In the philanthropic world, we tend to hear a lot about the importance of storytelling and making emotional appeals. However, the problem is that in a flood of information, many of those messages get washed away—failing to grab peoples’ attention. Thus, consistent nonprofit messaging is vital to building lasting connections with donors.

One-off emotional appeals are usually memorable in the short term but not the long term. Instead of one-off emotional appeals, nonprofits, charities, and philanthropic organizations should focus on consistent messaging. With consistent nonprofit messaging, philanthropic organizations can deeply connect with donors and receive more support.

When nonprofits, charities, and philanthropic organizations publish content every now and then and fail to unify that content with consistent nonprofit messaging, they can lose relevance with donors. Research has shown that our attention spans have fallen over the years. However, I would argue that our attention spans for the things we don’t care about are limited—just think about how much time you or someone you know has spent binge-watching a good TV show.

Consistent nonprofit messaging helps increase donors’ muscle memory, which can build loyalty. When donors are repeatedly exposed to the work a nonprofit, charity, or philanthropic organization is doing, they’re more likely to remember that next time they want to donate to a cause. Donor muscle memory is especially important in a time when charitable giving is decreasing—according to a Giving USA report that analyzed charitable giving for 2023, “adjusted for inflation, giving declined by 2.1%” that year.

Without consistent nonprofit messaging, donors are at risk of becoming disengaged, either donating less or stopping donating altogether. Consider a 2018 study of charitable giving, which revealed that “reciprocity decays rapidly over time.” Specifically, the researchers examined donation requests a university hospital system mailed to patients and found that the more time had progressed since their treatment, the “less likely to donate” patients were.

Read the full article about consistent nonprofit messaging by Cherian Koshy at Forbes.