Direct marketing in non‐profit services: investigating the case of the arts industry

Direct marketing is seeing growing acceptance among non‐profit services as a means to reach audiences, raise revenues, and foster long‐term relationships with customers. However, academic research has lagged in investigating the influences on the extent to which these organizations implement direct marketing, and subsequent effects on performance outcomes associated with such marketing activities. This research investigates the case of non‐profit arts organizations. The results show that organizational formalization, external integration, total marketing effort, and managerial self‐confidence influence the direct marketing techniques implemented by the firm. The model also shows that sales and fund‐raising revenues are driven primarily by total marketing effort, while the percentage of total revenue derived from season‐ticket subscriptions is driven by the breadth and uniqueness of the direct marketing techniques implemented by the organization.