CandidateSigns.com Blog

A candidate asks: “I’d like to send donors a gift to say ‘thank you’ for their contribution; something flat that can fit in an envelope, any suggestions?”

It’s appropriate to want to properly thank a campaign contributor for their monetary contribution to your political campaign. And, it’s likely that as the candidate, you want to express your gratitude by thanking with a gift. It makes sense.

So, wouldn’t this be a great opportunity to send the contributor a gift? The answer is absolutely not. People have done this before and it doesn’t get the reaction you’d think.

Contributors would rather get a personal, hand-written note from you. A sincere and warm note will mean more to them than a gift, and it will demonstrate your campaign is a good steward of your contribution dollars.

Sending the potential contributor a “gift” will only feel like “stuff” to them. They’ll feel like they are throwing their money away, which will kill your response rate. No, it won’t make them feel more “obligated” to send a check.

But, when you’re raising money for your campaign, it’s absolutely necessary to send a follow up to the potential contributor. Let’s assume you’re making phone calls (“dialing-for-dollars”) and someone says they’ll send you a contribution of $100.00. At that point, it’s a pledge, and you need to follow through and make sure it materializes.

Therefore, after you’ve ended the phone call, you must write a thank you note telling them you appreciate their contribution; this should be a hand-written note on either note or greeting style card.

You also need to include an envelope that’s addressed back to you that has the postage already paid on it. In other words, a self-addressed stamped envelope. This technique will increase the response rate dramatically. You may also want to put in a response card as well. Remember, people don’t want to waste time, so make stapling their business card to the response card an option.

If someone is contributing to a political campaign, they’ve usually been around long enough to know that a candidate needs to save their money for voter contact programs. That means they want to see you spend your campaign money on signs, door hangers, direct mail, postcard, get-out-the-vote efforts, early voting and absentee programs, door-to-door, fundraising and other activities that gain your campaign votes.

A contributor will appreciate diligent spending of campaign dollars more than a gift.

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