“Knowledge Marketing helped to fully automate our Pickup Solicitation Program and reduced our marketing costs from $200 CPM to $31 CPM.”
[Solicitation management company of Vietnam Veterans of America-Minnesota]
Challenge
Non-profits often have to run their operations with limited technology and resources resulting in inefficient delivery systems; Vietnam Veterans of America was no different. “We had run our donation pick-up service the same way for over 20 years. It was working, but we knew it could work better,” said the Solicitation Management President. “With consumer preferences changing and rising costs of solicitations (direct mail and telemarketing) we knew we were missing out on additional donor opportunities and loss of incremental revenues.” Knowledge Marketing quickly presented DonationDriver, a turn-key web-based solution designed to manage the solicitation and pickup service for household good donations. “We were a bit skeptical going to an online solution when we didn’t have a single email address from our donors, but recognized this was our opportunity to be an industry leader. Not only did Knowledge Marketing help us organically acquire these email addresses and grow our list but they were instrumental in establishing the ‘automated permission-based mailings’.”
Solution
Traditionally, Vietnam Veterans of America used door-to-door bag placement, telemarketing and direct mail to solicit and schedule donations of the donors’ household goods. Knowledge Marketing’s DonationDriver program did not change what the VVA was currently doing but rather added to their program with impactful results. Knowledge Marketing’s DonationDriver was the perfect solution. This web-based program automated their entire marketing communications that included: emailing Solicitation Messages for household donations, enabling donors to Schedule a Pick Up online, emailed a Thank You Confirmation and sent Reminder Messages just prior to the scheduled pickup. Knowledge Marketing knew the first step for implementation was to quickly grow the client’s email database list that was zero. Their strategy was to use the VVAs current solicitation efforts that included both telemarketing and direct mail to drive potential donors to their website. From there they were asked to opt-in via email to schedule their pickup. Additionally, they also collected emails through their telemarketing service by completing a simple web-based form. For the VVA, automation was critical not only to grow the donor list but to maintain it as well. Donors could opt-in to email communications which would remove their name from the direct mail list. If a donor did not respond after three emails, their name was automatically added back to the direct mail list. As donors changed their email accounts, they would still be able to be contacted by a secondary method. Vietnam Veterans of America achieved results very quickly utilizing Knowledge Marketing’s solutions.
Results
“They didn’t change the way we do business, they took what we do and made it better,” said the operations team. “This was critical to our business as the internet and email communications continue to become central and core to the business-to-consumer market.” Here are a few of the results:
- 85% opt-in rate to receive solicitations via email within 30 days of launching,
- VVA’s business went from 0% online to 35% online within 12 months,
- Grew email opt-in list from 0 to 50,000,
- Overall costs were reduced 25% due to email solicitations being more cost effective,
- Solicitation costs went from $200 CPM to $31 CPM,
- Implementation took less than 14 days.
“This was a low risk, high return on our investment. I would recommend Knowledge Marketing’s DonationDriver program for any charity pickup service business.”
