What we learned from Make-A-Will Month
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Hi there,
I’m Gracie, a member of the Content Team and one of the FreeWilllians who drafts outreach for many of your organizations! I’m writing to you from my Brooklyn apartment, surrounded by my most constant companions (my plants) and from the comforts of my “home office”: a dresser-turned-desk a few feet from my bed. Nice to meet you via newsletter!
Another National Make-A-Will Month has come and gone — the most anticipated holiday of the year (okay, fine, at least in planned giving fundraising) — and we at FreeWill were thrilled with what we saw. Just as we hoped, our bequest partners took advantage of this unique planned giving opportunity and sent out over 200 pieces of Make-A-Will Month outreach.
Here are a few of the major takeaways we learned from your Make-A-Will Month campaigns:
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Partner outreach campaigns work. In July, 36% of FreeWill’s total bequest dollars came in through partner outreach. But as your Make-A-Will Month campaigns went out throughout August, that percentage climbed to an incredible 64%!
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Standalone email outreach is key. We might sound like a broken record, but the numbers don’t lie. Of all the outreach that generated gifts, 85% were emails, which garnered an average open rate of 21%.
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Collective moments inspire action. Partners raised a total of $18.4M for their organizations during this single month alone! As we look ahead to National Estate Planning Awareness Week (NEPAW) in October, it’s clear that collective campaigns, with a deadline attached, add a key sense of urgency to making wills and bequests.
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To study these pointers in action, we can look to one specific Make-A-Will campaign that blew us away: Southern Poverty Law Center’s email series. This legal advocacy FreeWill partner sent a two-part email campaign offering the bequest tool as a will-writing resource for their supporters, and raised a stunning total of over $1M in commitments! Lastly, lest we underestimate the power of a good reminder, it's worth noting that over 2/3 of those bequest dollars were raised through their follow-up email.
Now, it’s time to bring these learnings to your next campaign. National Estate Planning Awareness Week (NEPAW) is right around the corner, from October 19th through 25th, and offers an excellent chance to put these learnings into practice!
And remember, FreeWill will be right there with you. My Content coworkers and I are looking forward to drafting your unique NEPAW content — and reporting back to you on how overall partner outreach does during this important week.
Take care,
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Gracie Farese
Content Specialist
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P.S. We've centralized our partner resources so that you can access all things FreeWill directly from your portal! Stay tuned for more information in our next newsletter, but feel free to log into your portal and browse our new Resources Page.
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