As the end of summer approaches, nonprofits nationwide start planning for year-end fundraising. From October to December, we send out email appeals, direct mail appeals, and handwritten notes. We set meetings and make calls—and we ask our board members to do the same.
Too often, though, organizations struggle until the last minute to hit year-end fundraising goals. Why?
The answer has little to do with your year-end strategy. Instead, it’s all about your year-round donor communications.
So, before you gear up for year-end fundraising, we recommend taking a step back to assess your overall donor communications approach.
Top Donor Communications Mistakes
The main way donors hear about your nonprofit’s work is directly from your organization. So, what messages are you sending your donors?
Some common missteps we see include:
- Only communicating with donors when you want money. Donors are people, not piggy banks.
- Failing to emphasize impact. Are you telling your donors only about activities, rather than the collective impact those activities are achieving? If so, you’re selling your organization short.
- Making donor communications your last priority. If keeping donors updated is always your organization’s last priority, trust us, your donors will know it.
Here’s a spoiler: The secret to effective donor communications is consistency.
Your donors already believe in your organization’s mission—and they’ve put their money toward that mission. Your job now is to keep them engaged. (For more on donor engagement, check out our webinar on Donor Relations that Create Donor Retention.)
Step 1: Document Your Current Donor Communications Practices
Improving your donor communications means taking a hard look at your current practices. You should start by documenting:
- How do you contact current donors? Email? Direct mail? Personal outreach?
- How often are you contacting donors? Does the contact rate vary by giving level or type of donor (individual vs foundation)? Many organizations aim to send monthly email updates, which may be supplemented with mailed materials and personalized outreach (phone calls, meetings, etc.) for larger donors.
- Do you have a donor database or contact list? If so, is it regularly updated with accurate information (and who is responsible for doing this)? If you don’t have a donor database, will you be putting one in the budget for next year?
- How much customization do you do in your donor communications and appeals? Are you tracking which donors are interested in which aspects of your organization’s programming—and then using that information to customize outreach?
- What percentage of your donor communications are focused on asking for money vs reporting activities vs sharing impact? (To learn more about how to better share impact, check out our webinar on impact reporting to increase fundraising.)
Some of these questions can get thorny. And some people on your team might be embarrassed to admit to major gaps in donor outreach. So, it’s important to approach this as a fact-finding mission—rather than casting judgment or assessing performance.
Step 2: Create a Donor Communications Schedule
Once you’ve answered the questions above, you’ll know what you’re working with. Next, you’ll want to set a schedule for the following:
- Regular email updates to all donors. For example, you could send monthly impact reports that demonstrate how your work is having a concrete impact.
- Regular personal touches for top donors. For example, for your largest individual and foundation donors, you might want to reach out personally at least twice per year with more in-depth updates and/or to schedule calls or meetings.
- Direct mail. If your donor base responds better to mail rather than email, you might send printed membership or supporter newsletters twice per year to round out your email updates and direct mail appeals.
- In-depth wrap-up communications, such as a year-end report or a report at the end of a major campaign. This will be a chance for donors to see the cumulative scope of your organization’s impact. Plus, you’ll remind them of all you accomplished (that they may have forgotten or missed).
Step 3: Assess Capacity
Once you have your schedule, you’ll need to make sure you have the right capacity in place to deliver on it.
We’ve seen a lot of organizations develop fantastic donor communications strategies and start strong. But after a few months, staff get busy. There are board meetings to plan, grant deadlines to meet, and fundraising events to plan. Eventually, someone realizes that no one has sent a donor update in months.
So before you send that first donor impact report, you will need to document who is:
- Maintaining your donor list or database.
- Monitoring the donor communications schedule and making sure deadlines are met.
- Drafting written communications (both email and print).
- Approving final communications.
- Hitting “send” on email communications.
- Dealing with the printer and mail house for direct mail.
Let’s be honest: all of the above takes time and money. That’s why the final step is planning a realistic donor communications budget.
Step 4: Create Your Donor Communications Budget
Successful donor communications require some level of financial investment—whether that’s in staff time or consulting time.
Key budget questions to ask:
- Do you have enough capacity to craft the donor outreach materials you will need? You will need someone familiar with your programming who can write well for different audiences. If you don’t have this capacity, what would a new staff position or a part-time consultant cost to do this work? In some cases, skilled volunteers can also help create some written pieces, but remember that volunteers may also get busy.
- Do you have enough staff capacity to keep your donor outreach on track? Someone on your team should be looking at the donor list and outreach calendar every single week. Again, this could be a staff position or a part-time consultant.
- Do you have a donor database with updated contact information? If not, consider adding this cost to your technology budget for the coming year.
Pro Tip: Do You Have a Strategic Plan?
Although it might sound off-topic, one of the unsung benefits of a strategic plan is its ability to supercharge your donor communications. A strategic plan:
- Provides built-in metrics that articulate your impact goals and make it easy to report on progress.
- Demonstrates to donors that you’re focused on impact—including making the best use of their contributions.
- Can help you renew or increase gifts from current donors by giving them insights into what’s ahead—and how they can be a part of it.
- Saves time creating new content for donors. For example, if you’re reporting to your board quarterly about your strategic plan progress, you can adapt those same reports to send to donors.
To learn more, you can check out our full guide to nonprofit strategic planning.
