At The Shepherd Centre, mid-value donors have historically sat within the Key Relationships team alongside major donors. The stewardship program to date had been very low touch.

In February of last year, The Shepherd Centre’s Director of Fundraising attended a mid-value session and ‘Myth Smashers’ at FIA Conference 2022. They realised that, like many organisations, mid-value donors were an under-stewarded segment of their donor database despite contributing a significant collective income. Given the necessary attention, they suspected that mid-value donors had the potential to boost the fundraising income stream even more.

In 2019, Sam Meisner-Lemon had been tasked with overhauling the then somewhat sidelined Gifts in Wills program, and managing the well-established program was now her sole focus. Now, she was met with the challenge of doing the same for mid-value.

Through a combination of re-engagement calls, appeal warm-up and follow-up calls, donation thank you calls and tailored DM packs, Sam and the team created a mid-value specific offering, to build rapport with the donors and increase income.

In this session, Sam will focus primarily on the 2023 Christmas Appeal Mid-Value DM pack, taking us through the ups and downs, the learnings and the results.