Most fundraisers are familiar with the idea that it’s less expensive to keep a donor than to find a new one. And many are aware about how to retain donors: they need to build strong connections between the charity and the donor. In the past, charities have focused on the importance of making rational, deliberate appeals on the assumption that donors made rational, deliberate decisions when giving. 

There’s a lot of conversation around behavior science and how emotion influences the decision to buy, donate or join in the marketing blogosphere these days. Many of those conversations cite the work of Nobel Prize winner and psychologist, Daniel Kahneman. In his 2011 book, “Thinking, Fast and Slow,” Kahneman argues that the mind incorporates two systems for decision-making: one that works quickly making decisions more on intuition and emotion, and a second that works more slowly to rationalize the decision. Because it takes less effort, we’re more likely to rely on the first system.

The secrets revealed by virtue of the responses, and qualitative research we conducted, allow PSF to gain immediate traction from their marketing spend with confidence.