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Email is cheaper than direct mail but thats not why you should embrace it.

Your non-profit organization should be communicating with donors and members by email for four strategic reasons.

1. Involve

Email, by its very nature, is interactive. Your readers expect to see links in your email messages, links that they can click. Your readers expect to be able to hit Reply and answer a question youve posed, or share their opinion. Email is attractive to donors and members, and your organization, because it helps them get involved.

By using Forward-this-to-a-Friend buttons in your emails, and message boards and forums on your website, your email messages help your constituents share information with friends and colleagues, and discuss relevant topics. If your donor file has plenty of donors who are not engaged in any meaningful way with your organization, email is a cost-effective way to make them more active, with their happy cooperation.

2. Advocate

Email is powerful because of its immediacy. The letter you draft and send at 10:09 am arrives in your donors email inbox within minutes, a feat impossible using a letter, envelope and postage stamp.

Because email is immediate and because it encourages interaction, its the perfect medium for mobilizing your members. With email, you help your members simply and easily advocate for your cause. The more sophisticated email systems on the market let you customize each email message so that it contains the name and contact details for each members local, provincial/state and federal elected officials. The easier you make it for your members to act as advocates, the higher your response rates will be to petitions and other take action messages you mail to further your cause.

3. Fundraise

The key to raising money online is not your website but your email. Email is how you build relationships with your members and donors. Email is how you invite them (and inspire them) to donate. Your website is simply where your donor makes the donation. Some donors, of course, will chance upon your website and give a gift while they are there, but these kinds of donors are in the minority.

One exception is emergency appeals, where organizations like The Red Cross, Doctors Without Borders and Habitat for Humanity raise a great deal of money online from strangers. But the secret to securing second and subsequent gifts from online donors is your emails, not your website. Your website informs and educates, certainly, but your emails are the vehicle that must transport your donors there.

4. Inform

A leading cause of donor attrition is lack of communication by the non-profit. Donors who send gifts but do not hear from their charity often enough soon take their gifts elsewhere. Just as important as frequent communication is relevant communication. And thats where email newsletters are so attractive. Because a good email system integrates with your donor database, you can customize email newsletters for the unique interests and preferences of each of your constituents.

Kathy, for example, wants to receive alerts about AIDS orphans but not refugees. Bill wants to receive bulletins about Sudan but not Senegal. Samantha welcomes updates on her sponsored child but has no interest in attending special events. Email lets you satisfy everyone by sending personalized messages to your donors and members, messages that speak directly to their known interests.

Email fundraising has its challenges, of course. Spam filters, for one thing. And crowded inboxes. But as a tool for involving donors, mobilizing members, raising emergency funds and delivering late-breaking news, email stands alone.

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About the author
Alan Sharpe is a professional fundraising letter writer, instructor and mentor who helps non-profit organizations raise funds, build relationships and retain loyal donors using creative fundraising letters. Learn more about his services, view free sample fundraising letters, and sign up for free weekly tips like this at http://www.RaiserSharpe.com

A number of research projects have shown that children and teenagers are quite savvy when it comes to observing the parenting skills of their mothers and fathers. Generally, they rank mothers higher than fathers in most areas concerning communication, which is probably pretty close to the mark.

One area where they say both genders are falling down is in the area of talking to kids about sexuality. It would appear that fathers are poor overall and mothers are not much better. Mothers do talk to children about sexuality but talk with girls more than boys and when they do they stick to plumbing and steer clear of topics such as masturbation and homosexuality. There appears to be five traits shared by parents who are able to talk openly about sexual issues with their children:

1. Parents give factual, truthful answers to childrens questions.

2. Parents listen to children.

3. Children are able to voice their opinions about sexual issues.

4. Parents dont insist that children stick to a rigid code of behaviour.

5. Parents use real life opportunities to engage children in discussions about sexuality.

Talking to kids about sex is hard work. Parents need both the processes in place to communicate with kids and the confidence to engage them about personal matters.

Michael Grose is a popular parenting educator and parent coach. He is the director of Parentingideas, the author of seven books for parents and a popular presenter who speaks to audiences in Australia, Singapore and the USA. For free courses and resources to help you raise happy kids and resilient teenagers visit http://www.parentingideas.com.au

You have been in business for several years and you have been handling the finances for your business. One day you get tired of managing the money, receipts and all the paperwork to prepare for taxes. You begin to think to yourself who you can contact, what steps you can take! You put the thought of your mind and continue running your business. A week later you are driving down the road and you hear a thirty second commercial on the radio. The voice says, Have you been managing your business finances for several years and now you have grown tired? Now is your chance to contact Journey to Wholeness. They will teach you about building a financial team. Contact them at www.journeytowholeness.net Then it returns to music.

You begin thinking to yourself what is a financial team? Who makes up a business financial team and can there be a downside to a financial team? When building a financial team the following are important:

1) Bookkeeper

2) Accountant

3) Personal Banker

4) Financial Planner

The role of the bookkeeper is to handle your monthly bank statements and reconciling your account. You would give this person all of your receipts so that they have all the necessary paperwork to give you the summary of your account. The bookkeeper can generate reports based on your monthly statements. The bookkeeper can advise you on sales tax and a sales tax license if you need that for your business

Next is the accountant. The accountant would do your taxes at the end of the year with the various statements from the bookkeeper. This should be a fairly easy connection based on who your bookkeeper is. The accountant can advise you of all the deductions you should be taking for your business. I have often talked to business owners that did not have an accountant and invariably did not deduct all that was allowed.

Personal banker is the person that you would discuss over different lines of credit and financial tools you might need for personal and business. You could discuss with the personal banker a business account, setting up the account and even having a business line of credit.

Financial planner is the person that will help you with long term goals such as life insurance, disability and retirement planning. Even if you do not talk to this person initially, make sure you eventually take the time to talk to a financial planner and discuss long-term goals.

The bookkeeper is not necessary if you are skilled and knowledgeable in managing your personal finances. Pitfalls to not having personal financial team working for you is that you do not accomplish financially what you would like to. You end up in debt and do not know how to remove the debt as well as get back on your feet. When you do not set goals, you have nothing to work towards.

A Financial Team is outside looking in with an unbiased opinion. That can help you achieve goals and dreams for you and your family. Maybe after reading this you are asking yourself, do you need a financial coach? You might because they can provide one-on-one coaching or counseling based on where you are. They also could connect you to others member for your financial team.

Too many people on the team can spoil it if they are not in agreement about what needs to be done. If you are in the beginning phase of building a financial team, I recommend starting out with the bookkeeper and accountant. Either one of them if not both of them should be able to recommend a financial planner. You should already know your personal banker.

Take the time today to assess where you are and if you need a financial team. The time a financial team could save you and teach you could mean the difference between success and failure in your business. It is my hope that you would prepare your business for success.

Dr. Taffy Wagner is a speaker, publisher and author of Debt Dilemma, Homebuyers Helper, e-books Spare Change and Every Little Bit Helps. She is the financial advisor for Christian Business Talk Radio. Dr. Taffy conducts seminars on business and personal finances. She is the co-founder of Journey to Wholeness, where she and her husband provide mentoring, counseling and coaching for individuals, couples, business owners and organizations so they can achieve success in the life. She is available to speak to groups, coach individuals and provide mentoring. Contact her through her website at http://www.businessmoneymatters.com/ Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/?expert=Taffy_Wagner