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Win the Deal and the Day by Knowing How to Handle Objections

Persuasion is the key where the goal is to get donations. But what happens if your potential donors start having objections? The good news is there is a way to overcome them. However, first and foremost, it’s important to understand your role in the process, as well as remember it during your fundraising pitch. The latter may sound strange, but it’s true that anything can happen during a pitch that can cause focus to be lost.

The first instinct when faced with any objection is to defend it. But the best tactic is to get on the objector’s side and assist them with solving the issue that might be causing the objection. Similarly, the presentation of information may seem like the most important thing. But really, it’s in finding ways to say and do those things that will inspire a person to make a donation.

Aligning with a Donor

Defending your position when faced with objection also means there is opposition involved, the very thing that hinders your ability to persuade. But this can be traded for validating what the objector is saying. This doesn’t mean agreeing with them; it simply means understanding their reasons for objecting, and then empathising with that. As well, it requires looking for something they stated originally that you can respond to respectfully.

Preparing for Persuasion

The best and easiest way to stop objections is to eliminate their source. Many times, this source can be located right in the pitch for donations. Is your pitch clear and detailed, covering a few major points completely, or is it a long list of briefly touched-upon points? The less clarity a pitch has the more questions it will raise and the higher the likelihood of objection.

Questions that are difficult for organisations to answer lead to more questions on the donor’s part, which can breed doubt.

Tell a Story

Another way to handle objections is to tell a story. Unlike a case study, a story will reach donors on a personal level because of their reality and the fact that they usually involve other individuals. In order to effectively handle objections, you must tell one of two stories; either one that brings existing problems to light, or one that shows how your organisation has helped to solve these problems for other individuals.

Illustrating existing problems will involve effectively communicating to the donor the worst case scenario for your charity. For example, this could be something along the lines of "In just 20 years, we could see the last of the bumblebees". You can also illustrate the problems that donors have and would like to be able to fix.

Although these may seem like the norm, often our first instinct can be to give donors the facts about a charity and what it provides to the community or others who are in need. The question to be asked in this case is whether this tactic will help make the donor want to partner with a charity.

Need vs. Want

The point of handling objections effectively is that everyone, even your donors will buy what they want vs. what they need. Being able to effectively create a wanting in the mind of your donors will help them to justify this as a need, making it more likely that they will donate.

And this can extend to any marketing campaign you may currently be relying on your fundraising CRM software to keep track of. Simply accessing your archives of past campaigns and taking a good look for potential objections can give you that much more of a stronger impact when the time comes to completely wow prospective donors.