Primary Research Group has published Survey of Use of Direct Mail in Fundraising, ISBN 978-1-57440-286-5.

The 94-page study presents detailed data on the direct mail fundraising efforts of 38 non-profits, of which two-thirds are institutions of higher education. The study helps its readers to answer questions such as: Has direct mail spending kept pace with other forms of fundraising spending? To what extent has email replaced direct mail? What percentage of total funds are raised by direct mail? How much are organizations spending overall and per piece of mail sent? What is the overall cost structure and what percentage of costs is accounted for by design, printing, fulfillment, postage, and other costs?

What has been the impact on direct mail strategies of digital printing? How many organizations engage in collaborative mailings? What are the best sources of mailing lists? Is direct mail passe? How do organizations make their direct mail and opt-in email strategies work in harmony? How do their social media strategies impact their direct mail effort? Do they handle mailings in-house or do they outsource? If they outsource, which services do they use?

Just a few of the report's many findings are that: 

• For the entire sample, a mean of 52.47% of total revenue raised came from donations from individuals (vs. institutions), a figure that was significantly higher (57.37%) for higher education than for all others.
• Organizations that raised more than $5 million (median for this group is $85 million) spent a mean of $93,271 on direct mail for fundraising.
•  For the largest fundraisers, nearly 28% of total printing costs were accounted for by digital printing.
• Only 15.38% of the higher education fundraisers in the sample don't use email at all for fundraising purposes.
• A shade more than 43% of organizations sampled include a postage paid of pre-stamped return envelope with their direct mail pieces.

The study is available directly from Primary Research Group and also from major distributors of books and research reports. Print and PDF versions are available for $95.00. Site licenses are also available. For a table of contents, list of tables, free excerpt, and participants list, visit our website at www.PrimaryResearch.com.