Improving Donation Appeal Effectiveness With Marketing Analytics: Empirical Essays on the Content, Context, and Consequences of Donation Appeals on Donation Behavior

This dissertation investigates how charitable organizations can improve the effectiveness of their donation appeals by considering not only what is communicated (content) but also how, to whom, and under what circumstances the appeals are delivered (context). Using marketing analytics and empirical field data, the dissertation is structured around three interrelated projects each comprising a chapter. Chapter 1 provides a meta-analysis of 174 randomized field experiments, identifying which content elements in donation appeals (e.g., social norms, donor agency, impact framing) most effectively influence donation behavior, and how their effects vary depending on communication channels, donor types, and charitable causes. Chapter 2 maps the real-world direct marketing practices of 44 leading Danish charities, highlighting how current donor retention and win-back tactics align—or misalign—with research-based recommendations. Chapter 3 addresses a potential downside of donation appeals—donor reactance and churn—and tests novel donation appeal interventions (e.g., appeal breaks, opt-outs, impact messages) that mitigate these risks while enhancing net revenue. Together, the studies underscore the importance of contextualized, donor-centric communication strategies and demonstrate how academic marketing research can generate insights with real-world ecological value for the nonprofit sector.