Telling a Compelling Story
Lesson 2
Watch and listen to a recording with slides, or read the full text below. NOTE: Some pieces of the video content may be outdated. Rely on the text below for the most up-to-date content.
After completing the basics of your organization’s profile, you’ll need to complete your organization’s “About” section, the most important part of your organization’s page because it’s where you make your case for support: Why should donors give to your cause? We’ll call this your organization’s “story.”
What you write for this section is not for this section alone, because it can and should translate to all your campaign communications. In other words, your case for support on your organization’s profile should be reflected in your campaign emails, social media posts, phone banking scripts, and so on. We’ll go into depth about how to do this in later courses. Ensuring that your campaign is integrated in this way improves your donors’ experience and increases the chances that they’ll give.
Consider these five principles in crafting a compelling story.
Simplicity
Prospective donors will probably spend only a couple minutes on your profile, so make sure it is short (no more than a few hundred words), easy to understand and digest, and easy on the eyes. A wall of text listing all your organization’s services and accomplishments is often not an effective tactic, because it is hard for prospective donors to digest.
Clarity of fundraising purpose
What are you raising money for? Describing a specific program or purpose – one with clear impact – is often more effective than fundraising for general operations, because it feels more tangible.
In the past, we were able to use Give OUT Day to raise funds for a specific event we were having: bringing together families from around the state for a summit on family acceptance in Spanish. The funds we raised helped us sponsor families to attend free of charge.
Martiza Martinez
Somos Familia, Leaderboard Winner
Our campaign was centered on our rapid response to COVID-19 through the development of a new virtual program, PFLAG Connects, for our 400+ Chapters.
Maggie Ardiente
PFLAG National
Specificity of donor impact
Donors often want to know how their, say, $20 donation will make a difference. Can you quantify donor impact? In the next lesson, we’ll cover how to display this information as donors are in the donation checkout process.
Strong, urgent ask
Consider linking your fundraising ask to Pride Month, and be sure to let donors know what’s at stake: thousands in additional prize money! Above all, always put the donor at the center of your ask.
Emotional appeal
Facts and figures can be helpful in making your case for support, but stories that demonstrate your impact, such as testimonials from clients, are often most effective at persuading prospective donors to give.
Example: Oasis Legal Services, Leaderboard Winner
Oasis Legal Services leveraged emotional appeal through a client story on their primary fundraising page:
For years, Maria was terrified that her children, Sebastian and Angela, would learn that she is lesbian. While Maria had the strength to survive ostracization and rejection in her home country of Nicaragua, she knew that her kids' rejection would cause emotional damage from which she would never recover.
Oasis offered Maria acceptance, encouragement, and pride. After meeting with her Oasis team and applying for asylum, Maria was finally able to embrace her true identity. She obtained a work permit. She dropped her kids off at school and didn't worry all day that if she got caught up in an ICE raid, no one would be there to pick her kids up from school.
Maria came out to Sebastian and Angela in 2019 and they have embraced who she really is. In order to celebrate their mother, they attended San Francisco Pride with her in 2019 (pictured below).
“Thank you very much for everything the Oasis team has done for me. . . Thanks to you and my work permit, my life has changed completely. . . I am happy being who I am, complete with my children. I am very happy knowing that they are happy, too.”
Asylum seekers like Maria need your support now more than ever. Join our Oasis community as we stand together to ensure that LGBTQ+ immigrants are protected.
