RESPONSE AND COOPERATION

A question that often arises when we discuss survey research with our clients is “why do we need a good response rate to a survey?” A high response is important because it ensures that the people who respond truly represent everyone else like them who did not have a chance to respond.

In its most basic form, response rate is the number of complete interviews divided by the number of eligible names in the sample. The definitions of “complete” and “eligible names,” however, can vary widely from one research organization to the next. Associations of research professionals like AAPOR and CASRO recognize at least six definitions of response rate, yielding various rates of return. Research firms can use the formula they prefer. To further complicate things, mail, telephone and in-person surveys have slightly different formulas.

The cooperation rate is the rate of people reached who agree to take a phone survey. This rate varies quite a bit depending upon the survey sample, and whether the survey sponsor is revealed or blind. Revealed surveys among nonprofit constituents tend to yield much higher cooperation rates, while blind surveys yield lower rates.

Campbell Rinker often uses the following methods to improve response rates among survey populations. These are presented in the order of observed effectiveness in increasing the cooperation rate, which eventually leads to an improved response rate:

• Reveal the sponsor of the survey to be an entity, organization, product or service for which the respondent has some known affinity or loyalty. This approach is not appropriate when gathering perceptions about other organizations, or for gauging reactions to concepts that will not be “branded” with the organization's name.

• Offer a cash incentive for participating in the research. Non-profit organizations should be careful in doing this, especially if the organization is evidently the sponsor of the research.

• Mail a letter in advance of a phone survey to prospective respondents, indicating when and why you might call them.

• Offer goods, services, discounts or coupons as a participation incentive.

• Offer to make a donation on the respondent's behalf to one of several worthy causes. Let the respondent select from a list of organizations as the first question in the survey.

• Offer a sweepstakes as an incentive. If you use this approach, be sure to include disclosures about the likelihood of winning (“the chances of winning depends upon the number of submissions, but is no less than 1 in [total invitations sent]”). Organizations with socially conservative constituents should take care with this approach, as it carries connotations of games-of-chance. Some charitable organizations turn this concept upside down by humorously indicating that an undesirable prize (such as a live goat) will be given to a randomly selected non-respondent.

• Send a personalized reminder notice for mail and web surveys, or schedule callbacks for phone surveys.

Using one or more of these techniques can help your research produce more representative response, which means that you and your organization finish your research project with results you can better depend on.

Of course, you have to make sure the sample list is random in the first place. But that's another column!

DONOR DELIGHT, PART II:
Tracking the Waves and the Currents

In our last issue, we looked at the concept of donor satisfaction and delight, discussing how measuring donor attitudes can help nonprofits manage donor relationships with concrete goals in mind. In this issue, we continue on that topic with a deeper discussion of two unique areas of measurement: Donor Behavior and Donor Attitudes.

The basic question comes down to whether fundraisers plan based on the waves or based on the currents. Let me explain.

Donor behavior describes all the outward appearances of a donor's activity. The acts of writing, calling, giving, engaging, volunteering, attending and recommending a charity to friends are all desirable outward donor behaviors. There are also undesirable donor behaviors, typically indicated by the absence of a positive behavior.

Most sophisticated nonprofit organizations track donor behavior as a means of relating to donors on a more personal level. Tracking the outward evidence of giving, volunteering, or attending drives the categories by which the donors are classified, impacts a nonprofit's treatment of them, and helps shape the measurements of fundraising success.

On the most simplistic level, donor behavior occurs as a reaction to some trigger event – a sort of cause and effect relationship. Though not a deep, psychological explanation, this is how donors (who rarely think deeply about their giving) see it and report it.

However, like an iceberg with 90% of its mass underwater, we know that behavior is influenced in ways that are not immediately visible. A recent survey we conducted among 3,000 lapsed and active donors shows they were very unlikely to view any event in their personal lives or in the world around them as causing a decrease in their giving behavior. Yet they were much more likely to say that not giving was triggered by their perceptions of a nonprofit. This research supports the notion that giving is “all systems go” until some barrier influence rises up to challenge the emotional motivation.

My colleague Adrian Sargeant of the University of Bristol in England has developed a comprehensive map of donor behavior that shows how a donor, before reaching a decision to give, goes through a veritable gauntlet of attitudinal influences. These influences have an enormous impact on donor behavior. The things your organization does to trigger the donor's decision process are like waves hitting the top of the iceberg – a lot of visible activity, but little immediate impact on the direction the iceberg takes.

The thing is, the waves are what fundraisers typically measure. We can easily see them, and see their impact. Unfortunately, fundraisers rarely measure the currents. And the currents that flow beneath the surface have the power to stop the iceberg cold, or force it in a completely new direction. Like deep ocean currents, donor attitudes have much more influence on the direction of a donor's behavior than they are credited with.

Certainly, donor attitudes are quite complex. Sargeant's excellent model shows us that perceptions, experiences, habits, heritage and values all shape the donor's reaction to your nonprofit's appeal. These attitudes work both ways. Just as they supply the principal momentum to any donor's loyalty to a nonprofit, they are also the first line of defense in checking the emotional impulse to give.

So, in addition to measuring the impact of the “waves,” it makes sense to measure the “currents.” In fact, by measuring the currents of donor attitudes, we can predict in most cases which direction our donor will travel – toward future gifts, or away from them. All of this begs the question “which donor attitudes should we measure to provide that answer?”

According to Sargeant, “research among nonprofits shows satisfaction and commitment to have a strong positive impact on donor behavior and retention, and that the optimum solution for predicting future behavior is to measure both. If the goal is to track trends over time and to provide rudimentary diagnostics, in my view there is rarely a need to move beyond a generic instrument.”

“Clients often suspect that they will be different,” he says “but the same factors always seem to emerge from the qualitative and quantitative research.” (Our research backs up this claim, especially for mass fundraisers. However, donors acquired through events, personal solicitation or friend-to-friend efforts are likely to have different satisfaction drivers).

Sargeant continues, “the essential drivers of satisfaction and commitment are dimensions that are core to every direct marketing environment and therefore relevant to every direct marketing organization. While the basic questions may not address every facet of service quality, they don't have to. Although I may only be measuring 40% of the construct, it is enough to be able to track long term trends as a consequence of changes in development strategy – and when used with importance and expectations – enough to take meaningful managerial decisions.”

Armed with a few satisfaction and commitment insights from a short survey instrument, an organization can predict the future behavior of about 80% of surveyed donors (no, this is not a typo!), based on comparing survey responses to subsequent giving over the long term.

Should organizations measure the waves? Absolutely. But because the fundamental donor attitudes have so great an impact on giving, it makes eminent sense to also measure the underlying currents of donor satisfaction and commitment on an ongoing basis.

Next time, our final article on Donor Delight will discuss how an organization might actually begin to measure satisfaction and commitment on an ongoing basis and use the findings to develop stronger relationships with donors.