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TY Thursday: Launching a Donor Recognition Program, 4 Key Tips

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A guest post by Gerard Tonti

The main reasons donors stop giving are a lack of acknowledgement, recognition, and appreciation for their gifts. Every lapsed donor represents another donor your organization will have to acquire, which is a costly pursuit. In fact, acquiring a new donor can cost your nonprofit 50-100% more than the amount that donor will give to your nonprofit.

A donor recognition program, when effectively implemented, not only helps you retain your existing donors, but can also encourage them to become even more engaged. In the long run, this effort can provide a significant amount of additional funds for your organization.

Properly thanking your donors is at the center of every nonprofit’s donor recognition program. We’ll recommend you follow these tips when you launch your donor recognition program:

  1. Set a SMART goal.
  2. Make a detailed plan.
  3. Prioritize personalization.
  4. Offer tiers of recognition.

1. Set a SMART goal.

What does your nonprofit want or need to accomplish with your program? Depending on your specific needs, you may aim to:

  • Convert mid-level donors into major donors
  • Boost your donor retention rate for next year
  • Increase annual revenue

Donor recognition efforts can go a long way to support all of these goals, but choosing one will help your nonprofit stay focused.

Regardless of what your organization wants out of your donor recognition program, make sure your defined goal follows the SMART template. Your goal should be:

  • Specific
  • Measurable
  • Attainable
  • Realistic (or relevant)
  • Time-based

For example, a SMART goal for your donor recognition program might be:

Improve the next calendar year’s mid-level donor retention rate by 10% through the implementation of a mid-level donor society and personal donation appreciation phone calls for mid-level donations.  

Setting your nonprofit’s goal will ensure it’s always clear whether or not your nonprofit has achieved the goal, and it will help you choose your specific donor recognition strategy.

If you need some assistance setting a specific goal, DonorSearch’s guide to nonprofit fundraising metrics contains a full list of Key Performance Indicators around which you can design your goal. Choose just one or two to guide your donor recognition program so your efforts remain targeted.

2. Make a detailed plan.

Once you’ve established a goal, it’s time to get your team together to make a plan for how to achieve it.

There are several things to consider when implementing a donor recognition program, like:

  • Who will be recognized? If your primary goal is to move mid-level donors up to major donors and improve your major donor fundraising numbers, you may choose not to prioritize lower-level donors. Be sure that “mid-level” is clearly defined with a donation range, so you can easily identify which donors will be included in your recognition program.
  • How will they be recognized? What recognition efforts can be automated by your organization’s constituent relationship management system, or CRM? (Donation receipts should make it on that list, but other, more personal communications like phone calls aren’t so easily automated.) Will you use a multi-channel approach? If so, which channels will you use? Will you further acknowledge your donors at events or in public?
  • When will they be recognized? The pace of donor recognition is also worth some thought and discussion with your team. An average thank-you communication schedule might go something like this:
    • Donation receipt: immediate
    • Donation thank-you email: within 24 hours
    • Donation appreciation call: within 72 hours
    • Donation thank-you letter: within 1 week
    • Thank-you gifts: within 1-2 weeks

Of course, this schedule doesn’t include special donor recognition events, which may be a part of your strategy as well.

3. Prioritize personalization.

The key to making your donor recognition efforts effective is to personalize your nonprofit’s communications. A generic “Dear supporter” salutation doesn’t make a strong impact, as donors don’t feel personally acknowledged. Donors need to hear that they matter, which means personalizing every touchpoint.

For nonprofits past a certain size, it’s necessary to rely on donor database software to assist with personalizing your recognition efforts. As we outline in our Salsa Fundraising CRM guide, you should use your CRM to:

  • Segment your donor list. Dividing your donors into separate lists based on specific commonalities allows you to easily target those groups for personal communications. For example, you may identify donors who have volunteered in the past so you can mention their past volunteer efforts in your thank-you letters. Doing so shows the donor your organization is paying attention to their support.

 

  • Automate communications. Once you’ve established the relevant donor segments, your CRM can automate certain communications so your recognition touchpoints won’t fall through the cracks.


  • Develop donor personas. In your donor profiles on your CRM, you can generate “donor personas,” or fictionalized representations of your nonprofit’s typical donors or supporters. Donor personas can help guide personalized communication strategies that you employ in your recognition program.

4. Offer tiers of recognition.

One of the most profitable yet easily overlooked fundraising strategies for nonprofits is showing gratitude for support. It’s important to offer tiers of recognition depending on the giving level of the donor. For example, a T-shirt and a thank-you letter would suffice for a one-time, average donor, but the same recognition wouldn’t fit one of your major donors.

Stepping up your recognition efforts as the donation amount increases ensures all of your donors feel adequately appreciated.

Plus, offering increasing levels of recognition can help incentivize donors to become more and more engaged with your mission. For example, recognizing your mid-level or sustaining donors with an invitation to a giving society can build exclusivity and encourage your lower-level donors to donate more to gain entrance into the society.

Similarly, public recognition of major donors on a donor recognition wall like one of these can help encourage your mid-level donors to give more and eventually become major contributors.

Your organization might establish the following tiered recognition plan:

  • Basic donor: thank-you email, letter, and branded gift (i.e. key chain, water bottle)
  • Sustaining donor: basic donor perks + entrance into donor society, special newsletter, annual appreciation event
  • Mid-level donor: sustaining donor perks + special access at events, annual behind-the-scenes tour, public recognition at events
  • Major donor: mid-level donor perks + inclusion on a donor wall or plaque, conversations with board members and directors, phone call, handwritten note, VIP access at events

This is just one example of a tiered recognition program—your nonprofit should decide what fits best for your organization and its goals. A smaller nonprofit may be able to implement personal phone calls for all of its mid-level donors and meet personally with all of its major donors, while a larger organization would lack the time and resources to call every mid-level donor. Tailor the program to fit your donors, your staff, and your existing donor stewardship strategies.

A strong donor recognition program is an invaluable fundraising asset. Despite the time and effort donor recognition takes, it’s an investment for your nonprofit’s future, strengthening your relationships with donors and encouraging them to become more involved with your mission over time.

Best of luck!

Salsa - Gerard TontiGerard Tonti is the Senior Creative Developer at Salsa Labs, the premier fundraising software company for growth-focused nonprofits.

Gerard’s marketing focus on content creation, conversion optimization and modern marketing technology helps him coach nonprofit development teams on digital fundraising best practices.

TY Thursday: Thank Donors by Giving Them Something to Do Next

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first time donors

You have a new donor. Congratulations! But if you do nothing, chances are more than two out of three that they will never give to you again.

Renewal donations are even less likely if they didn’t give to you in the first place: they gave to their friend’s fundraising campaign. That donor has not gotten to know, like, and trust your organization.

Leave them alone, and they never will.

So, what can you do to win over that kind of donor? One thing that works, sometimes, is giving them the chance to get more involved right away–in the thank-you.

How the Innocence Project Thanked Me

The Innocence Project is an outstanding organization, but it hadn’t been on the list of groups that receive donations from my wife and me. Until this year. Then, a friend asked us to support the group to celebrate her birthday, and we did.

Here’s the thank-you email we received:

Dennis and Rona —

Thank you again for donating to the Innocence Project. Your contribution will go directly towards fighting to free innocent people, advocating for reforms that can identify, rectify and prevent wrongful convictions, and supporting exonerees as they rebuild their lives.

Last year, the Innocence Project’s policy team — in collaboration with the Innocence Network and other key partners — successfully won 21 major policy reforms in 17 states.

But there is so much more to do, and many more wrongfully convicted innocent people counting on us to do this work. Stay in touch and join our social community on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram too.

And if you want to read more, check out our special feature on our Netflix series “The Innocence Files.”

We’re so lucky to have you on this team. Stay in touch!

—The Innocence Project Team

P.S. One more way to say thank you: Take advantage of the “new donors” discount at our official online shop. Use code WELCOME at checkout for 15% off any order today.

What They Gave Me, What You Can Give Donors

First, the Innocence Project gave me something valuable without any further ado: they gave me reasons to believe I’d done the right thing.

But then, they invited me to “join our social community.” Note that wording! I’m not following them. I’m becoming part of a larger group. Now, of course that means I will hear more messages from the nonprofit, but it also means I will add like-minded people to my social media feed–new friends I probably could not have found by myself.

If I’m not the joining type, they’ve given me a series to watch, so I will feel more informed…and closer to the organization and its work. And if I’m a shopaholic, I can go check out their store!

Whether they gave for the first time on an impulse or simply to support their friend, first-time donors are more likely to become second-, third-, and multiple-time donors if they take an action that makes them feel closer to your organization. Which of these things could you give your new donors?

TY Thursday: Did the Donor Mean to Give to YOU?

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Does every donor who gives to your nonprofit really intend to give to you? Chances are, the answer is no!

I am not talking about the donor who meant to give to Connexion in Massachusetts and mistakenly sent a check to Connections in Texas. That kind of mistake is rare.

Nor am I talking about the person who hit Donate on your website when they didn’t mean to. On most websites, the donor has to take a few steps before giving–sometimes, too many!–and that provides them with the chance to reflect.

I’m talking about the donor who knows the gift is going to your organization but doesn’t so much care about your organization as about something that you do. And make no mistake: there are a lot of donors like that.

So, how do you thank them?

Why Donors Give When It’s Not Your Organization They Care About

They care about their friends

Have you ever seen one of your loyal supporters start a Facebook fundraiser for you? Maybe for their birthday, or some other special occasion, Kelly Padilla asks her friends to help her reach a goal of $500…to benefit you.

Let’s say Kelly reaches her goal. Great! You have a little money you didn’t have before. But what you don’t have is a whole new set of donors: because they didn’t give to support you, they gave to support Kelly.

That’s true whether Kelly raises funds for you online, runs a charity race, buys a table at your gala, or even holds a house party. It’s true whether the gift is for her birthday, in honor of her retirement, or in memory of her mother who passed away recently.

The people who donate to these kinds of fundraising campaigns give because of their relationship with her, not their relationship with you.

They care about a program and the people it serves

There are lots of occasions when a donor gives because they like a particular program of yours but wouldn’t have been moved to give to the others.

This happens often in crises. After the earthquake in Haiti in 2010, for instance, I gave to an international NGO for Haiti relief. When they stopped letting me designate my gift for Haiti, I stopped giving to them. The others may have been worthy, but they were not what I meant to support.

Even on an everyday basis, donors may like one part of what you do more than others. I know it hurts to realize that. You have no black sheep in your nonprofit family. They’re all your babies! But a donor has a different relationship to them.

  • When I worked at an anti-poverty program, some donors cared about preventing evictions and homelessness. Others loved seeing pre-school children in Head Start.
  • An agency that supports survivors of domestic violence may have to talk about women survivors in most of its appeals, because its longtime donors identify with women. They may have to send segmented appeals to get support for male and non-binary survivors.
  • My dad spent the last 48 hours of his life in hospice care, and I used to give to the hospice agency. When it was swallowed up a county-wide hospital network, and that network assumed I would just switch my giving to them, I directed my donations somewhere else. I have heard stories like this from other donors!
  • If your agency does policy advocacy, a small number of donors will care about that intensely, and a larger number will want their money to go toward helping individuals and families.
“When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why the poor have no food, they call me a communist.”
― Dom Helder Camara

Your donors may not call you saints or communists, but they know whether they want to give food to the poor or challenge the system that creates poverty. It’s one of those goals that they care about: not your whole organization.

They care about a program you sponsor

Recently, I receive a wonderful thank-you in the mail. It included a personal note from the Development Director; her business card; and a brochure, a newsletter, and an annual report, all beautifully illustrated with photos in color.

The puzzling thing? I didn’t remember giving to the organization!

It turned out that I had given to a couple of smaller groups of incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women who relied on this umbrella organization for fiscal sponsorship. The name of the larger organization showed up on my credit card statement. It did not stick in my memory.

Because it was the women I cared about–not their fiscal sponsor.

How Do You Thank Donors Like These?

It’s a really good idea to thank every donor, even if in some cases you are unlikely to hear from them again. We know statistically, for instance, that people who give in memory of a friend’s mother who died this year are unlikely to give again next year. And few of the people who gave to support Kelly’s birthday fundraiser will become repeat donors, when you ask.

So, what can you do to give your nonprofit the best chance of building relationships with donors who might not care about your whole organization?

  1. Thank the fundraisers. Make sure that Kelly feels like a hero.
  2. Save the date. Can you remind yourself to ask Kelly to do the same next year? Or to ask people who gave in memory of her mom to give in her memory on the anniversary of her death the following year?
  3. Ask what interests the donor. When you call and thank them, ask what moved them to give. Or create a follow-up email and ask that question. It may be an issue at large or a specific program at your agency. You need to know.
  4. Record the information in a searchable database. If you can’t query your CRM and find out all the people who gave because of a particular issue, get a new database!
  5. Make sure the donor feels seen. Send them articles, stories, photos, quotes, appeal letters, and thank-you letters that let them know that you know why they give.

Because if they don’t mean to give to your organization yet, treat them right, and maybe you will earn their loyalty.

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