Author Archives: carolinefiennes

Why Eurostar’s charity partnership with the Ashden Awards is a very good idea*

Partnering to create value  Interested in fostering innovation, Eurostar has teamed up with the Ashden Awards for Sustainable Energy to create a new prize for local sustainable transport initiatives. In principle, Eurostar could have created an infrastructure of its own – … Continue reading

Posted in Corporate philanthropy, Effective giving, Mergers | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 7 Comments

Cheryl Cole Foundation: The most important 3 words

It’s off to a great start. But trouble ahead? Here’s what it should do. In its first year, Cheryl Cole’s Foundation is teaming up with the Prince’s Trust. Good. New donors almost always do well to partner with existing donors and existing charities. … Continue reading

Posted in Donor behaviour & giving stats | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | 6 Comments

Promoting giving to charity is like marketing discretionary purchases

Getting more people to give to charity = getting people to change their behaviour. That is, it’s a marketing job. The same as getting you to buy Coke rather than Pepsi, or to buy stilton outside Christmas, to buy a … Continue reading

Posted in Donor behaviour & giving stats, Fundraising | Tagged , , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Why do charities ignore millions of donors?

Despite my giving £200 to Cancer Research UK through JustGiving when a friend did a sponsored something, I never heard a bean from Cancer Research UK about it. A year later, I gave £100 to another charity when another friend did … Continue reading

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Raising funds? Just dress well!

Wearing designer logos virtually doubles donations According to a study reported by The Economist, all you have to do to increase donations is to dress well! A team of volunteers knocking on doors solicited donations raised nearly twice as much when wearing … Continue reading

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Who gives to charity, why, who doesn’t, why not & what to do about it

A segmentation based on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs is helpful in showing who gives, who doesn’t, and how to get more people giving more substantially and more often. This paper describes the segmentation, gives the data about giving behaviour and recommendations of … Continue reading

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Prince Harry: gives charity what he does best

Prince Harry goes to the Arctic: of course the press  go too. Smart guy. He’s doing what great donors do best: bringing to his charitable passions the most valuable and most unusual resources he can access. Raising the profile and … Continue reading

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Let’s inspire better giving, by… celebrating failure!

When did you last hear of a charity that was rubbish? By some estimates, fully 60% of donations are made with no research into the charity’s performance. Whereas about 0% of commercial investments are made with no research into the … Continue reading

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Buy one, get 24 free!

I just have to share this because it’s so stunning. You want to improve education in rural India. A good start is to improve attendance. So you look at the causes of non-attendance: poor transport to/from school; children having no … Continue reading

Posted in Great charities, Impact & evaluation | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 23 Comments

Of course we don’t discuss charitable giving: there’s no decent term for it

Language shapes how we think. No clear language: no clear thinking What is this thing that we do? “Deploying money, time and other resources to achieve positive social and environmental change”. A snappy phrase, don’t you think?? I’ve been talking … Continue reading

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