Recurring Extra Gift and Upgrade Best Practices
I shared previously that I’m a very active monthly donor to 40-plus different organizations. Most of those, I joined via direct mail. Since this is tax season, that means I received a ton of tax letters from organizations via mail in January, February and even March. Here’s what many nonprofits included in their letters: All […]
Best Practices for Recurring Donor Receipts
Last year, proposed Mastercard regulations and deadlines for subscription provided quite the scare for nonprofits. One of the regulations would have mandated providing recurring gift receipts every month — at least online. Another regulation would have required making it easy for the donor to find contact information on those receipts, in case the donor wanted to cancel or […]
Recurring Gifts Rocked It on Giving Tuesday
The results speak for themselves. Giving Tuesday 2022 saw a 15% increase in dollars raised compared to 2021 with $3.1 billion in total. Wow. If you rocked the results for your Giving Tuesday campaign, congratulations. If you didn’t, there’s always next year and end of year. If you don’t ask, you’re certainly not going to get it. […]
10 Things I Learned From 30 Years in Sustainer Giving, Part 5
As a fundraiser, your life is not easy. There are days when you wonder why you’re doing it all. There are days where you’re just Zoomed out. You can’t possibly think about yet one more event, one more direct mail campaign, one more Giving Tuesday or other giving day campaign. The stress is huge. There […]
7 Nonprofit Holiday Bloopers
My husband and I love going to the movies. Even during the pandemic, we tried to go if the movie theater was open. We were often the only two in the theater. We just love seeing new movies on the big screen. Instead of rushing out quickly at the end, we usually stay for the […]
10 Things I Learned From 30 Years in Sustainer Giving, Part 3
I hope you’re enjoying this list of things to focus on when it comes to sustainer giving. So far, I’ve shared four things I’ve learned. Some I had to learn the hard way but certainly they can benefit any and all fundraisers. Here are lessons five and six. 5. Challenges Are Opportunities A prime example […]
What I Learned From 30 Years in Sustainer Giving
I recently had the pleasure to present a keynote at Sustainers Day, organized by the Direct Marketing Association of Washington. It was a packed house, filled with nonprofits of different sizes and sustainer experiences. I always learned that rather than a how-to session, a keynote was meant to be inspirational in nature. So, I reflected on […]
Add a Monthly Gift Ask to Your Welcome Email Series
At a recent conference, I finally had a chance to meet some of the NextAfter folks in person. We talked about “The Nonprofit Recurring Giving Benchmark” study from NextAfter. It’s now a few years old, but I have a sneaky suspicion that the organization is working on something new and I can’t wait! Its research on digital activities is […]
Recycle, Reuse and Repurpose Creative
Whenever I get a box for a delivery, I look at the size and see if I can reuse it for something else. Can I ship a care package to a nephew who’s deployed? Could I ship something to our kids or grandkids? Well, the same applies to fundraising and direct response. I’ve been doing […]
How to Ask for an Extra Gift From Your Monthly Donors
One of my copywriter friends asked me: “Do you have a recommendation for how much to ask a monthly donor, when sending them a year-end appeal asking them to make a special year-end gift? I’m wondering if the right amount to ask the donor is the amount they give monthly?” As you’re getting ready for […]
