NWF Moves Quickly on Spill With Direct Mail
Timing is everything in dealing with a news-focused fundraiser. When an oil rig exploded on April 20, spilling oil into the Gulf of Mexico and threatening the surrounding ecosystem, the National Wildlife Federation (NWF) thought it had a short window to get an effort in the mail to piggyback on news coverage.
The pipeline leaked for nearly three months before a cap could stanch the flow. The Federation, in contrast, got its mailing out in under three weeks.
“It was a restricted mailing,” says Martina White, NWF director of marketing, membership acquisitions and renewals. “The money raised is going to the Gulf, not to keeping our lights on, and we wanted to give our members the opportunity to help as quickly as they could.”
Why not use e-mail? In part because the NWF has traditionally used mail for its fundraising efforts, and in part because e-mail coverage within its file tops out at around 12% to 15%.
The NWF selected 850,000 high-performing individuals — the top 85% of its million-name donor file — more than twice its usual targets. It relied entirely on house lists, and assumed recipients would understand that a low-production-value mailer design reflected the urgency of the appeal.
Still, the NWF analyzed donor histories and tailored each letter's ask ladder to reflect recent contribution levels.
To reduce turnaround time, Shawn Salta, a vice president at DirectMail.com, recommended a personalized 14-inch drop-cut letter, which would allow the letter and the reply to be laser personalized in one pass at the bindery. A # 10 outer envelope with a clear window eliminated the need to set up a separate run for envelopes.
Once the NWF signed off on the package's creative design from its agency, Merkle, it took only five days to get the campaign into the mail stream.
