard, acknowledged and appreciated. Iterating new and special ways to do that is a core part of our job, and revamping our acknowledgement process did just that.