Orange County, CA - January 9th, 2019 - The holidays usually bring out instances where wealthy people go over and above to spread holiday joy. Undoubtedly, people with disposable income are generous. However, a new study shows that it pays to offer wealthy people a sense of control when asking for donations.
Researchers at Harvard Business School and the University of British Columbia found that soliciting donations from wealthy individuals shows results if they feel as if they’re in charge. The study involved sending 12,000 donation request letters to wealthy alumni who bring in a minimum of $100,000 annually. Their income was verifiable due to the positions they held in public corporations.
Researchers wrote and sent out two different letters, both of which were asking for a charitable donation. The first letter focused more on the individual that gave them a sense of control —"Sometimes, one person needs to come forward and take individual action. “The other one being a bit vaguer: "Sometimes, a community needs to come forward to support a common goal."
The letters were then sent out at random to the 12,000 alumni, and the researchers then compared the amount of money the recipients were willing to part with in the name of charity. Results found that those who had received the letters offering more control were more generous, giving an average of $432.00. The more general letter gave on average just $270.00 which 1.5 times as much.
The results suggested that the difference consisted of merely giving prospective donors a feeling of more control over how the donated money is spent. Researchers suggest that their findings indicate that in the future, those conducting charity drives might gear their requests in ways that offer some degree of control to prospective donors. They might find they get more in return.
The paper is published in the open access site PLOS ONE.
