Michael Gilbert shares 12 common ways to fail at email
Howard Lake | 19 July 2006 | News
Michael Gilbert, publisher of Nonprofit Online News and author of The Gilbert Email Manifesto to nonprofits, has published “Twelve Ways To Fail at Email” based on the most common failures he has observed talking to and working with nonprofits.
His list of the top 12 includes issues such as not collecting email addresses; investing more in their website than in email; not acting upon the profile, preferences or behaviours of stakeholders; and not responding to email.
These might sound obvious but Gilbert’s analysis makes this list particularly useful. He starts his article by recommending how to use it, encouraging readers to rank them according to which ones are having the most damaging impact on your current online communication, and which ones, if you were to tackle them, would meet with the least resistance.
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This article was first published in Gilbert’s The Basics of Nonprofit Email, and later in The Guide to Nonprofit Email (February 2006), but this is the first time the article has been published at no charge.
About Howard Lake
Howard Lake is consultant editor of UK Fundraising. He founded the site in 1994 and successfully sold it in 2022. As director of Giving X Ltd he is exploring growing giving on a massive scale.
He is the founder of Fundraising Camp and co-founder of GoodJobs.