Company: The Points of Light Foundation
Contact: Todd Potochnik, Chief Creative Director
Location: Washington, DC
Industry: Not-for-profit
Annual revenue: $20,000,000
Number of employees: 125

Quick read:

The Points of Light Foundation's annual event had grown moribund, and the house list stagnant, says Chief Creative Director Todd Potochnik.

Potochnik and his team were able to boost attendance from the previous year's conference by more than 25% and garner an 85% "satisfactory or above" approval rating from attendees by hiring an agency comfortable working with nonprofits, altering the DM strategy, focusing on "inspiration" for the conference materials, and implementing email blasts.

Challenge:

The Points of Light Foundation's annual conference had become more of reunion than a fundraising event: The same people attended, year after year, and the 2005conference, in D.C., had an attendance of only 2,000.

Worse, the direct mail database used for announcing the conference saw "a significant number" of DM pieces returned in 2005, says Potochnik.

The Foundation organizes the conference in conjunction with the Corporation for National and Community Service. With so many stakeholders involved, the process was far from smooth.

Finally, the 2006 conference would be held in Seattle; consequently, many of the usual East Coast attendees would likely be unable to come.

When Potochnik took over the role of chief creative director for the foundation, the planning for the 2006 conference had already begun. He had to do something, and quickly, to make 2006's event a success.

Campaign:

The first thing Potochnik decided to do was to bring in some outside help. He chose Ted Deutsch, owner and operator of Deutsch Communications, to assist him in getting conference attendance up where it needed to be.

Together, they decided that Seattle could actually be a strong selling point for the 2006 event. Many potential attendees on the West Coast already loved the city, and many East Coasters were intrigued by it. But for Seattle to provide a real draw, it and the event itself had to be promoted the right way.

Step #1: Hire an agency familiar with not-for-profits

Potochnik and Deutsch immediately hired an agency to implement the direct campaign.

Ricci Communications understood the not-for-profit landscape, and it could deal with the last-minute approvals and missed deadlines that tended to plague the complicated event-planning process that the foundation and its partner followed.

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Case Study: A Nonprofit Crafts a Compelling DM Strategy and Exceeds Its Conference Goals by 25 Percent

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