Macmillan Cancer Support revised their legacy fundraising strategy in 2013 to increase donor reach and engagement. Legacy manager Helen Eddleston explains what they did to improve the gifts in wills process.

At the beginning of 2013, our legacy team decided to take a fresh look at its legacy marketing. Everything was up for discussion, but two key priorities emerged: first, we wanted to reach people who were not already engaged with our charity. Secondly, we wanted to ensure we were engaging our potential legacy pledgers throughout their entire legacy journey – not just at the beginning.

We felt that by uncovering more ‘stages of consideration’, we could steward people through a journey which would make them more likely to pledge a gift.

Crossing all channels
A key consideration for us was to ensure that the legacy message ran across all our fundraising activity. Dedicated legacy marketing on its own cannot reach all relevant audiences, but mentioning gifts in wills, however briefly, alongside other fundraising messages can increase the reach of legacy messaging substantially. We therefore set up a cross-sell plan with our individual giving fundraising teams. This led to a 1,000 per cent rise in legacy enquiries off the back of non-legacy-focused campaigns.

Meanwhile, we drew up separate plans to reach our cold and our warm audiences. The latter included some of our most loyal and engaged supporters – an obvious audience who would respond well to our legacy messaging. Less obvious as a target for legacy marketing was our cold audience – people who did not already support us with a regular donation or who were not otherwise financially engaged with the charity. However, as cancer affects so many, we knew it was likely that many of these people would care about our cause, even if they were not current supporters. Indeed, internal research revealed that three-quarters of the legacy gifts we’ve received came from people who had not previously financially supported us.

In targeting this group, our marketing activity spanned the stalwart channels of direct mail and display advertising to PR – using human interest case histories to generate a variety of positive media coverage. And for the first time, a direct response television advert was broadcast. Woven through all our activity was a message with a simple but resonant proposition: “You can use your will to give the people who matter to you a Macmillan team in their corner, if they ever need one.”

Warming up lapsed donors
Our warm audience did not just include the usual regular givers and committed volunteers. Lapsed donors, for example, were a welcome if unexpected source of support for and interest in legacies. We worked with the specialist legacy team at telephone fundraising agency Listen on a pilot scheme that involved calling lapsed donors and gauging their interest in leaving a legacy gift to the charity.

What seemed counterintuitive to some made good sense to us. We knew from speaking with lapsed donors that many had stopped giving because of their immediate circumstances; many had ended their regular monthly donations to our charity due to their financial situation at the time. We therefore suspected that lapsed donors would respond well when they were offered a different proposition that did not involve an immediate financial commitment – such as leaving a legacy gift in their will.

Our hopes were borne out by the results of the pilot. Around 10 per cent of those spoken to by Listen requested further information about leaving a gift, and an additional quarter said that they would consider leaving a legacy gift to the charity – regardless of whether or not they were in a position to resume their regular support.

Broadening the journey
Another focus for us was broadening and diversifying the legacy journey taken by our supporters. Special, tailored legacy events became an increasingly important part of our programme. Over 15 legacy events were held at a colourful and diverse variety of locations, from stately homes to garden centres. To these events we invited our top legacy prospects, including supporters who had previously enquired about legacy giving.

As with all our legacy marketing, a soft approach was taken to ‘sell’ the idea of leaving a legacy in a will. The events were all tailored so that they were relevant to the regions in which they were held, and all included presentations from a Macmillan nurse or other healthcare professional, as well as someone who had been affected by cancer who could talk about the wide-ranging support that they and their family received from Macmillan.

Legacy enquiries that were made during and after the event were followed up by the team within a month – but we went further than simply keeping in contact with people who attended. We also contacted people who had been selected for and invited to legacy events, but who did not respond. This was not a small group: for every five people that we invited to a legacy event, as many as four would not reply. Our telephone fundraising agency called these people to understand their reasons for not attending the event, and, more importantly, to uncover their stage of legacy consideration. Nearly one-third of those called said that they would consider leaving a legacy – of which half requested more information.

Moving on
We were very pleased with the results of our legacy marketing activity last year. Unlike other fundraising campaigns, the nature of legacies means that there is no immediate financial measure of success; however, we achieved a 44 per cent increase in enquiries and a 40 per cent increase in pledges when compared with the previous year.

If we are successful in developing these relationships and stewarding these supporters through their legacy journey, this initial success will lead to increased vital funds for our charity and our work to support people affected by cancer.

Helen Eddleston is legacy manager at Macmillan Cancer Support

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