No matter what action you want a person to take, AIDA is a time-honored way to take someone from knowing nothing about your cause to becoming a full supporter. But before you can use it, you have to know what it is, right?
AIDA is an acronym from the field of marketing. The letters stand for:
- Attention
- Interest
- Desire
- Action
Many will recognize that these steps form the backbone of any successful sales pitch. As such, these steps were well known even before there was a specific acronym to describe them. Since its coinage in the 1920s, however, it has become a foundational principle in the advertising world. To explain more fully, the steps are:
- Gain the audience’s attention, so that people begin listening to you
- Arouse their interest, so that they can see why your offering is beneficial
- Convince them that your offering meets their needs, so that they desire it
- Invite people to take an action
These steps describe a classic sales method that works for selling goods and services, but AIDA applies equally well to nonprofits that are trying to fundraise. Here’s a modified version that shows how it can be relevant to nonprofit ads and communications:
- Gain the audience’s attention
- Explain what problem your organization addresses, and why people should care about it
- Convince people that your organization is the solution, but needs support
- Invite people to take action
Steps two and three show a slight change from the classic AIDA format. Instead of demonstrating how you solve a problem right away, it is often best to get people emotionally invested in the problem first by showing why it matters. Then, once people are connecting to the issue, you can show that, with their help, there is a solution. This preserves the natural conceptual flow of nonprofit work. If people aren’t convinced that a problem needs solving in the first place, it will be impossible to get them to shoulder personal responsibility for making it happen.
This flips AIDA on its head a bit. Instead of focusing solely on how your offering meets the audience’s needs, you’re trying to show how your offering meets one of the world’s needs as well. At the same time, however, those inclined toward charitable work, have a need to “do good,” which supporting your organization can satisfy. The point is to convince people that, by meeting an unmet need in the world, your organization will help them meet their personal need to do good.
Confused? We hope not.
AIDA has been used to sell a lot of junk in the past, but you can put it to good use. Create ads and messages that are structured around its basic framework, and you’ll soon be converting strangers into supporters.
