Charity Address Labels Don’t Cut it With Younger Prospects

Published January 4, 2012 | By Elaine Fogel

Do you relate to any of these sentiments on charity address labels?

Enough of those silly address labels already!

If I Get Another Set of Address Labels I'm Going to Scream

The funny thing is that mailing charity labels helps nonprofits raise a lot of money. According to Paradysz's MarketRelevance, which tracks more than 25,000 direct mail solicitations per year, labels were included in nearly one out every three pieces of nonprofit direct mail received.

John Ernst in an AdAge article earlier this year, stated, "Why do they work? They're personal, useful and they connect to the lifestyle of the audience making lots of donations — those who write letters, send greeting cards and send checks to pay the bills. Best of all, address labels are consumable."

Yeah, but who's writing letters, sending greeting cards, and paying bills by post? People over 60.

If nonprofits want to engage younger donors and prospects, they need to use different premiums and tactics and then segment their mailing lists according to age and other factors they're using. Otherwise, charities are going to see their older donors wane over time and none to take their place in this marketing channel.

New technology gives us the means and the ways to do this. Multichannel marketing is proving to work well with younger donors who read mail and also use mobile devices. Surely we'll be seeing some newer premiums and incentives in the nonprofit world in 2012. I hope.

What do you think of charity address labels? Do you respond to them?
If you work for a charity, what has been your success rate using them as premiums?

Bonus: Check out this cute cartoon about address labels from Derek Lieu.