Back when I was a kid in the 1980s, around bedtime most nights, we’d be finishing up our evening television ritual – consuming classics like The A-Team, Cheers, Knight Rider, or The Greatest American Hero (look it up; it’s amazing) – and a foreboding, resonant voice could be heard over the network TV airwaves:
“It’s 10pm. Do you know where your children are?”
Anybody younger than, say, 40 may have never heard this admonitory question.
But it was a real thing.
It was a public service announcement that on the surface was a warning to parents that they better figure out where their kids were: it’s late and time for bed, and nothing good happens after 10pm. More deeply, it was a commentary on parenting during the era of latchkey kids and absentee parents – the era that formed what would later be called “Generation X.”
But that’s a story for a different time.
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What I’d like to do tonight is ask you, dear nonprofit leader, the following question:
“It’s September – do you know what your end of year fundraising strategy is?”
The end of the year provides a tremendous opportunity for your fundraising efforts – in both major gifts and annual giving. Individuals think of their giving in 12-month increments, many times giving just one gift per year, and the large majority of donors give at the end of the year, creating what we could call a hockey stick curve as you measure your annual fundraising progress. According to one statistic, as much as 31% of your giving may occur in December.
In this blog post, I’d like to share a few pointers that may help you maximize the good potential that’s right around the corner – always offered with the caveat that the best fundraising occurs in the wake of a movement, or after many years of good habits in your fundraising shop.
But now is always a good time to start those habits. And I hope the below will provide a few thought-provoking ideas that will help you put together your strategy.
Cast a wide net
If you’ve followed me for any amount of time, you’ve probably heard me say this before. Fundraising is a numbers game. And to hit your numbers, you will often have to reach out to more potential donors than you think you do.
The rate of return on an appeal could be anywhere from 0.5% to *maybe* as much as 3%.
And that means two things:
1 – Don’t expect to hit your fundraising goals simply by sending out a bunch of letters.
2 – Don’t expect to land any gifts unless you send out a bunch of letters.
And I’m not trying to be contradictory. You absolutely must cast a wide net. There’s no way around it. Use all possible sources for names: previous donors, possible donors, email recipients, newsletter recipients, event attendees, that one spreadsheet of folks who came to Jim’s backyard party four years ago – all of it.
But at the same time, realize that donors won’t give to an appeal in a vacuum. They give to an organization they feel connected to, one they can trust and that they know. An organization where they feel valued.
And that leads me to my second point…
Supplement your direct fundraising outreach with individual donor cultivation
If you do hope to increase the rate of return on your direct appeals, it’s super important that you engage in individual donor cultivation.
Hopefully, you’ve been doing this throughout the year: cards to say hello or thank you, stewardship reports that give your donors a sense of what you’re accomplishing, regular electronic communications with pictures and stories that celebrate your mission, social media posts that share all the color of what your donors make possible.
And as you approach the end of the year, consider engaging in a targeted phone calling campaign. Major Gift Solutions is doing this right now for a handful of clients. We’ve segmented donors into categories like “Gave last year but not yet this year,” or “gave over $500,” or “haven’t given since 2022,” or “event attendees,” etc. And we have written different strategies for each of those segments.
We also typically send an email ahead of our call. Something like this:
Dear Donor,
Hello from Organization!
You’ve been a super kind supporter of our work. Thanks so much for your partnership in our mission.
I wanted to let you know that I’ll be giving you a call in a few days. Just wanted to say hello and thank you personally for your generosity.
We’ve also got some exciting initiatives that we’re sharing with donors as we approach the end of the year, and I’d love to tell you about them.
Thanks again for all the ways you help make ORGANIZATION better. I look forward to speaking with you!
Your name
Short and sweet and to the point. It gives the donor a heads up that you will be calling. Then you call. Then they get the end of year fundraising stuff – emails, letters, socials, etc.
And – hopefully – after all of those individual touchpoints, something will stick. And you’ll make a well-stewarded, well-cultivated donor feel connected to your mission.
Involve your board or volunteers
One of the most powerful ways you can engage donors in your mission is to make sure that the “right” person reaches out. Now, please do not use this as an excuse – as happens way too often. (I’m not the “right person” to call this donor, so I’m just not going to call them.) No, please pick up the phone and say hello.
However, if you have done a good job of stewarding your donor throughout the year, and if you’re looking for a fresh way to engage them, you may want to try a volunteer fundraising campaign.
And I say “try” on purpose.
Because organizing a successful volunteer fundraising initiative ain’t easy.
To be really successful, it takes time. And a lot of trial and error. And even then, you may only find that a small percentage of your “fundraisers” do their homework.
But I have seen this work – sometimes with substantial success. So I suggest giving it a try.
If you’re new to this idea, you can start by working with your board.
And take my word for it when I say you will need to spoon feed them.
– Provide email scripts.
– Provide donor names.
– Provide email addresses and/or phone numbers.
– Build a shared spreadsheet.
– Make the assignments.
Then do a lot of check-ins.
And plan on filling in a lot of blanks.
And again, don’t assume that this singular practice will automatically turn the dial for you. It should be part of a broader fundraising strategy that is designed to engage donors all year long. And it should be supplemented with all of the above.
But if you have a decent volunteer base, and if your donors have been cultivated during the time leading up to your volunteer campaign, and if the other pieces are in place, then it’s possible that with the right person making the ask, you’ll see a decent response rate – at least one that is higher than a singular fundraising appeal sent all by its lonesome.
Make Giving Tuesday a launchpad and a landmark
If you’re not familiar with Giving Tuesday, take a look at this website. It’s got lots of free resources and good tips to help you organize a decent end-of-year push.
But I will say this from experience, and I hope you’re observing a theme here: don’t anticipate that you will meet your entire fundraising budget just by putting together a few Giving Tuesday Canva docs or sending a couple emails.
Your Giving Tuesday campaign should fit into a more comprehensive end-of-year strategy, which should in turn fit into a comprehensive 12-month strategy.
The benefit of participating to some degree in Giving Tuesday is that it is a relatively well-known phenomenon that donors anticipate. And if you don’t participate, it can be conspicuous.
So I do advise engaging in the festivities. Send a couple emails. Post a couple socials. Be part of a broader movement for good during a time when our society could really use some collective good.
And make sure that your Giving Tuesday strategy fits into an overarching plan that gives donors lots of reasons to celebrate all twelve months of the year.
Always celebrate the face of your organization
If you haven’t read my reflections on the face, take a minute to check them out here.
There is something about a person’s face. It changes our approach to the other. It makes us look a person “in the humanity.”
As you draft your messaging for the end of the year, make sure that you too are putting the face of your mission front and center in your donor communications. Who are the individuals your mission impacts? Who are the beneficiaries? What are the stories of lives changed?
And if your mission is not exactly person-centered, find the “face” anyway. What are the good moments that give your constituents a reason to celebrate? What are the person-adjacent stories you can tell? What conferences did you organize? Events did you facilitate? Gardens you planted? Pets you saved?
And make that meaningful story the hinge pin of all your messaging.
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Those are the reasons donors give.
They are entrusting you to make a difference. They are trusting your organization to accomplish the thing they believe in.
Use the end-of-year push to give them all kinds of reasons to believe.
Fundraising is an awesome calling.
You are offering donors the chance to be part of important, meaningful work. End-of-year fundraising is not a sales pitch. It’s not begging. It is an invitation into a story where their generosity makes a difference.
And if in that sense, you keep the main thing the main thing, you’ll find the end-of-year hockey curve is not just a myth. It’s a substantive way you can celebrate the good you do along with your supporters.
