Kate wrote:

I have a friend who is totally against everything that Compassion and World Vision do. Why? Because she’s convinced that music artists get “kickbacks” for every child they manage to get sponsored. Is this true? Can you clear this up to put her mind at ease?

Here’s my answer.

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It hurt when the checks from ASCAP lost digits.  It stung when book stores sent my CDs back to the distributor.  But the worst thing about Christian radio stations moving from 30 current songs to 12 in 2002, shifting from singer songwriters with metaphors to worship music cover bands, was when promoters lost interest and stopped booking me.  There’s no demand for a guy who hasn’t had a “hit” in a couple or three years.  So we lowered my asking price.  And did it again. And again. And again, until it was just enough that three or four gigs could pay the bills each month – because that’s all the gigs I could get…in a good month.  (It’s a good thing we sold that big house huh?)

I didn’t love music anymore by this point in my career.  But I was in love with speaking about Compassion International and growing fonder all the time.  It was cruel of God, I thought, to take away most of my audience just when I found something I lived to share with them.

About that time my artist relations person from Compassion got in touch.  The percentage of people at my shows who sponsored kids was unusually high.  She was happy about that.  But she wondered if there was any way I could do more shows – to get more kids sponsored.  She asked if I was playing so few shows by choice.  Of course not, I said, there’s just no demand right now.

I had some real angry talks with God back then.  Didn’t he realize how much good I could do if he made me a big soft rock star again?  Just one song on the radio and the shows would roll in, the churches would be packed out and loads more kids would be sponsored.  I made him promises.  I pleaded.  And I waited.

I don’t remember if it started with Brian (my booking guy at the time) or my artist rep from Compassion or my manager.  But I remember getting an e-mail containing a plan to get more kids sponsored that was endorsed by all three.  Here were its points:

1. Ask promoters to buy a hotel room, one meal, and pay for all promotion, sound, technical staff, lighting, and the rental of a keyboard or the tuning of a piano.

2. I would pay for all travel expenses: rental cars, plane tickets, and gas.

3. Compassion would pay me enough to cover my road manager/booking agent and pay myself.

4. The concert would be free to the public.

5. Compassion would be presented, as it always had been, at every show.

All three parties – promoter, artist and Compassion – would share the expenses and the risk of every concert.

I said no. It felt hypocritical, unethical, like stealing from the poor.

Until my artist rep from Compassion changed my mind with a lesson in marketing 101 and a little simple math.  Not everyone knows tens of thousands of kids die every day from poverty.  Not everyone who knows cares either.  Not everyone who cares wants to do something about it.  Not everyone who wants to do something about it knows what to do.  Not everyone who knows what to do is doing it.  Not everyone who is doing it will continue to do so.  That’s why Compassion builds web sites, designs and prints pamphlets, produces radio spots, uploads podcasts and releases videos.  With only 20% of America’s pastors speaking about poverty, the job of preaching communicating the importance of Jesus’ “Good News to the poor” falls on Compassion’s marketing department.  And that costs Compassion money.

But Compassion has made a commitment to its sponsors that a minimum of 80% of their $32 a month will go to caring for sponsored children – not spent on marketing.  So every dollar invested in marketing is examined at a few levels to make sure it yields the most benefit for Compassion’s children.  One of my concerts, she said, was a great investment.

She explained to me how much it costs to produce a radio ad and get it on the air and how many sponsorships that might yield per dollar spent.  How much it costs to run a print ad in a Christian magazine or film a TV commercial and how many sponsorships those marketing efforts might drum up.  Magazine ads, radio and TV spots – all of these are interruptions, easily ignored or turned off.  But at a concert, the audience is captive and possibly even captivated.  Dollar for dollar an artist is one of the best advertisements there is.

Not everyone thinks about this before balking though.  A pastor at a huge church in Texas once lectured me about taking money from Compassion.  I waited until he was through with his diatribe and then held up the stack of four-color cards laying on his desk – the ones adverting the church’s upcoming “Fall Festival.” “These are good looking cards but I’m more effective than this card because I believe in what I’m advertising and this card doesn’t believe in anything.  And I probably won’t be thrown in the trash can.” He let me speak that night and kids got sponsored.  And he joked afterward that he should have had me announce the Fall Festival at the concert.

Is there a banner ad anywhere with a 10-20% click-through rate?  Is there a mail-out that can do that?  A website?  A pamphlet?  One human being telling his story to another human being is a powerful thing.

So I said yes.  I asked you all to book me.  You did.  I was shocked.  And ever since then (November 2006) I’ve played and spoken about 10 times a month – 100 times a year.  And more than 3000 kids have been sponsored.

I am not paid a “kickback” for every child sponsored.  But there is a number of sponsorships I must get in order for Compassion’s number folks to think I’m a good investment.  I don’t know that number.  I asked Compassion never to tell me that number.  I just talk about what I love every night and whatever happens happens.  And what happens is I get many more sponsorships than Compassion wanted from their investment.  My audience is astonishingly generous like that.

Now, I still don’t like this arrangement but, short of climbing the radio charts with a remake of “Open The Eyes Of My Heart Lord,” I’ve got no better ideas.  If I could get bookings without this arrangement I’d call it off.  In fact, we explain to promoters how they’re getting me for free and a few of them (single digits) decide they’d rather pay me than let Compassion pay me.  I let them of course.  And I still speak just as fervently at those shows for Compassion as I do at all the others.

Simply put, I’m a guy who desperately wants to change the world for as many kids as I can and accepting Compassion‘s help seems to be the best way to do that right now.  I hope that changes. And if you have a better way, I’m listening.  Seriously.  Please.  Give me a better way.

Or book me for free by e-mailing Ben today.

Finally, pray for my friends Spence, Brian, Suzie and Stephanie at Compassion and for those who do similar jobs at World Vision, International Justice Mission and other worthwhile non-profits dependent upon spokes people.  It’s their very difficult job to discern which investments to make in which representatives.  Pray for artists, that they would fall in love with something bigger than themselves and, if they can afford to, that they wouldn’t take a dime for promoting it.