Love this.
❤️ ✍ Want your fundraising writing to resonate? Write words that stick: I'm talking about melodic words, memorable words, tactile words... ... Yes, even in your fundraising appeals and donor communications. Why? Because when you take the time to craft clear, beautiful words and phrases, your donors (and readers of practically anything you write, really) have been shown to: (1) Slow down (2) Read longer (3) Remember more (4) And, bonus 1: sticky words and phrases light up the brain (5) And, bonus 2: when you write for resonance, you spark human emotion (and nonprofit storytellers, we ❤️ human emotion). What am I talking about? Five easy techniques, to start: (1) Alliteration: when you use the same sounds at the beginnings of progressive words, that's alliteration. From actual donor communications: - He winced when he walked. - Today she tends a tidy acre. Like that. It's word-music, for your brain. Plus why say, "today she harvests crops from the garden" when you can give your reader "today she tends a tidy acre": something beautiful and equally clear, that will stay with them. (2) Sensory words: Please, for me, love your tactile words. Scent. Sound. Texture/touch. They instantly bring your writing to life without you having to do eons of describing. From actual fundraising appeals: - the jagged pain in your foot - the crunch of gravel - the silken whisper of fur through your fingers [this one does triple duty: tactile, assonance with the vowel sounds in 'silken' and 'whisper', and alliteration with 'fur' and 'fingers'] >>> At the end of this post I link you to my blog, where you can get some sources for why tactile words work so well. (Plus more on assonance, etc.) (3) Rhythm, (4) Rhyme, and (5) Repetition. Rhythm, again, fires the brain like music. Rhyme, same. Repetition, can act like rhythm. From actual appeals: - Move along, move along. Where are you supposed to go? - When the sun doesn't chase him, doesn't threaten to erase him... - You want to cry -- to shout -- to scream in return. [subtle rhythm: to cry to shout to scream] There's loads more you can do to write words that resonate. But I turn to these 5 techniques almost daily, and I hope they help you too (<- alliteration, just saying :-)). PS. I send fresh, nerdy stuff on writing for donors, generous words, direct mail, nonprofit storytelling, every 2 weeks if you're on the list --> lisasargent.com/newsletter 😊 PPS. That blog post I mentioned with techniques and sources: lisasargent(dot)com/blog [<-look for the literary devices post]
I do, too, Esther. Thanks for sharing!
Fundraising Copywriter | Donor Communications Specialist
1wThank you so much Esther! 🙏😊✍️