Nothing in life is free. Elements of truth represented in this adage may be apparent even in the altruistic setting of blood donation. Donors in the United States are often enticed by blood banks with widespread use of “rewards” or “incentives” for donating blood, which may include t-shirts, event tickets or even opportunity drawings for televisions and cars. Rewards can be adapted in a number of ways according to the target group. Recently, unusual incentives have produced successful results. 

Each donor will have his or her own set of reasons for donating, which may or may not have anything to do with incentives. This raises a few questions: Are the incentives working? If not, should they be replaced with something else? If they are working, do they work too well? At what point might desire for the rewards interfere with a donor’s truthfulness on eligibility questionnaires?

These were the questions considered during “Donor Motivation and Incentives—Are They Necessary?” (9220-RC). Chief executive officers from three donor centers in the United States gave different views on the types of incentives that have worked well for their organizations.

Win-Wins with Big-Brand Partnerships

To demonstrate that incentives are an important element in a blood center’s “marketing mix,” Paul Sullivan, from American Red Cross Blood Services (ARC)—Connecticut Region, described ARC partnerships with corporate sponsors to create donor recruitment promotions in his region.

According to donor motivation market research conducted by ARC earlier this year, one in four blood drive sponsors responded that giveaways were “very important” in their recruitment efforts. The study also showed many of the most successful ARC incentives have involved partnerships with major brands during donor recruitment promotions.

Sullivan laid out the details of two such promotions in his region. Donors in one program received a coupon for a pound of coffee from Dunkin’ Donuts;  in another program, the coupon was for or a carton of ice cream from Friendly’s restaurants. Results were tracked for both programs, showing significant gains from several perspectives. There was an approximate 10% increase in productive units collected during these promotions. Specifically, results showed increases in new donors (11% and 21%), young donors (15%-32%) and female donors (10-20%), as well as a greater response to telerecruiting efforts (2% and 3%).

In addition to such gains, the public exposure from events such as these provides no small return on the investment, Sullivan noted. “The cost of a promotion may be justified simply by the media interest and free coverage it generates.” When incentives are chosen that have real value to the donor, they can serve to boost the public image of both the blood center and the corporate sponsor. The sponsor receives “credit” for association with an altruistic cause, and the blood center’s mission is “legitimized” by association with a trusted brand. Moreover, the incentive contributes to a celebratory feeling in the donor about the experience.

From Sullivan’s explanation of how incentives fit in a recruitment program, it was clear that incentives can have an exponential effect by empowering multiple motivational forces at once. Beyond their primary value for their intrinsic desirability, giveaways or opportunity drawings provide sponsors with a fresh angle for recruitment messages, recruiters with a “conversation piece” and the media with a new story to cover. All these benefits support  the initial particular draw the item may have for the potential donor. Used wisely, he suggested, corporate promotions can produce win-win situations for all involved.

Looking Toward Long-Term Paybacks

Kay Schwartz, from American Red Cross—New York-Penn Region, described a variety of incentive programs used in her region that reach beyond immediate and short-term boosts in donor turnout. Schwartz felt that, in general, incentive programs should be turning focus toward donor loyalty programs, and that in terms of their effects on regular donors, incentives are useful for moving this group of donors to donate during periods of particular need.

Points for Pints is a donor loyalty program much like any frequent-customer points program, in which points are given for every donation as well as for recruiting new donors, pledging and making appointments online. Bonus points are also available from scratch-off cards distributed at each donation visit. Points redeemable for themed merchandise, auctions or services may be tracked online, where the relevant Web site doubles as a communications vehicle to maintain interest in the organization.

In addition to annual awards banquets that recognize loyal donors, blood centers can display photos of frequent donors on the walls of the donor room, along with statements about why they donate. Schwartz showed that the engagement of donors through such programs results in increased frequency of donations.

Schwartz also reported on the Dunkin’ Donuts campaign in her region, which resulted in a 16% increase in donations across the region, more than 4,000 units over goal. Moreover, 16% of donors surveyed responded that the promotion was a significant factor in their decision to donate at that time.

An unusual promotion Schwartz reported was the granting of scholarships to students from the State University of New York (SUNY), which represent the largest source of ARC donors for the area. When staff noticed that SUNY enrollments were up but donations from SUNY had not increased, they decided to tap this dormant market with scholarship rewards, an extremely popular program that has resulted in a 14% increase in collections.

Schwartz noted that once an infrequent donor has been influenced by a giveaway program, he or she may be more likely to be directed into donor loyalty programs. Initiatives such as the points or rewards programs are relatively easy to implement, she claimed, and can have longer lasting effects because theyinvolve a type of commitment on the part of the donor. Such programs that collect email addresses are extremely useful in enabling rapid communication with the donor base, especially calls to specific groups of donors when supply crises are type-specific.

The purpose of a giveaway program, she suggested, should be to move infrequent donors toward loyalty programs, so that donors are responding to the real needs of the blood center rather than merely to the promise of a “free” item.

How to Multiply the Gift

Turning the discussion in a different direction with hearty doses of humor, John Armitage, MD, of Oklahoma Blood Institute (OBI), recounted how a “giveaway culture” at OBI had reached an extreme that required some cutting back. Rather than diminishing the “gift” to donors, however, cutbacks and innovative thinking allowed new avenues to open up for donor appreciation that go beyond mere donor gratification.

Armitage described  the state of the incentive program at OBI when he joined the organization. Thank-you gifts were given for every single donation. T-shirts were the staple giveaway, catching on so much with the donor population that they became part of the “brand” of OBI and large-scale design and production for the t-shirts was performed on a massive scale. With 14 different designs and approximately 40,000 garments warehoused, Armitage felt the program could use a more disciplined approach.

Armitage described his technique for restructuring the incentive program as “coming in with a scalpel.” He started small, by ending practices such as giving two t-shirts for two-unit Red Blood Cell donations and over-ordering by 20%. OBI then launched two campaigns that retained the t-shirt giveaway but offered donors the option to decline the thank-you gift in lieu of a monetary donation of comparable value from the blood center to a charity. Donors who chose this option were tracked by the cards they marked indicating this preference. Awareness of and interest in the initiative was raised by giving it a physical presence: cards were displayed, as they accumulated, on the walls of the center.

Donors reacted by expressing excitement about another good cause, and the charities chosen, OBI found, were often ones that donors already volunteered for, which increased the positive effect on donor attitudes about the change. Side benefits, in addition to the giveaways going to a greater cause, included greater leverage with the media as spokespeople from the charity shared their spotlight with OBI.

Armitage described two initiatives of this type. The Open Arms Campaigns partnered with regional organizations such as a charity for leukemia and lymphoma and a local hospice. The Global Blood Fund, set up by OBI and other organizations as another alternative for donors, provides help to the developing world in obtaining adequate equipment, resources and expertise to recruit donors and collect blood effectively.