‘Message nerd’ explains what nonprofits get wrong about communication | RKD Group: Thinkers

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Justin McCord (00:04.93)

Welcome to the Arcade Group Thinkers by guest. I'm your host Justin McCord with me is Ronnie Richard. Ronnie, I didn't smack.

Ronnie Richard (00:13.344)

I'm impressed, I'm impressed. Well done.

Justin McCord (00:17.168)

I just did. Dang it. Listen, what a thrilling conversation we just had with this guest. Someone who brings a wealth of experience and I feel re-grounded in some of the principles of communication period.

Ronnie Richard (00:18.946)

Ugh!

Ronnie richard (00:42.828)

Honestly, yeah. mean, our guest today, Tom Ahern calls himself a copywriter or a message nerd. And it, almost took me back a little bit to college courses that I had when I started in journalism, some of those like truly foundational pieces and aspects of writing that you sometimes take for granted and you don't think about how it works into the communications you do today. Tom,

You know, it was really fascinating to for him to kind of take us through his path of how he got started and how he got into the nonprofit space and just some of those those lessons he learned really about just how we communicate human to human.

Justin McCord (01:27.95)

and headline to headline. And so for the message nerds, the communication nerds, everyone that listens, I saw you raise your hand, for everyone that listens or watches this that has to write in their career, this is an important conversation to listen to and to really dial in on how headlines matter.

And it makes me think of even the simple principle of bottom line upfront, the bluff method of communication. so without any further delay or ellipses or dashes, here is Tom Ahern on the Thinkers podcast.

Ronnie Richard (02:19.758)

Tom, want to start with a simple question out of the gate. What are your feelings on the Dash today?

Tom Ahern (02:24.064)

huh.

Tom Ahern (02:29.698)

The dash.

Ronnie Richard (02:31.074)

The dash. I wanted to be clear on which one.

Tom Ahern (02:35.502)

Not, yeah, we're not, dear audience, we're not speaking about the N dash. We're speaking about the M dash. Much longer. Um, I don't have feelings about it. use it from time to time. Why, why that question, Ronnie?

Ronnie Richard (02:55.918)

Okay, I'll frame it this way. With the growth of generative AI today in chat GPT, everyone seems to think when they see an dash that that means it was written by AI.

Tom Ahern (03:11.7)

Lord, I hadn't heard that urban myth yet. And maybe it's not a myth. Is that a true indicator?

Ronnie Richard (03:21.134)

It's, what a lot of people think now. And I will say from my perspective, a writer, drives me crazy.

Tom Ahern (03:26.414)

yeah

A lot of people think a lot of things, as we've discovered since social media took over the world. they're not all... Is it true? I'm asking you guys, you're professionals, you know the answer. Is that a true indicator of AI? The M-Date.

Justin McCord (03:50.57)

I don't believe that it's true. I think that we look for reasons to either push a positive or negative perception of generative AI. what may have started as one person's experience has become a headline that others want to run with. And because we live in like an algorithmic state, it becomes easy, right? For that to be the case.

Tom Ahern (04:18.221)

That was left out of the Constitution, but it's true. In the United States, we live by an algorithm.

Justin McCord (04:25.432)

do, we do. Ronnie, I love that even just as a starting point because you have been my editor for years now. And you know the M-Dash and the ellipses are two of my favorite writing tools, you know, and so for better or worse.

Tom Ahern (04:51.756)

Let me ask a question. So the people listening to this, talked about that, directors of development and leadership. So why would they give a flying pigeon about AI? We need to address their pain.

Justin McCord (05:12.432)

well, I think it's a great point. I the reason why is that there is, discourse. There are wars and rumors of wars. are pressures that leaders face. and so I hear from our clients and other leaders that the use of AI.

both at a high level into the tactical level. It's a board level conversation. so, you know, why would

Tom Ahern (05:53.26)

the board get involved in tactical stuff?

Beep! Like AI.

Justin McCord (06:03.822)

Well, why would the board get involved in tactical beep at all? Right? I think that it's the nature of those relationships, which are complicated to say the least.

Tom Ahern (06:18.062)

Complicated. No neurotic. Yes.

Justin McCord (06:24.718)

So complicated and neurotic, those are interesting ways to even think about fundraising overall. so, Tom, you have been in this space since 1980.

Tom Ahern (06:44.43)

Not in this space since 1980. 1980, I was just getting my first full-time job in something related to marketing, which was public relations. That was not, well, it happened to be a state agency, so I worked with nonprofits. were a government agency.

And then I went into a big technology firm for five years where the contracts we were bidding on were worth hundreds of millions of dollars. And from that, I opened up a small ad agency and we did quite well. And then around 2000, fundraising came in the door for me.

Justin McCord (07:41.432)

How did that door open? What was the entree?

Tom Ahern (07:44.886)

Right. Well, my wife had been a consultant to nonprofits since 1985. And it was kind of funny when she came home because, know, was like, I'm going to set up a consulting business for nonprofits. Yeah. The first thought is, that's a great way to go broke. They don't have any money. Why don't you consult with people that could have deep

pockets at least. Anyway, she did, she was quite successful and around 15 years into her career as a consultant, she was speaking internationally and blah, blah. She asked me if I could write a direct mail letter for one of her nonprofit clients and I thought, I don't know. Maybe.

I've written plenty of sales letters. I was a trained sales copywriter and I've sold all sorts of things successfully.

Ronnie Richard (08:58.304)

I thought you done direct mail before. Okay. Yeah.

Tom Ahern (09:00.396)

Well, that's what I meant. I had done direct mail. I had been trained in direct mail. Direct mail was where you get your, your scars and where you get your real knowledge and you, you worship response rates and all the good things that are so important. KPI leadership, those are, you know, response rates. That's a KPI. anyway,

So, you know, the first stuff I did for the nonprofit world, I did for free. I had no idea, you know, whether it would work or not. It must have worked okay. I got better and I got specific fundraising training from people like Mal Warwick and Jerry Panis and Martson Lundy that

consulting firm.

Justin McCord (10:03.064)

Yeah, those are those are some of the greats like those are amongst the pantheon and the the nonprofit direct marketing.

Tom Ahern (10:10.924)

I go higher than that. can go up to Jerry Hunsinger who I subscribed during the 1990s. Jerry Hunsinger sold a monthly course in how to do direct mail fundraising. And I

I bought that course. Now you can get the very same thing for free on sophie.org. All his lessons is like 80 of them. Yeah. What an asset that is to our industry because it's all free. And generously so they really don't, you know, they'd ask you for support, but they don't make a deal of it. Anyway.

Yeah.

Justin McCord (11:09.742)

You've, you have this connection even over the last 26 years, you have this connection to the world's best donor communications practitioners.

Justin McCord (11:30.783)

What have you learned from them? What are like, what are the lessons that stand out that, that these are the things that separate good from great in donor communications.

Tom Ahern (11:43.578)

We all read the same books. That was the first tell. I started getting invited to speak at AFP chapters, the local chapters. Then I got bigger and then I got bigger. The reason for that was I'd seem to be the only person that I met in fundraising who would ever

been a marketer.

I mean, a commercial marketer who lived and died by sales. I mean, some people had that in their background a little bit, but they weren't students of it. I was a student of marketing, the tactical side, not the research side. mean, I basically just, if somebody came along and told me something that sounded 51 % true,

I just run with that and try it. you know, I didn't need a hundred percent proof. anyway.

Justin McCord (12:54.638)

Okay, so here's what's fascinating and why it gets me excited to hear you just share those examples and even your path. I learned direct response by way of writing newspaper ads. So direct response newspaper ads. Yes, my favorite.

Justin McCord (13:18.118)

stuff, right? If everybody could go to bootcamp for newspaper ads, we would have much better communications coming out. Much better offers for one thing.

Justin McCord (13:31.512)

Yes, and inspired equal parts.

Tom Ahern (13:35.57)

Offer what is the structure of an offer? know, how valuable is that headline? Whoa. It's really valuable. Et cetera.

Justin McCord (13:48.16)

And it was, it was under a gentleman named John Spolstra who was an executive in the sports world and a master direct marketer in terms of using direct response print ads to sell tickets. so he took me to school off of equal parts Ogilvy. And so studying the work of Ogilvy, right? That was

Tom Ahern (14:15.642)

And one thing, you know, no matter who you met, if you were both discussing Ogilvy, you knew you had found a soulmate.

Justin McCord (14:26.584)

Yeah. And then the other part was the Peterman catalogs and studying those. so it's so interesting because it is in its own way, that was my boot camp in the early aughts.

Tom Ahern (14:39.15)

That's true. mean, you know, people, yes, all of the above. Peterman is a particularly interesting example. mean, a cultural thing through friends too. Yeah. Yeah.

Justin McCord (14:59.054)

Yeah, right. Yeah.

Tom Ahern (15:02.816)

So anyway, you know, basically study the tides going in and out of culture and try to fit your messaging in there somehow. So it floats rather than sinks.

Ronnie Richard (15:20.43)

So Tom, when you're making this move into starting to work on fundraising and starting to write for fundraising direct mail appeals, what sort of learnings did you take from the marketing side and the commercial side that you brought into it? then on the flip side, like what is what were some of the things that were different that you had to sort of adjust and adapt to?

Tom Ahern (15:30.754)

What?

Tom Ahern (15:46.516)

it was interesting, right? my wife, Simone, told a story. co-wrote a kind of standard text on fundraising called keep your donors. And it's a big fat book that is used like in college classrooms sometimes and so forth. So a lot of people have encountered it, whether they read it or not. Wow. It's a big, thick book.

We knew we weren't going to have kids. So we built a house together that was built around two home studios, basically. So we had home offices in 1988 before home offices were very, you know, they were still weird. The IRS didn't even know what to do. And anyway.

So I'm up in my office on the top floor and she's in her office on the second floor and she described me thumping downstairs with a direct male appeal from some charity that she worked with in my hand shouting, who are these people? What do they think they're doing? This sucks. Which you heard a lot in our house.

I started analyzing donor communications as a self-training operation, as well as trying to provide a public service, taking marketing principles and applying them to what I was seeing. so I started looking at, you know, dozens, then hundreds, then eventually thousands of pieces of donor communication.

The light bulb for me went off when I had about 60 donor newsletters in front of me spread around on the floor because I was going to be doing a talk and they were all the same and they all were horrible. borrowed, what I perceived at the time was that each

Tom Ahern (18:12.888)

charity when they were presented with the communications problem of how do we do a newsletter that goes out to our supporters. They would borrow from some other charity. Yeah, well, this is what they do and we'll do it too. And the principle that was seen to be operational was that if we tell everybody how great we are, we will raise a lot of money.

because they'll reward our success. And they couldn't write headlines worth a lick. they're publishing a newsletter and the market is right on the edge of the internet interrupting everybody's life. We're talking 2000, 2005.

The internet is about to actually, the polar ice cap is about to melt because in 2007, Facebook goes public and the smartphone is introduced by Apple. Boom!

Justin McCord (19:35.958)

Well, and even rewind just a second to, you said, 0405, the tsunami and Katrina and the launch pad for those into digital, even in the early days where your website was a brochure.

Tom Ahern (19:56.686)

Was that 2004, five?

Justin McCord (19:59.448)

Five, five,

Tom Ahern (20:01.422)

Yeah, well, that was the first time I think a lot of the country said, we're not as smart as we think we are.

Justin McCord (20:11.348)

That's, remember that because I was working in my league baseball at the time and we had a, the team that I was with, we had a pitcher who was from the new Orleans area. Ronnie's from the new Orleans area and we had a led, electronic, outfill the walls where you could display advertising. And we did a, a fundraiser to support this picture and, nonprofit organizations that were going into Katrina. It's the first time I remember,

using a URL in a strategic way in terms of what that looked like to drive response.

Tom Ahern (20:49.294)

I just want, mean, give me a picture in my head. What do mean?

Justin McCord (20:55.07)

So we were using, again, 2005, we were telling people in stadium to go to a URL to make a gift in support of Katrina relief efforts. prior to that, I don't remember using that in direct response when we would refer to the print ads that I would do prior to that were far more call in.

is URL orient.

Tom Ahern (21:28.334)

We're in a transition period there where people are beginning to weave this into their behavior. And this is, and this, they want to help. That's what happens with every natural disaster. You know, I mean, it was amazing to me at one point I was down in, I don't know, Australia, I guess. And speaking to people who from the Red Cross,

from all over the Pacific basin, So Australia, Asia, blah, blah, And they were talking about the response to the Haiti earthquake. Red Cross was—money just poured into Red Cross from all over the world because of the Haiti—

earthquake, being front page news, you know, such a long time, people really wanted to help. So they would find, you know, the Red Cross. That was the top brand. anyway, that was, that was when things started to get interesting on the digital side of donor communications.

Justin McCord (22:49.74)

What do you, has stayed the same in donor communications through these waves of the launch and maturation of web and email and social media. What stayed the same in that 20 year period? Because it's easy to understand that channels are where things may be different, but.

Ronnie Richard (23:17.774)

Right. Yeah.

Tom Ahern (23:19.618)

Yeah. listen, it is fascinating question because I, you know, you try to simplify this for people that I do a lot of teaching. So, you try to simplify and make it, make it as easy as breathing. How do you do effective donor communications? No. Well, you only have two things to work with. two and a half.

You have words and you have images. Now digital brings life to it, which is that half. So you have two and a half things to work with and life, you know, to use a shorthand for life, let's call it personality. Right? So your, any attempt at communication.

Yeah. I, I believe it will penetrate most deeply if it has strong personality, obviously strong and attractive rather than strong and repulse.

Justin McCord (24:34.4)

We're seeing more and more like,

Go going well, well beyond the line is now a new version of driving awareness and response. I mean, it's it's true. Like there is something to grabbing and shaking right to to help.

Tom Ahern (24:57.248)

You don't know!

Justin McCord (24:58.85)

Yeah, right. I mean, it's the same thing I do when I open my spice drawer and I take the salt out or the garlic salt and it's all, it's just compact. And so you gotta really get vigorous with it in order to get some air and some separation and to get a good dose out of it, so to speak. Okay.

Tom Ahern (25:01.122)

Phil, you try it!

Tom Ahern (25:23.882)

So, you know, this metaphor because you're, you now have garlic salt in the midst of our really amazing.

Justin McCord (25:33.294)

Imagine, imagine Ronnie's life.

Tom Ahern (25:37.102)

the

Ronnie Richard (25:38.232)

confident he'll land this.

Justin McCord (25:47.192)

things, if things stay the same, yes, then we get compact. You have to break things up or at least challenge the status quo. Now how you do that, there's, there's, there are people that have scalpels and there are people that have machetes.

Ronnie Richard (26:02.958)

I want to get back to.

We were talking about it little bit.

Tom Ahern (26:07.66)

do with fundraising.

Justin McCord (26:10.158)

Back to garlic salt. Should we get...

Ronnie Richard (26:11.81)

No, no, we'll go back a little before the garlic. I want to take us back to this moment. You have all the the newsletters laid out on the ground and you're looking at them and you're having this moment where you're there. They're all the same. They're all copying off of each other. You've described donor communications as built to fail. But what are some? I think that was like a hint of it like what are some things that you see often?

Tom Ahern (26:33.026)

Right.

Ronnie Richard (26:42.104)

some common mistakes, some things that too many organizations are relying on and making these mistakes.

Tom Ahern (26:50.53)

Well, before I start, Ronnie, let me just point out that we did a webinar for this in January. And the webinar itself takes an hour and a half just to explain the basic principles and the question and answer. We run a, what we call a all you can eat question and answer. We bring in a guest expert and that person will answer all your questions until the very end.

Once that went four additional hours. Wow. We didn't, I apparently taught them nothing in the first hour and a half, you know, presentation. They still had four hours of questions in January for newsletters. had only an hour and a half of questions. So, let me point out, first of all, that if you don't have good headlines, you're absolutely totally. Buh-buh-buh, buh-buh-buh bleep.

bleep, bleep, bleep. So you have to learn how to write a good headline. That is the basic skill of news publications. That's it, and that's all I have to tell you. And you know, you're bringing that to an audience of fundraisers. And they're going, I didn't go to journalism school.

And I don't know how to do that. And you don't. I mean, we're mostly taught how to write, like, in 10th grade English. And what are we writing? Essays, book reports, crap that, you know, is not meant for a public audience. It's meant for a teacher who's got a, you know, all too ready red pen.

Tom Ahern (28:47.118)

The thing that I would say crystallizes the major problem of donor communications outside of the major agencies, you guys do not make mistakes with your clients. The major agencies do not make mistakes with their clients. They work very hard not to make mistakes with their clients. They learn.

all the time. are learning operations. so we'll put them aside. That's services about, I'm going to guess, no, 3 % of the nonprofits in the world. The rest, or poor deers, are doing this themselves, often with a board that is everything but helpful.

Ronnie Richard (29:47.32)

So they're flying in the dark is what you're saying. Essentially like they just.

Tom Ahern (29:50.818)

They do not know how to sell. They do not know how to write a headline. They do not know how to put together an offer. were talking about offers in magazines and newspapers. That's where you learn communications until you learn those skills. You're not communicating, you're broadcasting.

Communication means you're getting a response.

That's my definition.

Justin McCord (30:28.994)

Message sent, message received. I mean, it's no different. Tom, I've got a 17 year old and a 15 year old and I tell them. Bless your heart. All the time, like just because you said something doesn't mean that you communicated.

Tom Ahern (30:46.306)

And do they listen to you, Dad?

Ronnie Richard (30:49.656)

I'd the same thing back, I think.

Justin McCord (30:52.366)

Yeah, right. So it is it is. And I was taught that it is on. It is on me as message sender to ensure that message recipient can understand what it is that I am that I'm sending now. I can only control what I can control. But like there is a pursuit of clarity in that that that escapes us.

Tom Ahern (30:53.794)

I told you.

Tom Ahern (31:21.302)

Their entire life is learning now. I forget how awful school was and so forth. And then listening to your parents, come on.

Justin McCord (31:32.248)

Yeah, right, right. Yeah. So, okay. So, so given, know, given the space that we're in, are you, to what extent are you optimistic about fundraising versus to what extent are you concerned about fundraising?

Tom Ahern (31:44.472)

Mmm.

Tom Ahern (31:59.904)

I'm not concerned about fundraising at all. am not. what was the first part of that question?

Justin McCord (32:09.102)

Well, to what extent are you optimistic? how, in terms of the future of fundraising, not now, but five years from now, 10 years from now.

Ronnie Richard (32:19.278)

Is the garlic salt container half full or half empty?

Tom Ahern (32:23.182)

Thank you for bringing it all together. you. Yeah. Ronnie, my answer is first of all, people are innately generous. this something I've observed? Yes. Is it something I know from neuroscience? Yes. Is it something that I see all the time in huge numbers?

Yes, yes, yes. So I don't worry about what I, maybe the yes, maybe I'm not paying enough attention to the operative word here is fundraising in trouble. Well, if it continues in its merry ways, yeah. The thing I discovered when I had all those newsletters spread out was they don't know what, how to talk to.

their target audience. Your target audience is everything you have. That is your wealth. That's your goal. That's your treasure. You need to think about them a lot. And when you're doing communications, you are the

You're the avatar for that target audience. You're talking to yourself as a buyer, not as a seller. And I don't mean to make it seem more esoteric than it, than it is basically, you know, a couple of beers and you can get to that sweet spot of believing you're the actual target audience. do it all the time, pretty much every day.

I am my own target audience.

Tom Ahern (34:21.201)

But if you don't think about your target audience, which is exactly what I was observing, all these newsletters, all the communications, hundreds, then thousands of things I looked at, the front of the parade of mistakes was that they wanted to tell you about their stuff.

about their programs, for instance. And it's like, I don't care about your program. That's what insiders care about. Outsiders, and this is another thing that the nonprofit world just, they don't even talk about it much less, know, insiders and outsiders, totally different language. Totally.

Justin McCord (35:16.066)

Yeah.

Tom Ahern (35:18.698)

And, and they're going, yeah, but I don't sound like that. And you're going, yeah, that's the point. It doesn't sound like you, know, whoever that is.

Justin McCord (35:31.96)

Yeah, it's, man, the more things change, the more they stay the same, Tom, like the,

Tom Ahern (35:38.606)

This is human nature. I forget which famous writer said it, but some smart ass back in the 20s probably, that there's no human desire stronger than the need to edit somebody else's writing for however it goes.

Justin McCord (36:01.774)

Yeah

Tom Ahern (36:03.23)

And we are all guilty. know, the best technology we have, the thing that separates us from the squirrels outside of my yard is that we can write. can talk, we can express, we can converse all of these things. and the people who are good practitioners, that is they raise enough money. They meet.

their goals. They are within parameters. Those people like you, they don't make real mistakes.

Justin McCord (36:46.066)

There's a lot of wisdom in that. There's a lot of wisdom. it just, it strikes me, know, Ronnie and I have lots of conversations of the place that we are and the opportunity that we have both through the format of this podcast, but then in our everyday work, that there are greats that have come before us. And then there are people who are coming behind us

who expect us to carry forward important lessons and to be able to hand off this torch of fundraising and the art of it to them. And I feel like as a part of this conversation today, you have even reminded us of a couple of the important torches that we get to carry and to have the responsibility to hand on to others.

Tom Ahern (37:41.095)

Hey, could you pass me that garlic salt?

(37:47.758)

Group Thinkers is a production of RKD Group. For more information, including how you can partner with RKD to accelerate growth for your fundraising and nonprofit marketing needs, visit rkdgroup.com.