Create a Magical Experience To Grow Recurring Donors
I’m an avid supporter and reader of SOFII, as it has some tremendous free stuff, like fundraising examples, articles and case studies from all over the world. I especially like the articles on retention, loyalty and, of course, recurring giving. Over my almost 30 years of fundraising, I’ve always been impressed by the many studies, especially those […]
Why Recurring Giving Leads to Better Donor Retention
If you look at the most recent statistics on donor retention, the year 2020 was not great. One reason was that many organizations put a hold on asking for contributions in the first half of the year because they worried about donors not giving. Many continued to be reluctant well into the second half. Hence, […]
Does the Peanut Butter or Jelly Come First in Monthly Giving?
You probably have seen me quote Seth Godin before. His blogs inspire some of mine. It’s a short one so I’ll share his full post on “The Order of Operations” because it’s so important when it comes to monthly giving: “If you put the jelly on before the peanut butter, the sandwich will fail. “And if you […]
Monthly Giving Will Grow in Popularity in the Post-Pandemic Nonprofit
Over the past few weeks, I’ve been able to do some traveling again — in-person client visits, family visits, fun. Sitting on airplanes and in airports means time to read. I never leave home without a fundraising book to enjoy (along with other books, of course). Recently, I read “The Post-Pandemic Nonprofit: 12 Disruptive Trends Your […]
4 Examples of How Things Can Go Wrong With Monthly Gifts
As you may know, I’ve been scanning and tracking examples of monthly giving approaches and follow ups for years. There are so many wonderful ways nonprofits ask for monthly donors. So many tremendous examples of saying thank you in the most grateful of ways. There’s so much that goes right with monthly giving and the […]
Identify Potential Monthly Donors Using Data
Donor data has always been important in raising funds for nonprofits. It’s literally your ‘gold.’ It provides you with everything you need to keep track of your donors and know most of what there is to know about them. Especially when it comes to outreach to potential monthly donors. Why is this helpful for outreach to […]
What Smaller Nonprofits Can Do With More Communication and Recurring Gifts
Recently, I shared statistics from large organizations here and here. Now, it’s time to look at what smaller nonprofits are doing when it comes to monthly giving. I was excited to read the “Small Nonprofit Fundraising Benchmark Report,” published by Network for Good and the NextAfter Institute based upon 2019 data and 2020 surveys. This report publishes […]
Is the Interest in Recurring Giving Really Growing?
Nonprofit PRO just published its “2021 Nonprofit Leadership Impact Study” and while I like what I’m reading there, it’s still not quite where I’d like it to be. Or should I say, where it really ought to be to make and keep nonprofits sustainable. One of the conclusions from the report is: nonprofits need to […]
Monthly Giving Programs Are Like Eating Your Veggies
Recently, I was on Facebook Live with a colleague, and we were discussing some tips for growing monthly gifts. The question of why so many nonprofits are still hesitating about introducing monthly giving to their donors came up. It’s still a real mystery to me. It made me think of my childhood. My mom and […]
Is It Tax Time Yet?
If you’ve been following this blog for a while, you know that I don’t typically recommend sending monthly thank-you letters to monthly donors. Instead, I suggest you send one thank-you letter when they join, and in that, you explain that from now on, they’ll start receiving updates on how their gifts are making a difference. […]
