(Save or print this email. There's a lot in it to skim right now, but it will be an amazing reference after your next campaign.)

✓ Materials created

✓ Campaign launched

✓ Donations poured in

You exhale, lean back in your chair, and think: “Finally, this campaign is OVER.”

But…it’s not.

Every project is a learning experience. Some things work better than others. That crazy new thing you tried actually went very well. And now, immediately after, is when all that is fresh in your mind.

That’s why the last stage of any project or campaign should be a post-mortem. (We do this for all our clients’ big projects or campaigns with a detailed guide.)

As soon as it’s all wrapped up

• pull the reports
• review the UTM data
• and look for the trends.

We want to know what worked, what didn’t, what engaged donors, and which messages hit home.

And then, right away, create a rough blueprint for next year’s campaign, event, or project: “based on what we know now, this is what we’d use as our starting point next time around.”

That guide might include anything from a campaign calendar (how we’d adjust the email or media plan next year) to messaging notes (with ideas of angles or ideas to try.)

Your offboarding guide (or post-mortem) doesn’t have to be fancy. But it should be done.

And fast. Capture these insights while they’re fresh. The longer you wait, the fuzzier everything becomes. (“Wait, why did we choose this angle?”)

How to run your own post-project or campaign analysis:

Use your UTM data, open rates, and donation reports to answer the following:

1. Which emails had high open rates – and why?
2. Where did we have the highest unsubscribes – and do we think it was the timing, the cadence, the messaging?
3. Which paid media platforms actually brought in donations? Was there enough ROI to justify the cost?
4. At which point in the campaign/week/day did most donations come in?
5. Did people give more, less, or equal to what they gave in the past?
6. How many new donors did you get? Where did they come from?

Afterward, consolidate all your theories:

• “Subject lines with XYZ worked best.”
• “Our best sent time for emails is 9pm.”
• “We got a surprising amount of donations with a click-through ad on our local news site – we should definitely try that again, maybe even find more similar platforms to use.”
• “Based on the questions we got during the campaign, people didn’t really understand what this specific program does.”
• “Looking at which emails did well this year, maybe X theme will really resonate in the future.”

A campaign isn’t finished when it goes live.

And it’s definitely not done with the last donation.

Your project is complete when you’ve documented the data, listened to what it’s telling you – and used it to make an even better plan for the future.

Our agency helps multi-million dollar nonprofits with marketing strategy and copywriting that touches hearts. And gets people giving. See our NPO packages

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