Email solicitations are efficient, environmentally-friendly, and effective.  However, there is a large demographic that these solicitations miss.  For the older physician or executive in your community, targeted, direct mailings can be highly effective.  These are more time-consuming, but Nyaya has all the materials at your disposal to accomplish mailings in an efficient manner.   The key strategy is to leverage who you are-- you and your family know people who believe in you and want you to succeed.  They are inspired by you and want to help.  At the same time, if they are to take you seriously and give you money, you need to be very clear about any titles, accomplishments, or institutional affiliations you have that give you legitimacy.  And you need to send a mailing that is professional and well articulated.  Once you have the addresses in an excel spreadsheet, the whole process should only take your 3-4 hours.  The most time-consuming part is collecting the addresses.

Steps: 

Summary Materials

(all in SharedNyaya\Clinic\Grants\personal fundraising)

cover letter: nyayahealth.org/Library/donations_cover_letter_dm.doc

brochure: nyayahealth.org/Library/nyaya_brochure.pdf

reply card: nyayahealth.org/Library/donations_reply_card.pdf

patient stories: nyayahealth.org/Library/patient_stories.pdf

Identify your audience

Identify physicians and executives and people in your extended local community that you can mail.  You should focus your mailings on people you know have significant disposable income.  In distinction to the emailings in which the average donation might be $25, you should aim for significantly higher donations from direct mailings.   Whitepages.com is an excellent resource for finding addresses of people you know but for whom you do not have an address. 

Adapt the cover letter

Adapt the cover letter provided above.  This is not a time to be modest or downplay your role in Nyaya or your accomplishments.  Some excellent tips are found here:  http://nonprofit.about.com/od/fundraising/tp/fundletters.htm

Review the brochure

You should review the brochure to make sure that it is up-to-date and consistent with your letter.   If you need to edit the publisher itself, the MS publisher file is in live sync.

Review the reply card

You should review the reply card to make sure that it is up-to-date and consistent with your letter.

Print the cover letter, reply card, and brochure

Fed-ex Kinko's, while slightly more costly than Staples, has better offerings, a nicer web interface, and much faster service.  All the information is preloaded under our registered usernames (for some reason with fedex, requires separate log-in); login here to gain access to the usernames:

http://docs.google.com/a/nyayahealth.org/Doc?docid=0AdZQBHyI2oBYZGY4cmdwbmJfMTR6a3MzbXZnbQ&hl=en

Login to Nyaya's print online fedex account:

https://www.fedex.com/us/office/copyprint/online/print/packages/

My suggestion is to handwrite the to: address labels and the "Dear Mrs. Name" parts of the letter.  As such, don't bother with mail merges etc.  It is more personal and ultimately, given our smaller volume of letters, not much different in terms of efficency.

For brochures, you should select paper category "Resume, Executive" even though it is double the price.  It is more expensive but the end result is more professional. For letters, just select standard, laser paper.

Print return address labels

There is a template for this within Nyaya's fedex account: 

http://businessprinting.van.fedex.com/return-address-labels.aspx

Otherwise, grab Nyaya's logo (\SharedNyaya\Clinic\Official Documents\Logo) and create your own.

Note that these take 7 business days to arrive at your place.

Handwrite the relevant components, compile, and send

Once you get all the materials, each envelope should have one signed in ink cover letter, one brochure, one reply card (note that the reply card is printed two per page, you will have to cut in half), one self-addressed stamped envelope.  On the cover letter, add a personal note in ink to any individuals you know well.

Optional but highly suggested: Obtain non-profit bulk rates at your local post office

You should apply at your post office for non-profit bulk rates.  This will save about 40% off the mailing rates and will also make you look more professional. This typically takes two weeks to process.  You have to do this individually for each local post office you use.   Notes on applying for non-profit bulk rates:

http://nonprofit.about.com/od/nonprofitbasics/ht/postage.htm

Legal Note

You should only send mail to individuals whom you or your family and friends know personally.  Nyaya Health does not engage in mass mailings.