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Fundraising Tuesday: 5 Essential Elements of an Annual Giving Plan

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A guest post by James Barnard of BWF

Your nonprofit’s annual giving strategy gives your organization the unrestricted funding it needs to power its mission. Everything from your volunteer program and community outreach projects to the electric bill for your organization’s headquarters can be funded with annual gifts.

Because unrestricted funding is so important for your organization, you need a clear annual giving plan to help reach your goals. In this guide, we’ll highlight five essential elements of a successful annual giving plan:

  1. Inspiring goals
  2. Pipeline development strategies
  3. A clear message
  4. Personalized donor outreach and stewardship
  5. Appreciation efforts

According to BWF’s annual giving guide, today’s nonprofit donors expect “meaningful engagement, personalized interactions, and curated experiences that speak directly to their motivations and needs.” Creating a plan with the following elements can help you exceed donors’ expectations and develop relationships that last long after your annual giving campaign ends.

1. Inspiring goals

Your nonprofit’s team will have an objective to work toward when you set clear goals. Use your goals to set priorities and establish benchmarks for success.

Your goals should be specific, measurable, and attainable. Review past annual giving campaigns to develop a relevant, achievable goal based on your current and potential fundraising capacity. Base your goals around specific fundraising metrics such as:

  • Revenue
  • Donor acquisition
  • Donor retention
  • Fundraising ROI

Assign reporting responsibilities to each of your annual giving team members. For example, one team member might be in charge of tracking revenue while another keeps tabs on your donor acquisition and retention rates.

2. Pipeline development strategies

Reaching your annual giving goals depends on your nonprofit’s ability to connect with new and existing donors. To make this connection, use your donor pipeline to convert audience members into annual giving donors.

You can find leads by engaging with individuals who have already been involved with your nonprofit in the past, including:

  • Past donors
  • Past volunteers
  • Past event attendees
  • Social media followers
  • Website visitors

You can also conduct prospect research to discover potential new donors who may not yet have any relationship with your organization. With the help of a prospect research consultant or database, you can identify potential donors who have a high giving capacity and an interest in your cause and then focus in on those who fit into your ideal donor profile.

Reach out to these potential donors using a combination of digital messaging and traditional outreach like appeal letters. Establishing a multichannel communication approach helps keep your appeal top of mind for potential donors.

3. A clear message

To help your nonprofit stand out, craft a relevant message that resonates with the widest group of potential supporters.

Whether you’re reaching out as part of your mid-year or year-end giving appeal, your outreach should be unified and compelling. Follow these tips when creating your annual giving message:

  • Tell a captivating story. Clearly explain why you’re raising funds and who will benefit from your organization’s projects and programs. Consider highlighting the journey of a central protagonist who was supported by your organization’s work.
  • Create a catchy slogan or tagline. Make your annual giving strategy stand out by creating a slogan for your campaign, such as “Building a Stronger Tomorrow” or “Love Your Earth Today.” You can use your slogan as a hashtag on Instagram or Twitter to track conversations about your campaign.
  • Highlight donor benefits. Describe the value donors will receive from joining your campaign, such as the ability to join your donor society or receive complimentary merchandise.

Whether you’re telling your story within a social media post, letter, or email newsletter, keep your message brief and provide an easy way for supporters to get involved. For example, you might include a link or QR code leading to your online donation page.

4. Personalized donor outreach and stewardship

As mentioned, donors expect to be treated as individuals. Creating personalized content for donors rather than generic, one-size-fits-all messages will help you generate deeper relationships, and as a result, more donations.

Build donor relationships throughout your annual giving campaign by:

  • Segmenting donors to create tailored content. For example, you might create groups of former volunteers, donors, and event attendees. Then, you can send more relevant messages to each group based on their interests.
  • Personalize your appeals. Use the information you have in your donor database to customize your outreach messages with donors’ names and references to their past involvement. For example, you might thank someone for their previous volunteer work or past donation to your year-end giving initiative.
  • Answer donor questions. Be responsive if donors reach out to you with questions. Providing a positive customer service experience by quickly addressing donors’ concerns will help build trust.

5. Appreciation efforts

When you wrap up your annual giving campaign by showing gratitude to donors, you can lay the foundation for long-term relationships with them.

Make your thank-you notes stand out by:

  • Sending messages in donors’ preferred formats. Use your donor data to determine each donor’s preferred communication method. Personalize your thank you messages with donors’ names and donation amounts.
  • Asking donors for feedback. Donors can provide valuable feedback on everything from your campaign messaging to your donor engagement efforts. Asking them for feedback and implementing their recommendations makes them feel heard and appreciated.
  • Giving donors a way to stay in touch. Keep the conversation going — invite donors to continue engaging with you by following you on social media, signing up for your email newsletter, or registering for a volunteer opportunity.

If you feel like your nonprofit could use more personalized support throughout your campaign, don’t hesitate to reach out to a fundraising consultant. These fundraising partners can provide you with the tailored support and recommendations you need to exceed your goals.

James Barnard, BWF, head shotJames Barnard, Associate Managing Vice President of Annual Giving and Digital Marketing at BWF

James an integral part of the team at the global fundraising consultancy BWF. He helps nonprofit clients develop digital strategies for fundraising and marketing. James has been active in CASE for a number of years, participating as a conference speaker and CASE District II board member.

Grantmakers, Don’t Be Like a Death in the Family

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There’s a reason why I usually advise nonprofits to spend more time pursuing donors than grants. Grantmakers can be like a death in the family!

Gary, Dennis, and Joel Fischman

Last July, my brother Joel died at the age of 59. He died suddenly, as people with pancreatic cancer often do. To wind up his affairs, I had to deal with a court-appointed administrator, with an investment firm, and with three offices of the U.S. government (his employer).

The administrator was wonderful, both humane and experienced. The investment firm took more care to make sure they were crossing the T’s and dotting the I’s than to make the experience easy for me, but that’s all right: I’d rather they send the right amount of money to the right recipient (our mother, Joel’s heir).

The HR office at Joel’s employer, the US Courts, was both deeply caring and efficient. They made sure I would know what to do and how, and they cautioned me about how long it might take.

The unexpected obstacle was the Federal Employee Retirement System (FERS). After several rounds of mail (sent to my mother and forwarded to me), they finally got to the point where they were ready to release my brother’s money. Only…they required my mother’s signature, by hand.

Not my electronic signature, as her Power of Attorney. Not even my signature in ink. Apparently, as far as this particular branch of the federal government is concerned, a legal Power of Attorney might as well be a roll of toilet paper.

They insisted my 88-year-old mother with the trigger finger take a pen and sign on the dotted line before they would send any of the money my late brother had left for her. Apparently, I could have been defrauding them by sending them a Power of Attorney that’s been valid for years, but if Mom painfully signed their document today, that would prove she’d done it of her own free will.

Grantmakers, don’t do this!

If you run a family foundation or manage a grant program at some larger charity, don’t act like the FERS. You don’t want to be a source of grief!

Literally, there’s a good chance that someone who’s applying for your funds has lost someone close to them recently. Between Covid-19, RSV, police violence, and maternal mortality rates, there have been even more deaths than usual these past few years (and a disproportionate amount of the mourning has taken place in communities of color).

But even if the particular applicant has not put on their mourning suit lately, many nonprofits are dealing with a set of social ills that take their clients’ lives and drain their own vital energy, day by day.

You want to support them. I know that. The last thing you want to do is administer death by a thousand cuts. But…listen to the brave nonprofits who are risking losing your money by telling you that’s exactly what you’re inflicting.

As Charlie Brown would say, “Good grief!” (Only, there’s nothing good about it.)

Grantmakers, please do this instead

  • Simplify, simplify, simplify your proposals.
  • Accept proposal formats that a variety of other funders accept, so the nonprofit doesn’t have to rework the proposal over and over.
  • Get rid of word and character limits. Let people write in natural sentences.
  • Make unrestricted grants.
  • Make multi-year grants.
  • Come up with reporting requirements that nonprofits can meet just by doing their work, not by making a separate database stand on its head.
  • Be kind. Remember that other people are carrying burdens you know nothing about.

Fundraising Tuesday: Effectively Marketing Your Nonprofit’s Next Virtual Event

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A guest post by Dominique Desmarais of CharityBids

The COVID-19 pandemic boosted the prominence of virtual charity events. But nonprofits have continued to leverage them beyond the days of lockdown because of their many benefits.

For most of your supporters, virtual gatherings are likely unique, refreshing, and convenient to attend. Plus, they can help your organization save on costs, or tap into exclusive experiences like celebrity appearances or performances. There’s also a wide variety of online fundraising tools and strategies you can use for a virtual event.

However, just because your auction will be held via Zoom or your gala will take place in an immersive virtual reality venue doesn’t mean that your marketing efforts can take a backseat. With virtual events, you still need to pull out all the stops when it comes to promoting the occasion and encouraging people to attend.

In this guide, we’ll help you get started by providing three tips you can use to effectively market your nonprofit’s next virtual event.

1. Take a multichannel approach.

Even though your event is going to take place online, you should still cast a wide net when it comes to choosing marketing channels to promote your virtual event. Use a multichannel approach to make sure that you’re covering all of your bases.

So, what channels should you use?

  • Email
  • Social media
  • Radio and TV
  • Printed materials (such as flyers and posters)
  • Direct mail

Of course, some channels will be more useful than others, depending on what you know about your supporters. But the main idea of a multichannel approach is, according to Double the Donation, to “increase your chances of reaching out to your supporters with their preferred communication method.”

As you cast your marketing net wide, keep these best practices in mind to make your efforts as effective as possible:

  • Brand your materials to your nonprofit. No matter the channel your supporters are using to learn about your event, they should know that the messaging is coming from your nonprofit. Be consistent in using your nonprofit’s brand elements across your marketing materials. Place your name and logo in a prominent place on all of your materials, and use similar color schemes from channel to channel. This way, you’ll build brand recognition for your organization while promoting your event.

 

  • Use calls-to-action to encourage registrations. The end goal of your virtual event marketing strategy is to get your supporters to register for your event. Use calls-to-action (CTAs) to encourage them to take that step. A CTA is simply a statement that encourages people to do something. For example, you might include a CTA in an email newsletter that says, “Help end the rhino poaching crisis by registering for our webinar today.”

 

  • Pay attention to timing. Different channels will be useful at different times leading up to your virtual event. For instance, printing hundreds of flyers probably wouldn’t be a very wise move in the last few days before your event. Those materials would better serve your marketing strategy a few months prior to the big day. On the other hand, social media will be a great tool to use in the days and hours leading up to the event because they’ll reach your audience quickly.

As you select the different channels you’ll use to market your virtual event, make sure to be consistent in how you talk about your event. Share critical details like date, time, and cost to register. This way, everyone will get the same information regardless of the way they receive that information.

2. Make your website your event information hub.

Because your virtual event will likely require that your supporters register online, you should use your website as a central event information hub, directing supporters to it no matter how they hear about your event.

CharityBids’ guide to nonprofit event planning suggests creating a microsite or dedicated events page on your website that includes an easy-to-use registration form. This way, you can not only get people registering for your most current virtual event, but also establish a clear section on your website that supporters can visit regularly for news about future events.

Let’s look at some additional ways you can strengthen your website to make it an effective marketing tool for your virtual events:

  • Spotlight your event on your homepage. Put event announcements front and center on your website by including them on your homepage. This way, users will quickly learn about your events when they visit your website and be encouraged to continue their journey by learning more on your event page.

 

  • Create blog posts about your event. Your blog is a great place to plug your virtual events. For example, you might write up the history of your annual gala, share what your attendees enjoyed most about last year’s auction, or publish an interview with your event’s special guest. Don’t forget to include a CTA that encourages blog readers to register!

 

  • Add social media buttons. Once a supporter has used your website to register for your virtual event, they may want to share the event information with their personal networks. Empower them to do so by including social sharing buttons on your website. This way, your supporters can help market your event with one easy click.

As you prepare your website to be the central information hub for your next virtual event, perform some website maintenance. For example, make sure that your website is loading correctly, that every link on your site works, and that any outdated content has been removed. Additionally, ensure that your website is optimized for accessibility so that anyone can use it, regardless of ability. This way, you’ll be ready to welcome as many people as possible to engage with your event-specific web content.

3. Use personalization to make your communications more effective.

The best way to start personalizing your marketing efforts is to segment your target audience. This is the process of dividing your audience into sub-groups based on shared characteristics. Your promotional messages will better resonate with your audience when they’re tailored to specific audience groups.

To segment your nonprofit’s community of supporters, use your donor data to identify shared characteristics like:

  • Geographical location
  • Age
  • Donor status
  • Communication preference

Here’s an example of what this might look like in practice: Say that you review the donor data in your CRM and learn that 60% of your supporters live in your local community. Knowing this, your team could determine that it would be a good use of marketing dollars to hang up event posters in community centers, and ask local business owners to keep a stack of flyers by their cash registers.

To take your personalization efforts to the next level, use your recipients’ first names and reference their previous donations or involvement with your nonprofit. Personalizing your materials when you can will make your supporters feel seen as individuals and feel like your virtual event invitations are meant just for them.

The success of your nonprofit’s next virtual event will heavily depend on your ability to market it effectively. Leverage the tips in this guide to make your efforts count, and consider working with charity event planning and production experts to make the process even easier. You’ve got this!

Dominique DesMarais head shotAuthor: Dominique Desmarais, Marketing Manager at CharityBids

Dominique is the Marketing Manager at CharityBids. She earned her Bachelor of Commerce from the Smith School of Business at Queen’s University, specializing in Marketing and International Business.

Over the years, Dominique has developed a strong passion for creative direction and strategy development. She brings a unique and artistic approach to marketing, rooted in her enthusiasm for the creative, entertainment and fashion industries, and their applications to establishing and growing digital presence. Having launched her own creative agency, Dominique was able to collaborate across cultures and bring creative visions to life through disruptive innovation.

When she’s not working, you can find Dominique hunting down the best food in the city, taking in an art exhibit, or capturing the beauty of her surroundings through photographs. She has a fire to create change and a drive to fuel success, while continuously striving to learn, grow, and prosper.

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