And you are.... ? They don't know who I am. And, they don't care.

Are you using boiler-plate direct mail appeals, based on who you are and not who your targets are? Chances are very strong that you're wasting money.

The difference between communications that do or don't say, convincingly, "Welcome" ... or "Welcome back" ... or "I know you care" ... or "I hope you haven't forgotten us" ... or "If you're like I am" ... that difference can be the difference between extracting money and generating a negative "They don't even know who I am" reaction--or non-reaction.

(Note that adverb--convincingly. We're in the Age of Skepticism, so don't let personalization lapse back into its own boiler-plate.)

Tailoring your message to individual target groups is no big deal, because the core--the ancient "We need help and you're the helper" mantra--doesn't have to change. What do have to change are the opening thrust and the closing "kicker."

You have a first-time donor. What's in order here? Some welcoming, some stroking warmed by "You're making a difference," recognition, the cleverly constructed implication that as an insider the individual now shares some responsibility--professional salesmanship paralleling a Lincoln dealer welcoming a new owner who traded in a Cadillac.

Then what?

Assuming you've done all that and done it professionally, do you then shift the name into the multidonor stack?

Not yet.

If you have the creative resources to handle it, you send a second-stage appeal that, subtly or overtly, positions the donor in the guilt-generating limbo separating one-shots from veterans.

Astute nonprofit professionals know what their astute contemporaries in commerce know: Treating "iffy" semi-customers with extraordinary grace and acceptance does pay off. The future of a single-shot donor is either lucrative or frustrating. Drop-offs are part of the hunt, and we accept the percentile losses as natural. What we shouldn't accept is losing a new donor to a more aggressive, more psychology-savvy competitor. And that's what every other nonprofit is--a competitor.

It starts with the envelope

If the new donor is in your database as the result of a direct mail appeal, use that same medium to begin the cementing process.

What should you put on the envelope? That's not only a good question, it can be a crucial question. If you haven't been testing envelope copy, oops. The best time to start testing is yesterday. And don't be surprised to discover that, contacting new donors, no envelope copy might bring better results than all the fustian, bombast, and obviously phony stroking we see on our competitors' envelopes.

Why is that? Because, even though seminars and books and articles preach the significance of envelope copy, that very preaching has an underside: Sending a mailing with no envelope copy can be the most personal communication you can muster. Certainly the notion is worth testing, especially when turning up the initial heat on new donors.

Can you personalize?

The "Bulk Theory" of donor acknowledgment is (opinion) less effective than the "Singular Theory." You don't have to extend the concept to an "adopt a highway" level, which many find obfuscatory--and obfuscation is the bitter enemy of effective fundraising. You should suggest, especially to new donors, what benefit the contribution has wrought. And that benefit is singular, not bulk.

So you have made it possible to buy those books for the library ... or feed a hungry child for a week ... or buy warm clothing for the kid who's shivering in thin rags ... or repair the cracked stained glass window ... or keep a patient alive ... or help educate a worthy but needy student.

You get the idea: Benefit is personalized, not generalized. There is ample evidence that naming huge organizational goals is a turnoff to donors, and new donors are especially likely to disappear if they sense impending exploitation.

The cousin of generalized benefit is the statistic. Percentages are deadly. Take a look at any appeal, whether in print or verbalized or on the Web. As practice, if that appeal uses percentages, rewrite it, replacing the percentages with examples. You'll invent the examples, but the originator has them at hand and hasn't used them. That nonprofit marketer doesn't know what you know: You always have more personal verbiage than a percentage, to describe what you need and how the individual can and should participate.

Stems, not flowers

One not so subtle change the Internet has wrought on all facets of force-communication is the supremacy of forthrightness. Flowery wording is out; straightforward communication is in.

That means fewer adjectives and more specific nouns and verbs. If you were writing retail copy, you'd recognize that, well into the 21st century, you're selling pants, not trousers. That concept makes equal sense in the charity world, because, like Wal-Mart and Sears and Saks and Neiman Marcus and Target, you're competitive with all those other charities out there. Straightforward wins.

Don't grope for words that show off your vocabulary, because those are the words that erode the impression of sincerity.

That brings us to another moment of truth. How lavish should your presentation be, both for attracting donors and for holding them?

Big, colorful brochures implicitly are a pro and a con. Positive: They reflect stability and position. Negative: They imply wasting money on flash, rather than targeting expenses toward goals of goodness. Here, absolutely, is a test-area. Brochures can enhance response ... and they can suppress response. Within the brochures enhancing response, full color can bring in more donations than two colors ... or fewer donations than two colors. Commercial/financial mailers often report that full color damages response because attention is drawn to production instead of reader-benefit.

If you include ancillary enclosures, ask yourself what purpose these enclosures accomplish. Yes, you want to validate the purpose of your organization and the position it enjoys in making the world a better place.

No, you don't want to say so much the very over-exposition makes your words suspect. You become like Shakespeare's Hamlet--"The lady doth protest too much, methinks."

Straightforward pays

Apparent sincerity cements a relationship far tighter than any amount of strutting and chest-thumping. Although "We need help" has become a worn-out cliche, treating new donors as though they've joined your board of directors and are sharing inside information is another reflection of fund raising professionalism.

Does that mean you send a printed or online newsletter? Careful, now. A too-common mistake is loading up with names and events with which the new donor can't relate. Follow the Yellow Brick Road pre-paved for you by businesses that live or die by their ability to recruit and milk new customers. It's hard to beat "You" ... and "We" become competitive only when we tie ourselves to "You."

Easy, isn't it? For the genuine professional, the Yellow Brick Road, as Dorothy and her four pals (that includes Toto, too) found out, is actually paved with gold.

Herschell Gordon Lewis is the principal of Lewis Enterprises, Fort Lauderdale, Fla., consulting with and writing direct response copy for clients worldwide. His 28th book, Asinine Advertising, was recently published. Among his other books are How to Write Powerful Fund Raising Letters; a recently-published new edition of On the Art of Writing Copy; Marketing Mayhem; and Effective E-Mail Marketing. His Web site is www.herschellgordonlewis.com.