Legacies and bequests
There are huge numbers of people out there who have not included your charity in their will simply because they have not been asked - and you can successfully ask for a bequest by mail.
The straight up. no holds barred approach to bequests and will-making you'll see below is based on extensive focus group research that indicated that Australians, like the British, really don’t mind talking about death and dying and are not offended by being asked for a bequest. Indications are that the US market may not share this relaxed attitude.
Organisations which have been prepared to invest in the development of a good quality bequest acquisition pack and follow it up with well-written, good quality servicing have yielded huge returns from their bequest programs after a period of time.
Bequest services we can help you with include:
- Development of a case statement
- Creative strategy for bequests and legacies
- Fulfilment strategy
- Contact strategy for bequestors, inquirers and intending bequestors
- Direct mail to ask for bequests
- Copy and creative for fulfilment elements eg will forms, wording, booklets, personal records
- Survey mailings that include bequest information
- Advertising for bequests - offline and online
- Online bequest information and fulfilment - strategy, copy and creative.
Here are some examples of very successful bequest materials:
John Wood bequest acquisition pack - Cancer Council NSW
“If you Will they will - how your bequest will help find a cure” - The Cerebral Palsy Foundation
Tim Winton bequest pack and fulfillment brochure - The Wilderness Society (Artwork to come)
John Wood bequest acquisition pack - Cancer Council NSW
The John Wood bequest pack was first mailed in 1999 and continues to survive numerous attempts to beat it.
The signatory, John Wood, is a well known and much-liked Australian TV, stage and film actor whose wife had breast cancer.
The pack had a number of important and distinctive features:
- sent by a well known and well-liked celebrity
- offer to meet with the celebrity
- recognition, by joining the ‘Daffodil Circle’
- a no-obligation back-end Will Kit, including how to leave a bequest to Cancer Council, questions to ask your Solicitor, and free Will and Codicil forms
- a front-end premium of a bookmark, which included a handy pass-on reply form
- the reply form was styled as a very appealing two-fold invitation which they could accept or decline, making it less like a standard fundraising ask.
“If you Will they will - how your bequest will help find a cure” The Cerebral Palsy Foundation
Brochure to send to people who enquire about leaving a bequest to the Cerebral Palsy Foundation.
A companion booklet was created for The Spastic Centre NSW (which provides direct help to people with cerebral palsy) titled “If you Will, we will”, featuring pictures of children and adults with cerebral palsy and the things they will achieve if people leave gifts in their Wills.
Key elements of the booklets include:
- Strong concept incorporating a call to action
- Powerful emotional elements
- An inspiring sense of possibility
- Clear statement of vision and goals
- Detailed examples of how the money will be used (using real researchers and current projects)
- Simple instructions on how to leave a bequest
- A back end premium of a very beautiful, high quality custom box created to keep legal papers in
- A clear and uncompromising set of promises about how the funds will be used and how the bequestor will be treated by the organisation
- Lovely high-quality professional artwork to set the pack apart from other more pedestrian designs.
Tim Winton bequest pack and fulfillment brochure - The Wilderness Society
The Tim Winton bequest pack was easily the scariest letter I’ve ever had to write. Tim Winton is a very successful and highly regarded writer, who has a great passion for the Ningaloo Reef in Western Australia.
I admire him enormously and trembled in my boots at the thought of trying to sufficiently approximate his writing to sound authentic to the prospects.
I was immensely relieved to get the draft back with a few tiny word changes! Very kind of him.
.