The British Union for Anti Vivesection have used direct mail to recruit new supporters
for over 30 years. However over time the costs have steadily increased and mail
responsiveness has reduced. In a competitive marketplace understanding potential
supporter motivations and attitudes is vital in order to develop more responsive
messages. So in order to keep the medium viable the BUAV asked ESP to undertake
research on donor motivations.

The qualitative research was conducted one-to-one via the telephone and the
quantitative via paper based questionnaires in the quarterly newsletter. This allowed
more time to be spent understanding each donors reasons for giving by using
deepening questions to ladder down through layers of motivation. The information
was then analysed for trends. The resulting outputs provided the marketing team not
only a rich vein of material from which to draw on but a hierachical importance for
each trend.

Strategy

A new recruitment pack was created using the learnings from the motivational
research. The verbatim language from the research was instrumental in
determining the new tone of voice and selecting the topics covered within the
new test.

In addition analysis of the existing control pack highlighted potential copy and
design techniques that could be used to increase action and interest.

The Results

The test pack ran head-to-head against the control across 15 different lists. It
produced a higher response rate in 12 of the 15 lists and in some cells it more
than doubled the response rate achieved by the control. The test pack also
increased the target income across 12 of the 15 lists. Additionally the average
gift value was increased in 8 of the 15 cells.

Overall the test produced an increased return on investment of 80% when
compared with the previous control pack.

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