Amnesty International Australia has a loyal and passionate supporter base of human rights activists. Their “Leave a Legacy” initiative is an important opportunity for Amnesty donors to express their values and leave a legacy that continues to uphold human rights.

In August 2021, Amnesty partnered with Dataro to see if AI could help them identify potential bequest donors within their existing donor base to nurture for a planned gift.

Before this, the charity used an in-house propensity model to target its legacy communications. Despite early success, Amnesty lacked the internal capacity to maintain the model and was looking for an “out-of-the-box” solution to help consistently and accurately identify donors most likely to be interested in leaving a bequest.

In their first full year using Dataro’s Stewardship model, Amnesty grew their confirmed bequests by an impressive 60%, adding 72 new confirmed bequestors in 2022. The charity is on track to improve this result even further in 2023.

Key results

Using Dataro’s AI software to find the right bequest prospects, Amnesty achieved:

• 72 additional confirmed bequests in 2022

• 60% increase in confirmed bequests YOY

• 30% of confirmed bequests came from Include a Charity Week campaign

• An estimated $4.32 M in additional income generated (average Bequest $60k)

UPDATE:

• In 2023, Amnesty grew confirmed bequests YOY by a further 17%

• By the end of 2024 they confirmed an additional 140 NEW bequest supporters (62% increase YOY)
  
  

How we did it

A critical aspect of success for any machine learning model is that the event being modelled (i.e. bequest confirmation) occurs with sufficient frequency to accurately estimate the relationship between the model factors (data inputs) and the outcome (prediction).

Because bequest confirmations constitute less than 0.05% of all charitable gifts, this can pose a challenge in producing propensity models that deliver accurate and reliable predictions.

Dataro addresses this by training specialized “foundation” machine learning models using anonymized data from over 100 organizations. Using a series of unique sampling and validation techniques, we can provide sufficient positive cases (i.e. bequest confirmations) to the model in training to attain very accurate predictions from the model (i.e. identifying the best prospects to nurture).

Dataro’s Stewardship model ranks donors based on their likelihood of being interested in leaving a bequest. The ranks are integrated within the charity’s CRM against the donor record, with ranking number 1 being the most likely to confirm a bequest gift. This ranking system empowers fundraising teams to identify the best prospects to include in their campaigns and helps streamline efforts for maximum impact.

Amnesty’s planned giving strategy

Amnesty runs three stand-alone legacy campaigns annually, including an anniversary campaign, a donor survey, and their hugely successful Include A Charity Week campaign.

Amnesty has used Dataro’s AI stewardship scoring system since 2021 to identify the best bequest prospects and to target their legacy campaigns across multiple channels, including direct mail, eDM, telemarketing and social media advertising (via look-alike audiences).

In 2022, Amnesty also implemented online will-writing services Gathered Here and Safewill to make it easier for donors to write their wills and leave a gift to the cause they care about.

Direct mail is the most effective channel for converting Amnesty donors to bequestors, followed by email. Amnesty runs telemarketing campaigns to follow up or remind individuals who don’t convert during the initial DM/eDM outreach.

Confirmed bequestors continue to be engaged by the charity via regular email updates, invites to special events and a telemarketing call every 18 months to verify that the donor’s gift in Will status has stayed the same.

Analyzing the results

Amnesty says Dataro’s AI software has revolutionized the way it approaches planned giving. Equipped with Dataro’s AI-generated stewardship ranks, Amnesty knows which donors are interested and ready to hear from them about leaving a legacy that upholds human rights.

Amnesty solicited 10k supporters using Dataro’s stewardship ranks to identify the best bequest prospects as part of their Include A Charity Week campaign. The multi-channel campaign included an offer for discount will-writing through the online platforms that helped to add 21 new confirmed bequestors.

The results show that AI-powered machine learning is highly effective at identifying donors interested in leaving a bequest. The direct mail and integrated digital campaigns with online will-writing platforms have also proven to be an effective way to convert more Amnesty donors to leave a legacy that upholds human rights and safeguards a brighter future.