Start an Appeal Mailing

After you create the mailing and configure its selection of recipients, you can start the mailing. After you start the mailing, you can track information about the responses received from the mailing, including the number of responders, the total and average gift amounts, the response rate, and the return on investment (ROI) amounts and percentages.

Because you can associate the same appeal with multiple mailings, when you start a mailing, the program automatically assigns a “finder number” for each potential donor in the mailing. The finder number identifies the mailing and the donor. For each mailing, the program stores a mailing ID and finder numbers to determine which mailing the gift belongs in, or whether it is an indirect response or unresolved response.

After you start the mailing, you can export its output or generate its output letters or labels in Microsoft Word. You can also use analysis tools to determine the effectiveness of the mailing.

  1. Access the record of the appeal mailing to activate.

  2. Under Tasks, select Start mailing or Restart mailing. The Start mailing screen appears.

    Note: To run the appeal mailing activation process from its status page, select Start process or Restart process under Tasks.

  3. Under Criteria, the selection, package, and label template selected for the mailing appears. Edit this information as necessary.

  4. Under Details, select the label template to use with the mailing. To select a template, select Choose file and browse to the template file to use. To remove a selected template, select Clear file.

  5. Under Results, select whether to create a selection of the constituents who receive the mailing.

    If you select Create selection from results, enter a name to help identify the selection and select whether overwrite an existing selection with the same name.

  6. Select Start. The program activates the mailing. The status page of the appeal mailing activation process appears so you can track its status and history. For information about the items on this page, see Appeal Mailing Activation Status Page.