We're Julie Cooper and Brett Cooper, fundraising copywriters for great causes. Does your fundraising bring in as much money as it could? You can send donor communications that stir hearts to action. We'd love to help. 💛 Start by subscribing to our FREE and fun weekly newsletter.
Please don't AI-ify your fundraising story notes!
Specifics bring authenticity, connection, and feeling. FEELING is believing. This is the 156th Fundraising Writing Newsletter. If you find value here, please tell a fundraising friend. (Your fundraising friend can subscribe here for free.) In this issue: ✅ Please don't AI-ify your fundraising story notes! ✅ A preview of our scheduled 2025 webinars ✅ Randomly yours: to inspire and recharge you Wednesday, January 1, 2025 Happy New Year, Reader! 🎉 For some things, AI can be amazing. But with fundraising stories, AI tends to erase specifics in favor of bland generalization. Without specifics, you have summaries. 😴 Summaries are not persuasive. If you're telling a fundraising story without specifics, you're losing your reader. Most donors need to feel it to believe it. Admittedly, your handful of true believers are already feeling it... but everyone else could use reminding. Help them feel what they've felt before. Share a compelling story that feels real. To do that, you'll need specifics. Unfortunately, your fundraising story specifics may be getting ground up by the gears of AI. ⚙️⚙️⚙️ Which is why I implore you: Please don't AI-ify your fundraising story notes!This is what Brett and I are seeing: Someone in your organization knows a fundraising story. They type it up and then they ask AI to make it better. AI makes it sound more professional. AI makes it sound more corporate. AI makes it sound more polished. AI does not make it better. Not if you want results. It's to the point that we've had to ask several clients, "Please send us your rough notes. Give us your spelling mistakes, your run-on sentences, your rambling non sequiturs, your bullet points, your hurried thoughts. We'll make it work, no worries. Just please, don't use AI. We need specifics!" Here's an example of the kind of rough notes we prefer. 💛These came from a native Kenyan in the field: Winjoy is a three-year-old jovial girl from Kenya. She is the only child in her family and lives with her grandmother. Her mother is a form three student in a nearby day secondary school. Her grandmother is a small-scale farmer who plants vegetables, sorghum, and millet on their small piece of land. She sells some of the farm produce to enable her to pay school fees for her daughter and provide for her granddaughter.
Winjoy reported to Kapsowar in the company of her grandmother. Her left upper limb was swollen around the elbow joint, and she was crying because of pain. Investigations revealed a fracture of the lower end of the humerus that needed surgery. A posterior splint was applied, and she was to be admitted to the ward for limb elevation so the swelling could subside before the surgery. On hearing that, her grandmother was in tears as she did not have any money for admission. She even requested that they be allowed home and, if possible, let the fracture heal without surgery.
Unfortunately, the doctor could not allow them to go because of the nature of the fracture and the risk of malunion if proper alignment was not done. After a lengthy discussion with the doctor, she agreed, and Winjoy was admitted. She needed support to raise the $646 needed for the surgery.
On the 23rd of January, Winjoy underwent a successful surgery funded by Watsi through SAFE. She was discharged home the next day after the procedure, and she was to be reviewed in three weeks for possible pin removal and physiotherapy review. Her grandmother could not hide her joy. She believes that Winjoy will be able to join school and continue with her studies without any problem once she recovers well.
Winjoys’ grandmother says, “I am more than grateful for the help that I received. I did not have anything that would have helped my grandchild get treated. May God bless the donors so that they may never lack anything.”
These notes contain so many wonderful specifics: dates prices places problems solutions and quotes. It's thanks to these specifics that we were able to tell an impactful fundraising story in a newsletter that helped lift results in the next appeal to record heights. Here's the story we spun from the specifics. (The image shows the story in the design. Below that is the text only, in case that's easier for you to read.) You were there for Winjoy when her grandmother could not afford surgery.
Take one look at her big, bright smile and you’ll see: it’s no wonder this girl was named Winjoy. The 3-year-old from Kenya must surely win joy in the heart of every person she meets. So . . . meet Winjoy!
Can you picture it? Winjoy Jerono arrives at AIC Kapsowar Hospital in January of 2023. Her grandmother accompanies her. At this moment, Winjoy is not herself. She’s crying tears of pain. An accident has left her arm severely injured.
When the doctor shares the bad news of a broken bone, Winjoy’s grandmother gasps at the cost of the surgery: $646. A humble, small-scale farmer with a small plot of land, she can’t afford that. She barely gets by selling her vegetables, sorghum, and millet to pay Winjoy’s school fees. There’s little left over. Certainly nowhere near the $646 she needs. That amount is nearly the per capita income of this region in western Kenya – a year’s income to fix a broken arm!
So Winjoy’s grandmother does the only thing she can think to do: she asks the doctor if she can take Winjoy home to heal without surgery.
Imagine how difficult this must have been — with no hope in sight, and Winjoy still in pain.
The doctor said he must refuse the request. The splint that the hospital staff had given Winjoy would not ensure correct alignment. Winjoy could only heal properly if she had surgery.
What could her grandmother do? She didn’t know. But we did. She could rely on YOU.
You were there for Winjoy and her grandmother. You were there when the Kapsowar surgeons — powered by you through AMH’s Surgical Access for Everyone (SAFE) program — performed the surgery that set things right again for Winjoy.
Today, Winjoy is healing. Smiling. Living her best toddler life. Getting ready to go back to school. Bringing joy to the world. Her grandmother is happy too, because of you. Thank you! This kind of moving, effective, bottom-line-impactful story is not possible without specifics. So please, for your fundraising stories, tell AI, "Take this job and shove it!" A preview of our scheduled 2025 webinars... More info on Tom Ahern's January 29th webinar "How to Market Bequests" is headed your way tomorrow. Interested now? Go here. Randomly yours: to inspire and recharge youFor your brain, heart, and funny bone...
Until next time: May you always safeguard your fundraising story specifics like nuggets of gold never to let slip through your fingers. With gratitude,
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We're Julie Cooper and Brett Cooper, fundraising copywriters for great causes. Does your fundraising bring in as much money as it could? You can send donor communications that stir hearts to action. We'd love to help. 💛 Start by subscribing to our FREE and fun weekly newsletter.
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