Are you scaring away your donors through your surveys?

Imagine two people meeting for the first time.

One of them (say A) buys ice cream for the other one (say B).

B becomes extremely happy to get this ice cream.

What do you think will happen in these situations to continue that story?

➡️ 𝐒𝐢𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 #1: Feeling happy from that ice cream, B starts asking A TON of questions to A. B doesn’t share much, but those one-sided questions go on for hours!

➡️ 𝐒𝐢𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 #2: Wanting to know everything about A immediately after that first ice cream, B starts with the most personal questions – “what’s your race, ethnicity, sexual orientation…?”!

➡️ 𝐒𝐢𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 #3: : Hoping to get more ice-creams from A in the future, B starts to follow A's social presence to find if A can afford B’s future desserts right after their meeting.

➡️ 𝐒𝐢𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 #4: Interested in finding more friends like A (who can buy ice-creams), B ends the meeting early so they can find more people in the world who resemble A, and thus comes a list of people C, D, and E.

➡️ 𝐒𝐢𝐭𝐮𝐚𝐭𝐢𝐨𝐧 #5: Wishing for second ice cream soon, B starts to ask the same question about A’s interest in the friendship every other month. I suppose A might think B’s not much of a listener?

Do you think any of those situations lead to sustainable friendship between the two?

Now replace

● B with a nonprofit,

● A with their donor

● that ice cream with a gift made to the nonprofit, and,

● that act of asking questions with engagement surveys

I know our work is not that straightforward. Still, please tell me you are not scaring away your A?