Donor Participation Project’s Post

Cultivating Deep Community Engagement: 4 Key Factors For nonprofits seeking to boost donor retention and participation, cultivating a deep sense of community is key. According to research from the Donor Participation Project, successful nonprofits that have grown donor participation over time share four factors in common: Participatory They facilitate two-way conversations and make supporters feel like their voices matter. For example, they host interactive virtual or in-person events where donors can engage with staff and each other. They also solicit feedback and input from donors on a regular basis. Purposeful They bring people together around a shared purpose, not just for social reasons. The community has a reason for coming together, like advocating for a cause or participating in a volunteer program. Donors feel connected to the mission. Recurring They provide repeat opportunities for donors to engage over time. One-off events are not enough. Things like monthly giving programs, alumni groups, and annual events that people look forward to every year help build familiarity and loyalty. Leadership development They identify supporters who want to get more involved and help develop them into leaders and ambassadors. Things like volunteering, joining a committee, or becoming a board member allow donors to strengthen their ties to the organization and spread the word to others. Nonprofits that check all four of these boxes are most likely to see donor participation and retention rates rise over time. While it requires an investment of time and resources, cultivating a deep sense of community and purpose among supporters can pay off through sustainable funding and lasting impact. The key is making donor engagement and participation a top priority, and being willing to experiment with new strategies to find what resonates most with your mission and supporters. With attention and care, nonprofits can build a base of lifelong supporters connected to their cause.

Small nonprofits looking to retain donors can employ several effective strategies: Keep Detailed Records of Communications: Utilize a nonprofit CRM to track all communications with donors. This helps in spacing out asks, contextualizing interactions, and analyzing the effectiveness of outreach efforts. Offer Various Engagement Opportunities: Beyond monetary requests, involve donors in other ways like volunteering, in-kind donations, advocacy actions, and event attendance. This approach keeps supporters engaged and feeling valued beyond their financial contributions. Encourage Personal Face-to-Face Communication: Personal interactions, especially with major donors, build trust and a closer connection with the organization. Personalize Marketing Outreach: Address donors by their preferred names and reference their past interactions and contributions. Personalized communications are more engaging and show that you value each donor's unique contribution to your cause. Showcase Your Impact: Clearly communicate how donations are used and the difference they make. Use tools like infographics to break down costs and impacts, enhancing transparency and trust. Regular Follow-Up: Timely and personalized follow-ups after donations are essential. Mix your communications to include updates on projects, volunteer opportunities, and thank-you messages, not just donation requests. Ask for Feedback: Regularly seek feedback from donors on your communications and updates. This shows that you value their opinions and are committed to improving their experience with your organization. Express Gratitude: Always thank your donors promptly and personally. Acknowledging their support regularly, even outside of donation times, reinforces their importance to your mission. Implementing these strategies can help small nonprofits not only retain existing donors but also build stronger, more meaningful relationships with them, ultimately leading to a more stable and effective organization. For more detailed insights, you can visit NonProfit Hub, NonProfitEasy, and Keela. TheGrowthMedium.com

The Value of Building Trust: How Engagement Leads to Dollars For nonprofit fundraisers, building trust with donors is essential. Donor relationships built on trust and engagement lead to more consistent and larger gifts over time. However, many organizations struggle to make the case for investing in engagement. A recent podcast featuring fundraising experts Louis Diez and Ron Cohen provides data-driven insights on how trust pays off. Diez and Cohen’s analysis of nearly 10,000 donors from multiple organizations found a clear correlation between donors’ level of engagement and lifetime giving. Donors who reported interacting with an organization at least five times in the past year and said they felt “always” or “very often” valued gave at higher levels. For example, donors who gave between $2,500 to $10,000 were twice as likely to be highly engaged as the average donor. Highly engaged donors were five times more likely to have made gifts over $100,000. Extrapolating from these findings, Cohen estimates that increasing the number of highly engaged donors—even modestly—could result in over $1 million in additional lifetime revenue. Of course, revenue generation is not guaranteed, but focusing on engagement and trust-building strengthens relationships in a way that motivates giving. How can organizations build trust and increase engagement? Cohen and Diez recommend reporting back to donors on surveys and campaigns to show their impact, acknowledging all gifts sincerely, and inviting more touchpoints that make donors feel valued. - For major donors, that may mean in-person meetings. - For annual fund donors, sharing stories of how gifts were used can help build emotional connections. While relationships take work, focusing on engagement and trust pays long-term dividends. Diez urges organizations not to see engagement as a “wishy-washy feel good thing” but as a strategic imperative. By valuing and cultivating supportive communities, organizations build goodwill that generates revenue and spreads through advocacy and word-of-mouth. Though soft on the surface, trust produces hard results. The data shows engagement matters—and building trust leads to dollars.

Reversing the Trend: How to Find and Engage New Donors Nonprofit fundraising has faced a steady decline in donor participation over the last few decades. However, fundraisers can take action to reverse this trend by prioritizing the identification and engagement of new donors. According to fundraising expert Adam Platzer, the first step is to focus on qualifying new prospects through events, referrals, and faculty relationships. Events provide an opportunity to engage new donors in person, while referrals from existing donors and faculty members can uncover major gift prospects who are currently off the radar. The key is following up quickly after initial meetings to begin cultivating these new relationships. Once new prospects have been identified, nonprofit fundraisers should develop strategic engagement plans to build affinity over time. Weinger recommends a tiered engagement model where donors start at a low level of commitment, like volunteering or mentoring students, and then progress up the pyramid as their passion and giving capacity grows. The closer donors get to the top levels, which may include joining the board of trustees, the more likely they are to make a major gift. To solicit these new donors effectively, fundraisers should focus on the impact of the gift and stewardship of funds rather than the amount. Share videos and stories demonstrating how current programs change lives. Explain exactly how the donor’s gift will be used and recognized to inspire their philanthropy. Creative strategies like matching gift challenges, deadlines, and public announcements can also motivate new donors to give sooner and at a higher level. The most important element, however, is developing strong internal relationships to drive fundraising success. Weinger argues that communication across departments, public recognition of colleagues’ contributions, and educating staff about the fundraising process builds trust in the development office and leads to more and bigger gifts over time. By following this holistic approach of identifying, engaging, and soliciting new donors through internal partnership, nonprofits can begin to reverse the trend of declining fundraising participation. Overall, the key to major gift success is collaboration, not competition.

Anyone getting ready to write a spring fundraising appeal? We've got 8 tips to make your appeal more Community-Centric. What would you add? 1.   Use your appeal as an opportunity to share how your organization lives its values. If you value collaboration, write about the ways you partner with others in the community to fulfill your mission. If you value activism, tell the stories of the people demonstrating in the streets and showing up at the capitol.   2.   Ask the people you serve what they want donors to know – and then tell it to your donors. Take advantage of opportunities to connect directly with service users or check in with a colleague who works with service users and ask them what they think community members want donors to know.   3.   Highlight people's strengths, skills, and agency with their consent. Take care to present their complexity and wholeness. Use people-first language. Avoid reducing anyone to the problems they've faced.   4.   Demonstrate that you value all the people who are working to achieve your mission – program participants, staff, volunteers, donors. Name the staff member who directly works with a service user you feature. Quote a volunteer sharing why they give their time. Talk about the steps your organization is taking to ensure your staff is well-compensated and cared for.   5.   Position your organization in the ecosystem of people and organization’s working to make the community better. Name your partners and tell your supporters where they can go to learn more. Ask your service users   6.   Point out the systems at play to help your donors understand that the problem you’re addressing is not caused by individual choices or behaviors, but by larger forces that require collective action and solidarity. If you’re providing shelter for people experiencing homelessness, write about the housing shortage. If you’re helping children learn to read, write about the opportunity gaps in our educational systems.   7.   Treat donors as partners and demonstrate how the whole community is stronger because the community is working together. You can do this by using 'we' language when you talk about solutions and by making sure your donors can see themselves as part of the story (not the heroes of it). For example, "Your gift joins with many other gifts from people who care. Together we can create change."   8.   Be authentic. Use your own voice with words like, "I invite you to join us again this year to be part of our community of change-makers." Make sure your message feels like a two-way conversation, not just a transaction. Start with your values and center your community and your appeals will move more money to mission. We’ve seen it happen over and over again. Want more tips for your appeals? Check out "How to Raise More Money by Featuring Your Values in Your Appeals." https://lnkd.in/gGNx8yQm

Why Donor Relationships Matter For nonprofit fundraisers, building strong relationships with donors is key to success. Donors who frequently discuss an organization, feel valued in those conversations, and have a history of consecutive giving are much more likely to make larger lifetime gifts. Donor engagement leads to increased giving over time, as shown in data from surveys of nearly 10,000 donors. Focusing on engagement is strategic, not wishy-washy. While engagement’s effects can be hard to measure directly, the data shows a clear pattern: more engagement leads to bigger gifts. For donors who gave under $1,000, the median gift over 11 years was $2. For donors who gave over $50,000, the median number of years of consecutive giving was 11. The more people positively discuss an organization, the more good things will come its way. To build engagement, demonstrate credibility, reliability, and intimacy with donors, as defined by McKinsey. Report back on what you learn from them and how you use their input. For example, if you survey donors, share the results and how you plan to act on them. Send updates on the impact of fundraising campaigns donors contributed to. These types of accountability and follow-through establish trust. While technology and social media play a role, meaningful personal outreach is key. For example, one college sends the widows of alumni a bookplate dedication for the library, noting it memorializes a shared value or interest of her late husband. This thoughtful gesture, expecting nothing in return, resonates profoundly. To make the case for engagement internally, focus on its strategic benefits, not just fundraising. Engaged donors become advocates, helping to build enrollment, forge community partnerships, and more. An “engagement first” mindset takes work, but pays long-term dividends. Building trust and loyalty with donors will be increasingly critical as societal expectations of nonprofits continue to grow. Focus on relationships, and the dollars will follow. Fundraisers, invest in engagement now. Your donor pyramid is changing, and those organizations that meet donors where they are with a value-first approach will thrive. Why? Because donor relationships matter.

How Engagement Leads to Dollars Engagement is more than a feel-good tactic for nonprofits. Done right, an engagement strategy can directly lead to increased giving and revenue. Fundraisers Ron Cohen and Louis Diez recently discussed data showing how organizations can put a “dollar amount on engagement.” Cohen shared a story of Wabash College creating memorial book plates to honor deceased alumni. Though the families weren’t asked for donations, many visited campus and became ambassadors for the school. Engagement built trust and spread goodwill, with untapped potential for future giving. Diez said to “look at your donors and the ones who have given the most. Try to measure how loyal they’ve been.” Their data shows donors who have given for 6-11 consecutive years typically make much larger lifetime gifts. The more people feel engaged with your work, the more they give. Cohen and Diez surveyed 9,000 donors and found that those who “meet or discuss the organization at least 5 times a year and always or very often feel valued” gave at rates up to 5 times higher in each giving level. For example, while 0.5% of all donors gave over $100,000 lifetime, 2.5% of highly engaged donors were in this top category. Focusing engagement on just an additional 4% of donors could result in over $1 million in new gifts. The presenters call this the “X factor”—the potential for exponential growth by engaging the right groups. But engagement is a long game. As Diez said, “It’s not that more of the people who gave $100 last year will give $200 this year. Engagement builds loyalty and trust over years through accountability and transparency.” While it can be difficult to make the case for investment in engagement, Cohen argues, “it’s just the right thing to do, and organizations need to be trusted in order to be invested in.” By building real relationships with transparency and follow-through, nonprofits can strengthen loyalty, spread goodwill, and see the dollars follow. Engagement leads to giving when done with the right motivations and the long view.

Since the 1950s, nonprofits have relied on impersonal outreach to inspire generosity from their donors. They leveraged direct mail, mass marketing, and event fundraising to drive donations. Everything changed in the early 2000s with the introduction of social media, smartphones and a hyper-connected world. The new normal for everyone became transparency, personalization, and a feeling of ever-present engagement. In addition, donors also had new levels of access to information about the causes they cared about. They could read curated news about issues they cared about, research program results, and even collect information about nonprofit employees. Unfortunately, as expectations evolved, nonprofit fundraisers failed to keep up. The number of donors to nonprofits is falling year after year. Institutional trust is at an all-time low. And burnout from fundraisers continues to climb. If nonprofits don’t make a fundamental shift right now, they risk their own future, plus the future of their beneficiaries. Responsive Fundraising by Gabe Cooper outlines the simple solution for nonprofit fundraisers everywhere. Using real-world examples from leading nonprofits, Responsive Fundraising explains how to take the personalized, donor-centric, connection-building practices most fundraisers reserve for major donors and scale them to work for all donors using The Responsive Framework. The Responsive Framework is an ever-evolving cycle where fundraisers listen, connect, and suggest giving options to each individual donor based on what they care about most. Throughout Responsive Fundraising, readers will learn what the data tells us about the modern donor and their generosity habits. They will receive step-by-step responsive fundraising plays they can implement right away to improve their current fundraising tactics. Plus, they’ll get a look into how responsive nonprofits are shifting their internal teams to create a more collaborative, successful organization. The time for change is now. Donors deserve it. Nonprofits want it. And beneficiaries need it. Responsive Fundraising: The Donor-Centric Framework Helping Today’s Leading Nonprofits Grow Giving will give your nonprofit the best path forward. Download the digital copy of Responsive Fundraising, Gabe Cooper's first book, here: https://lnkd.in/eJkggX4h Or, pick up a hard copy on Amazon: https://lnkd.in/eNdXuPff

In the dynamic world of nonprofit fundraising, staying informed about the latest trends is crucial. A recent report by M+R highlights some fascinating shifts in the landscape of online giving. While overall online fundraising revenue remained relatively flat in 2023, decreasing by an average of 1%, there are significant bright spots that nonprofits can leverage. Recurring Gifts: This area saw a healthy 6% increase, representing 31% of all online revenue in 2023. The stability provided by monthly donations is becoming an invaluable part of fundraising strategies, offering a predictable revenue stream that allows for better planning and execution of nonprofit missions. Mobile Messaging: As email campaign effectiveness declines, mobile messaging is stepping up. Nonprofits raised more from text messages than emails last year, with mobile messaging revenue growing by 14%. This underscores the importance of meeting supporters where they are and utilizing every communication tool effectively. Social Media Trends: Platforms like TikTok are emerging as significant players, with follower numbers for nonprofits on this platform growing by an impressive 112% last year. This growth represents a unique opportunity to engage with younger demographics and expand reach. As we navigate these changes, it's crucial for nonprofits to adapt and innovate. Whether through enhancing mobile messaging efforts or strengthening recurring donation programs, there are ample opportunities to connect with donors in meaningful ways. At Write On Fundraising, we are keen to help nonprofits adapt to these shifts and optimize their fundraising strategies. Reach out to see how we can support your organization in maximizing its fundraising potential. Reach out today to learn more about how we can support you. Email info@writeonfundraising.com or call 888-308-0087 today! Read full article here: https://lnkd.in/ghnYp2Wc

The Power of Automation: How Nonprofits Can Do More With Less Nonprofit fundraising teams are often overworked and understaffed. But automation can help scale your efforts and allow small teams to achieve more. Nick Prenger, CEO of the Prenger Solutions Group, shared how his team has leveraged automation to drive fundraising for Catholic dioceses across the country. Prenger recommends starting with a tool like Microsoft Power Automate to set up simple automated workflows. For example, you can automatically send a welcome email to new donors, thanking them for their first gift. This simple act can have a big impact, making donors feel appreciated and more likely to give again. To increase recurring giving, design an online donation experience focused on monthly donations instead of one-time gifts. Prenger has found that 20-25% of donors who give through these customized pages will opt to donate monthly. Focus your direct mail and email appeals on driving people to these personalized donation pages. Not sure where to start with automation? Begin with “low-risk, high-reward” tasks, Prenger suggests. Send automated stewardship emails with updates on how donors’ gifts were used. Automate birthday or anniversary emails to build personal connections at scale. These small acts of gratitude and acknowledgement can yield big dividends in donor loyalty and lifetime value. Of course, no automation can replace genuine human outreach. Prenger still recommends that fundraisers pick up the phone whenever possible to steward donors. But by automating routine tasks, your team can spend more time on high-touch cultivation and stewardship of key donors. To get buy-in to use new tools, Prenger recommends having the technology vendor explain data security and compliance to your legal team. Start with a pilot program to test the technology on a small group of donors and work out any issues before a wider rollout. With the right approach, automation technology can be an incredible force multiplier for nonprofits looking to strengthen donor relationships and fundraising revenue.