Fundraising Tips for Nonprofits: How to Apply the Top Strategies

Fundraising is likely the most challenging aspect of nonprofit work. That’s why the majority of organizational leaders seek out fundraising tips for nonprofits. We have tried to simplify advice in this article, with three key takeaways in mind. 

1. Helping you get back to basics. It can be difficult for new fundraisers and seasoned professionals alike to follow best practices of fundraising continuously. The first component of this article is a succinct guide to fundraising best practices to set the right tone for your strategy work.
2. Advice on navigating fundraising strategies in a modern world. Modern tools and technology have opened new windows of opportunity for fundraisers to hone prospect lists and reach out to donors. Which tools really work, however, and how do you apply them?
3. How to apply new tools to old practice. Most time-tested strategies should still be incorporated into your playbook. They almost all can benefit from tech-enabled support, however, to ease administrative work and improve returns. How do you apply those new, modern tools, however, to old fundraising strategies in the most effective ways? 

We’ve outlined various ways you can use tools like Donor AI, integrated into management platforms you might already be using, to help you improve impact from campaigns.  Technology, when applied well with seamless integration across systems you are already using, can actually help you get closer to your donors while attracting new funding sources. 

The 6 Nonprofit Fundraising Best Practices

The critical factor for success in the modern fundraising environment is to apply technology, but in ways that improve trust in your nonprofit. It is no coincidence that trust in nonprofits has eroded along with giving to nonprofits over the past few years, and also along with the advent of technological solutions.  

In 2022, trust in nonprofits fell below businesses for the first time ever in the Edelman Trust Barometer. Trust fell another 4 points in 2023. Nonprofits need to get back their “consumer confidence.” 

This involves creating a strong foundation for fundraising best practices that integrates new tech tools to make the donor experience more connected and personal. It also should improve your transparency and reporting to ensure that donors trust you at the highest level possible. 

1. Sound donor data should be a top priority. A good data set can help you show your donors that you know them and understand them, which is foundational for trust. The best nonprofits keep detailed records of their donors and donor prospects in secure databases.
   
   The minimum collection points should be donation interests, giving capacity and profession. 
   • Modern tools like Donor AI can help you populate a donor dossier for your different prospects and analyze the data for your donation needs.  
   • You can also look to volunteer management platforms like Golden to connect with personal profiles and linked social media platforms for more information.  
   • In fact, Golden can link and integrate Donor AI, Blackbaud, Salesforce, and other popular CRMs directly to your giving program databases.  
2. Performance should align with KPIs. The best businesses set meaningful Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to then gather metrics to report back to their stakeholders. Nonprofits should all be doing so as well, for both fundraising goals and program goals. 

• • Donors need to trust that you are fulfilling your program goals with their gifts. With detailed KPI data, you can tell them exact statistics of how many people you have helped and to what extent.
  • You also need to know basic data from your fundraising campaigns to optimize your efforts. Calculating the average size of gifts, new donor rates, and donor attrition rates will help you visualize which fundraising strategies are working. 

1. Donor stewardship should always be at the forefront. It is easier to achieve a repeat donation than to attract a new donor.  If you don’t focus on thanking and appreciating your donors, they will likely stop supporting you.
   Donor data can help you better understand how to thank a donor and how to engage them deeper in your work. You want to keep a conversation with your supporters beyond asking for funding, by sharing program work, inviting them to volunteer events, and general communications. The more connected you are with their interests and preferred communication styles, the more personal you can be.
2. Online fundraising tools can help.  To make all of this intense tracking and stewardship possible, you need to automate processes. Integrated software tools like Golden can boost your effectiveness by sending personal thank yous and invitations, to the donor’s preferred communication channel (SMS, email, Facebook, etc.). You can even take advantage of tools to help you craft messages that sound more personal and inviting. 
3. All goals should be SMART. Too often, organizations set unrealistic fundraising goals that ultimately frustrate staff and deplete trust. Set smaller fundraising goals for different fundraising quarters, events, and campaigns, that build slightly on last year’s success. You want to ensure that your fundraising goals are specific, measurable, achievable, realistic, and timebound, the SMART model that good businesses follow.
   
   Also, be realistic of your capacity. The rule of thumb in fundraising, in general, is that you likely won’t achieve more than a 10% increase year-on-year for campaigns or events. If you have the same capacity as last year, you can probably set that metric. But if you have lost staff, or if you have a smaller budget for your events, set a goal that reflects your reality. 
4. Recurring giving programs can aid retention.  Too many nonprofits focus on annual gifts. Why not ask for a five year commitment, or even a ten year pledge? Donors can still re-evaluate at the time of their gift giving if they would like to support you, but they will be much more likely to help you if they gave you the tentative commitment. Also, this is a great strategy to help you project your fundraising success into the future. Starting the new fiscal year with gifts already pledged eases the burden and gives you a more accurate picture of your funding gap. 

Top Nonprofit Fundraising Strategies for a Tech-Enabled World

Once you have your guiding principles established, and a plan set with SMART goals and KPIs, you can think about applying fundraising strategies. 

Go for Small Donors

Major gifts and grants are usually the focus of the fundraising strategy, neglecting the smaller donors. The trends today are towards the small donations, however, in political fundraising and across the nonprofit world. They are easier to achieve, and can help you draw in new donors to then vet for larger gifts.

You can probably take advantage of technology to reach out to people who are already supportive of your work, at greater ease, and in new ways. Think about sending an email campaign or text appeals to your volunteer network, for instance. The point is to develop campaigns that honor small gifts and their place in your fundraising ecosystem. 

Try the “Martyrdom Effect”

There is a reason why shows like Survivor and Fear Factor were incredibly successful and spurred hundreds of spin offs across the world. People react to the “Martyrdom Effect”.

Try peer-to-peer fundraising events where your volunteers struggle to achieve a result, whether a marathon, or a fasting challenge. They’ll likely get more support from their networks. To recruit participants, you’ll want to tap into your database on volunteer interests and invite your supporters who are aligned with that strategy.

Create an Annual Event

Annual events are a time-tested strategy to engage and then re-engage donors. Donors like the continuity. They also like to be part of something, whether it is the “2nd Annual” or the “27th Annual”. Tech tools have made it much easier to automate invitations for donor and volunteer interests, RSVP tracking, and most of the event administration minutiae that used to make Annual Events cost prohibitive to smaller nonprofits. 

Think About a Snail Mail Campaign

People have become so bombarded with email and social media invites that nonprofits are turning back to snail mail. Direct mail campaigns have become more targeted with new tools like Donor AI and preference sorting at the same time.

Younger generations like the give-aways with certain donation levels that older generations began to scorn. This means you might get a higher return on a snail mail campaign, and achieve more towards your new donor metrics than with an electronic campaign. 

Use QR Codes

QR codes have become ubiquitous and are an easy way to share information. They’re interactive, too, engaging new audiences to click through and learn more about you on their own terms.

You can create custom QR codes with a variety of online tools. Think about sharing a donation page via QR code on your print and electronic materials. 

Conscientiously Cultivate Donors 

An essential component of nonprofit fundraising is applying a thoughtful donor cultivation cycle. There are generally five steps. 

1. First, you want to identify your donor pool, by assessing interests and capacity (analyzing your data).
2. Then, you can qualify those donors further, with a more careful analysis, aided by tools like Donor AI.
3. The third step is the cultivation. Instead of asking outright for a gift, you want to engage this person in your mission. Invite them to volunteer events or program events, visit them personally, or give them a backstage pass to understand how your nonprofit works.  
4. Only after you have high confidence that they are very interested in your work, ask for a gift. 
5. Then, follow-up with them, with continuous donor engagement (more cultivation), to repeat the cycle. 

Online Donation Forms with Branding

A simple, yet one of the most important fundraising strategies,  is to brand your donation pages. If you provide QR codes or links to donation pages but they do not have your logo and other brand stamps, a donor is often put off. They need to trust the form is yours. 

One helpful, but often overlooked, tool is white labeling. With a white-labeled online donation form, your organization’s name and logo appears instead of the vendor’s branding.

Make Each Campaign Unique

A top fundraising strategy is unique branding. Every campaign should have a special twist that is brand stamped on different giving forms and outreach materials. This can help you raise more funding, or additional gifts from the same donors who want to support different aspects of your work. 

Only Ask for What You Need

Tied back to the SMART goals, you will want to ensure that campaigns have reasonable fundraising goals. Donors are more likely to give to a goal they think you can actually meet. It’s called the “goal gradient” principle. 

Plus, you don’t want to seem greedy! There are plenty of worthy causes out there, and donors have limited resources. 

Provide Suggested Donation Amounts

In your text and in your donation form, provide suggestions for amounts. Give a fair range so that people give what they can but are not put off by you asking for too much.

Your data on average gifts can help guide the numbers. A tip is to mark the average gift a little below the middle amount, so that donors have that option but are encouraged to give a bit more if they can. 

Test Your Emails 

Use a small sample of your email list to test:

1. Your subject line. Try two and see which one has a higher return. 
2. The time and day sent. Morning or evening? Weekend or weekday?
3. Try different formatting. One with bullets, and one with bold. You can also try different pictures. 

Segment Your Email Lists

Again, use your donor interests and other data here! Segment your email list as much as possible for different demographics, like age and gender, and also for program interests. You can send a few different appeals that are more personal this way. 

Auctions

Live and silent auctions are time-tested fundraising strategies. In the modern world, you can do either by themselves or in concert with an actual event. New tech tools also make it easier to plan and organize these functions. You can likely engage a group of volunteers to run the entire program for you virtually.

Golden volunteer platform, for instance, encourages volunteers to build their own pages and invite their friends and family to support your work through their various social media and communication channels.   You can automate support materials, like videos from your executive director and testimonials, for them to showcase at their live events.

Set Up Donation Stations at Events

At your program and outreach events, you can set up a tablet with your giving page, or cards with your QR link. If you can make sure that volunteers are manning these stations to help interested donors, even better! Equip them with a give away present for each new donor to the cause to achieve an even higher return. 

Tell Your Story

On your website and within your program materials, you should tell a very compelling founding and impact  story. Donors connect better with a cause when it is personal and linked to broader issues in the community, to which they can relate. Testimonials from your program beneficiaries are very effective as well. 

Calls to Action

Every page on your website, and every email or communication you send, should have a call to action (CTA). These can be simple things, but they should engage the donor in taking direct action for your cause. 

Every time that they do so makes them feel more connected to your work. For example, ask them to e-sign a petition; skip a meal on the weekend to see what food insecurity feels like for vulnerable children; or re-post your message to just one social media channel. 

Peer-to-Peer Social Media Campaigns

Ask your donors or volunteers to send your fundraising campaign to their peers, or advertise it on their social media channels. They can go as far as creating custom pages that link with your donation button or donation QR, or they can simply report back on posts and likes. It is good to give them KPIs for their support, as in helping you achieve 5,000 new likes. 

Participate in GivingTuesday

GivingTuesday is the largest and most coordinated online fundraising campaign in the United States. Any nonprofit can participate. Think about posting a new campaign that day. 

It is a good excuse to ask your volunteers and donors to participate in social media peer-to-peer fundraising events. It is also a great way to reach out to new donors through emails collected at an event. 

Include Social Share Buttons on Your Website and Emails

You want to make sure you are constantly inviting everyone to share your messages, through social share button integrations on your website and emails. Management platforms can help you automate these processes fairly easily, for any of your communications. 

Being Strategic with Tech Tools will Help You Raise More!

When fundraising follows best practices, and integrates the top tech tools, you can achieve a greater level of efficiency and automation. When you synchronize your fundraising strategy with your volunteer management platform and your other CRM tools, you can be even more successful. 

Golden helps you personalize your fundraising strategies across your volunteer and donor pools with seamless database integrations. You can assess volunteer and donor interests with custom Donor AI analysis, to invite the right people to participate in fundraising events. You’ll achieve a deeper level of trust this way that translates to higher donor acquisition and retainment.

That’s why, amongst the top fundraising tips for nonprofits, we include considering Golden’s custom solutions for your organization. Request a demo today!