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Direct Response Fundraising

How strong is your direct response fundraising practice? This short, evidence-based self-assessment scores your organisation against fundraising standards, shows where your biggest gaps are, and puts the most useful fixes first.
It takes about 10 minutes. Every question is optional, and the more you can share, especially real numbers and documents, the more accurate your result.

Which best describes your organisation on: The NGO has a documented method for calculating donor lifetime value, updated at least annually?

Which best describes your organisation on: The NGO has a documented method for calculating donor lifetime value, updated at least annually?
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Which best describes your organisation on: Each acquisition campaign has an explicit allowable cost per donor target, agreed in advance?

Which best describes your organisation on: Each acquisition campaign has an explicit allowable cost per donor target, agreed in advance?
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Which best describes your organisation on: The NGO prioritizes prospect sources in cost order: MGM, lapsed reactivation, warm contacts, list swaps, then cold lists?

Which best describes your organisation on: The NGO prioritizes prospect sources in cost order: MGM, lapsed reactivation, warm contacts, list swaps, then cold lists?
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Which best describes your organisation on: The NGO maintains a documented profile of its existing donors that is used to guide targeting of cold acquisition?

Which best describes your organisation on: The NGO maintains a documented profile of its existing donors that is used to guide targeting of cold acquisition?
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Which best describes your organisation on: Media and list choices are backed by documented past performance data, not tradition or convenience?

Which best describes your organisation on: Media and list choices are backed by documented past performance data, not tradition or convenience?
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Which best describes your organisation on: Cold lists are selected with broker advice, tested before rollout, and managed to prevent fatigue and duplication?

Which best describes your organisation on: Cold lists are selected with broker advice, tested before rollout, and managed to prevent fatigue and duplication?
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Which best describes your organisation on: The NGO maintains a documented control pack and tests new variants against it systematically?

Which best describes your organisation on: The NGO maintains a documented control pack and tests new variants against it systematically?
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Which best describes your organisation on: Tests are designed to isolate significant variables with adequate sample sizes?

Which best describes your organisation on: Tests are designed to isolate significant variables with adequate sample sizes?
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Which best describes your organisation on: Ask strings are specific, tangible, and calibrated to the target audience's giving capacity?

Which best describes your organisation on: Ask strings are specific, tangible, and calibrated to the target audience's giving capacity?
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Which best describes your organisation on: Fundraising copy meets the Ahern 9-point audit standards?

Which best describes your organisation on: Fundraising copy meets the Ahern 9-point audit standards?
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Which best describes your organisation on: Speed of the first acknowledgment/thank-you communication to new donors?

Which best describes your organisation on: Speed of the first acknowledgment/thank-you communication to new donors?
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Which best describes your organisation on: Response handling capacity is pre-planned and tested before campaign launch?

Which best describes your organisation on: Response handling capacity is pre-planned and tested before campaign launch?
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Which best describes your organisation on: Campaigns use key codes enabling response attribution by media, list, segment, and creative variant?

Which best describes your organisation on: Campaigns use key codes enabling response attribution by media, list, segment, and creative variant?
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Which best describes your organisation on: The full set of standard direct response metrics is calculated for each campaign?

Which best describes your organisation on: The full set of standard direct response metrics is calculated for each campaign?
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Suggested uploads

These are optional. If you can share a few, we can check your answers against real evidence and give you a sharper, more useful result:

• LTV model documentation or spreadsheet
• Campaign briefs showing allowable cost targets
• Breakeven analysis per channel
• Prospect source hierarchy or acquisition funnel documentation
• Donor profile / persona documents
• Database schema or CRM showing profiling fields in use
• Media performance comparison data (response rates, cost per donor by channel)
• List selection records (data cards, broker recommendations)
• Merge-purge documentation
• Control pack documentation
• Test plans and results from last 2-3 campaigns
• Test budget as percentage of total media spend
• Recent acquisition packs / appeal letters
• Self-assessment against Ahern 9-point audit
• Evidence of ask string testing or calibration
• Sample thank-you / welcome communications with send-time data
• Fulfillment process documentation or SOP
• Response capacity planning evidence (call center SLAs, system load tests)
• Campaign results report showing per-segment and per-media metrics
• Key code system documentation
• Evidence of campaign-to-campaign learning loop (next campaign brief referencing previous results)

Upload any of these documents (optional). You can add several files.

A little context

Over the last 3 years, is your work in this area getting better, staying the same, or getting worse?

Over the last 3 years, is your work in this area getting better, staying the same, or getting worse?
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Where do you keep the relevant records?

Where do you keep the relevant records?
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Anything outside your control that recently affected this area? For example a crisis, a funder leaving, or a sector shock.

This is a demo of the tool. If you have any feedback on it, we would appreciate hearing it.