Get Schooled
Doing this effectively requires data, and the ability to let the data tell a story about each individual. Once you know the individuals in your audience, you can begin to converse with them in a one-to-one way.
[For example,] a Canadian university initiated a capital campaign to build a new athletic facility. We asked for a data pull that included for each alum, their grad year, whether they played on any sports team, and if so, which one(s). Each alum in our mail file received a personalized mail piece that had a timeline stretching back to the university’s inception. The alum’s grad year was marked along that timeline, along with a reference to a significant sporting event that the alum would recall from that time period. In addition, if the alum played on a sports team, the copy within the appeal made specific reference to that team.