Donor Participation Project participants got together on January 13, 2021 to share their experiences so far in their fiscal year.
Categories
DPP Happy Hour
Category: Donor Participation Project
This session has passed. DPP members can access a video recording, slides, and other materials shared by the presenter. We also hold a small group discussion the week after every presentation for further discussion and networking! Make sure to sign up here to get access.
Matthew Lambert, CEO, William & Mary Foundation, and Dan Frezza, Â Associate Vice President for Strategic Operations & Annual Giving guided a Donor Participation Project session on the details of their successful alumni giving participation strategy during their last campaign.
Some interesting takeaways were:
- Every donor interaction mentioned the three campaign goals of increasing alumni engagement, increasing alumni giving participation, and reaching the campaign’s dollar goal.
- They exploded their alumni engagement from about 10,000 touchpoints with alumni per year at the start of the campaign to over 30,000 by the last year of the campaign.
- They grew their Class Ambassadors program from 200 to over 800 volunteers.
- Their Giving Day also grew exponentially, and they viewed it as both an engagement and giving participation opportunity.
- Leadership (President, Board, VP Advancement) must make participation a priority.
- It is not a matter of either raising given dollar amounts OR achieving a participation goal, it has to be seen as giving AND participation.
- Success requires a broad-based focus, across campus.
- Diversification of the donor base is key (i.e. women in philanthropy, underrepresented populations).
- The main indicators of giving habits are: giving history, consistency, frequency, and gift amount.
- You must choose one among these three high-level goals: Retention, Reactivation, Acquisition. It will most likely be Retention.
- With Reactivation, time is not on your side. After 5 years, donors are as likely to come back as a non-donor.
- In the Acquisition bucket, newly graduated students were an important source of growth.
- Key drivers of their success were: increased retention (year over year giving), increased gift frequency (within a year), stewardship of good behavior (i.e. consecutive giving society).
Learn more about the Donor Participation Project and sign up here.
This session has passed. Join the Donor Participation Project to get access to our resource library with session recordings, member chat, and other benefits.
Nicole Stern, membership director at WDSE WRPT Public Television joined the Donor Participation Project to share her knowledge of monthly giving fundraising.
What is monthly giving?
Monthly giving, also called sustainer giving or recurring giving, consists of setting up an automatically renewing monthly gift to a nonprofit. It is the equivalent of a subscription.
What are the benefits of monthly giving for nonprofits?
Monthly donors have both a higher retention rate as well as a higher lifetime value. Over time, these two facts compound to create important positive effects on the revenue available to fulfill your mission as well as your donor engagement efforts.
How can I start a monthly giving program?
You must embrace monthly giving as a new of doing business for your annual fund.
Simply adding a checkbox under an existing online form is not enough. You must make it clear in all your outreach efforts (digital, mail, phone) that monthly giving is the default and best way to make a gift to your organization.
Won’t monthly giving preclude me from requesting higher gifts from loyal donors?
On the contrary, monthly donors are especially receptive to upgrade asks as well as to planned giving conversations. An established monthly giving program also frees up resources that you can invest in improved stewardship and more donor engagement.
How hard is it to start a monthly giving program?
These are the areas you need to pay attention to if you want to start a monthly giving program:
- Executive buy-in. Use the data in the presentation above to make your case. A full re-orientation of your annual fund to monthly giving will require changes in all your operations and in your cash flow.
- Gift processing. Monthly gifts turn one gift processing transaction into twelve. Fields may need to be added to code the gifts. For example, storing the credit card expiration date in your CRM can help you get ahead of credit card renewals.
- Digital communications. Your main gift form will need to make it clear that monthly giving is the default and most convenient way to give.
- Branding the program. Many organizations give a name to their monthly giving program (Sustainer Circle, Evergreen, etc.) to make it clear that this is something special.
As part of the Donor Participation Project, this Lunch Analysis session will be guided by Nicole Stern, Membership Director at WDSE WRPT Public Television.
Recurring (sustainer) giving has numerous advantages for your organization including predictable long-term revenue, increased donor loyalty, higher donor retention and lifetime value, and incredible upgrade potential. We’ll explore how to prepare your fundraising shop to implement a sustainer program, how to create and execute fundraising strategies to take advantage of this transformational way of giving, and how to avoid any potential pitfalls.
Nicole was featured in an article on sustainer giving in the Chronicle of Philanthropy, which is included in the Required Preparation section below.
Brainstorm and Discuss this Topic With Peers During our October 14 Lunch Analysis
Lunch Analysis is a 45-minute meeting that is a part study group, part scholarly discussion, part brainstorming session, and part support group. Participation is open to all who fundraise or have fundraised at a nonprofit.
Each Lunch Analysis covers a specific topic in donor participation and has required preparation and discussion. This one will be on October 14, 2020 at noon EST.
Required Preparation
Read the following three articles:
Explore the PBS Sustainer Learning Center
Jot down the answers to these questions:
- Have you attempted to implement a sustainer giving program?
- What results have you seen?
- What internal or external resistance have you encountered?
Sign Up
I verify that all participants are from a legitimate nonprofit fundraising organization.
Past Sessions
8/19/20 Lunch Analysis: How We Gather (Millenial engagement, community-building)
9/16/20 Lunch Analysis: Growing Engagement Among Underrepresented Groups
This session has passed. Join the Donor Participation Project to get access to our resource library with session recordings, member chat, and other benefits.
Our second Donor Participation Project meeting was about increasing representation and diversity in our donor populations.
Guided by Patrick Powell, CFRE, MBA, we had a lively conversation and learned a lot.
You can read and contribute to the session notes in this Google Doc.
Additional insights:
There was a common preconception in the industry: “It is going to take you so much longer to get a gift from a non-white donor.”
As soon as I made it my intention to build relationships with Black donors, in that same year I raised close to $250k from 2-3 donors.
It was about: 1) Getting in front of them to let them know that they were important to the institution, regardless of race or color, and that we recognize that they are making an impact and are making a difference as graduates; 2) Letting them know that we want to connect them and get them involved in whatever way is important to them; and 3) Asking them how do they want to put their stamp on an institution where, if they didn’t feel connected, we have a whole group of students who we don’t want to go through the same experience. Tell them, “You have the ability to change that.”
Join the Conversation
Sign Up
Sign up to join the Donor Participation Project learning sessions or to contribute to any of our docs:
We will only use your email for information about the Donor Participation Project and will never share your information with anyone else.
This session has passed. Read the summary and takeaway points here.
How have you tried to broaden your donor base and make it more representative? What has worked for you? What backfired?
As part of the Donor Participation Project, this Lunch Analysis session will be guided by Patrick Powell, AVP of Volunteer Engagement and Donor Philanthropy at Morehouse School of Medicine.
An expert in donor engagement and community-building, Patrick is part of one of the fastest-growing institutions in the country at Morehouse School of Medicine.
Brainstorm and Discuss this Topic With Peers During our September 16 Lunch Analysis
Lunch Analysis is a 45-minute meeting that is a part study group, part scholarly discussion, part brainstorming session, and part support group. Participation is open to all who fundraise or have fundraised at a nonprofit.
Each Lunch Analysis covers a specific topic in donor participation and has required preparation and discussion. This one will be on September 16, 2020 at noon EST.
Required Preparation
Take a moment to jot down the answer to the following questions:
- What is the percentage of alumni giving/participation for your Black and or Latino donors?
- Has leadership placed an emphasis on engaging donors of color at your institution?
- If yes, what are the strategies or best practices you’re utilizing to identify and cultivate this constituent group(s)?
- If no, what do you perceive the barriers are to these discussions?
- How has that impacted your desire to cultivate these specific groups if at all?
- Have you experienced any success or rejection as a result?
Sign Up
I verify that all participants are from a legitimate nonprofit fundraising organization.
Past Sessions
8/19/20 Lunch Analysis: How We Gather (Millenial engagement, community-building)
Participants
Adrian Annette Owen, CFRE, AVP for Advancement Services at LSU Foundation
Allison Kerivan, Director Of Annual Giving at Bentley University
Benjamin Osterhaut, Director of Annual Giving at Elizabethtown College
Billie Handa, Director of the Annual Fund, Denison University
Cameron Hall, Senior Director of Annual Giving at Texas Tech University
Hawken Brackett, Executive Director of Strategic Engagement at The University of Alabama
Jayanne Sevast, Director of Development, Annual Campaigns at Kutztown University of Pennsylvania
Miriam McLean, Director of Development, University Initiatives at Tufts University
Patrick Powell, MBA, CFRE, Senior Development Officer at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta
Sean Devendorf, Senior Director of Annual Giving, University Advancement at Tufts University
Sierra Rosen, Executive Director of Planned Giving at Brown University
Angie Thurston of Sacred Design joined a group of fundraisers as part of the Donor Participation Project to discuss the implications of the How We Gather report for nonprofit engagement and donor participation.
The document below summarizes the main points discussed:
- The sector also needs a reliable way to know what is working well in the areas of donor engagement. In the current pandemic environment, especially in the area of digital engagement.
- Angie shared a great thought:
People come for [the workout/artistic self-expression/having dinner with like-minded individuals/something else] but they stay for the community.
- Donor participation as it is sometimes defined can become a superficial numbers game. A deeper definition of authentic donor engagement is seen as necessary.
- It is important that there is wide representation among donor constituencies. The current trend toward fewer donors making larger gifts feels undemocratic.
Q: What are the common threads among the organizations in your report that have been able to grow large communities?
“Community” is a word that is frequently used in an empty way, but we its true that we found a hunger for authentic community. This is different from something like “networking,” which can be valuable in its own right.
Q: Larger, more established nonprofits include a broad variety of interests under their umbrella. How can we connect with and leverage those communities?
In larger nonprofits, like universities, communities develop organically around different issues. Sometimes these communities have a separate identity from the main organization. How do we have those communities embrace the values of the “mothership”?
Angie: This reminds me of meetup.com. There are thousands of communities made possible by this platform but its members identify with each other not with meetup.com. Some suggestions:
Q: How do we message the values of the organization, especially to sub-communities that have their own values?
Angie: Messaging about values depends on the extent to which the “real thing” is happening. Naming “values” is more effective if they match what is already going on. Otherwise, they come across as empty.
People should testify to the values of their community, based on their experience.
This connection between what is really happening and the official “values” can break down as organizations scale and grow. Some organizations are so reliant on the founder for these values that they fall apart when he or she is not there. We’ve all been guilty of this: “Developing Leaders for the 21st Century” sounds empty.
The statement of values is less important than the lived experience.
Among Millenials, there is a noticeable search for community, accountability, and an authentic voice. Communities must engage their constituents to be active, be purposeful, and demonstrate value to their members.
Angie: What we found striking is that lot of people (especially Millenials) are looking for deep community. But they are hesitant to talk about it in those terms (there is still a stigma for “loneliness”). People are wary of hyperbole. What they find appealing is “come play live music for one hour.” In other words, they want to hear the unexagerated reality of what the offering is.
Messaging should come from this lense. What are you actually doing? In real-life terms? Why have you made the decision to do that? Corporate messaging has exploited the word community and other concepts so much that people are hungry for a sense of reality.
Participants:
Khadija Hill
James Barnard
Hawken Brackett
Franklin Guerrero
Cathy Dodge-Miller
Patrick Powell
Ivan Alekhin
Angel Terol
Joanna Schofield
Sierra Rosen
Tilghman Moyer
Patrick Powell
Michael Spicer
Rebekkah Brown
Louis Diez
I recently shared a list of US higher ed institutions with a high growth rate. Specifically, alumni giving participation growth between 2009 and 2019.
My team and I have been interviewing the top 10 in the nation. This varied list includes Ellon University, Villanova University, Morehouse School of Medicine, and Princeton University. Here is what we’re learning:
Donor growth is (one of) the VPs personal priorities
Growing organizations have the unit in charge of growing this metric (typically “Annual Giving” or “Annual Giving and Alumni Engagement”) reporting directly to them.
They act like “community incubators”
A “community incubator” is a term I created to describe organizations that are constantly generating different engagement opportunities for their donor base. “It’s a volume business,” one of the growing org VPs shared with us.
None of the schools told us that they had just grown and grown their existing engagement opportunities (i.e. reunion program, alumni board) to reach their ambitious growth goals.
Instead, they told us that they were constantly innovating and finding new segments and designing engagement opportunities for these constituencies: primary care physicians, alumni business owner marketplace, athletics-focused groups, the list goes on and on.
They do not shy away from transactional exchanges
All the growing schools embraced the fact that, at times, people will just “give to get.”
What they get can vary from access (“dinner with the president”) to simple incentives and promo items in the public radio-style, or simply satisfaction (“the 100th gift will unlock $10,000 to a specific program!”). Often, this is done to promote first, second, and third gifts.
Intensive use of incentives, challenges, and matches are an integral part of all of these programs.
They make recurring gifts easy and emphasize this way of giving wherever possible
They all have robust offerings and streamlined systems for monthly giving and multi-year pledges that you can make online, on the phone, or by mail.
They experiment and change their org chart based on priorities and team strengths
If they’re convinced that annual giving and engagement are two parts of the same coin, they will put them together in the same department. If they believe that a certain area needs more attention, they will have it report directly to the VP. If they believe that this is no longer the case, they will change the org chart again.
Stagnation and rigidity are not part of the vocabulary at any of these organizations.
ANNOUNCEMENT: Research co-author Angie Thurston will be joining the discussion portion of the meeting!
Religious participation and giving is seeing the same decline as overall civic life participation.
The authors of this report study the “emerging landscape of Millennial communities that are fulfilling the functions that religious congregations used to fill.”
Angie Thurston and Casper ter Kuile discover and analyze successful communities with thousands of members (religious and non-religious, they include CrossFit for example) that bring meaning and purpose to its members, many of whom are Millenials.
As we struggle with how to involve people in general and Millenials in particular with our organizations, this is a surprising treasure-trove of ideas.
Brainstorm and Discuss this Report With Peers During our August 19 Lunch Analysis
Lunch Analysis is a 45-minute meeting that is a part book club, part scholarly discussion, part brainstorming session, and part support group. Participation is open to all who fundraise or have fundraised at a nonprofit.
Each Lunch Analysis covers a specific topic in donor participation and has required reading and discussion. This one will be on August 19, 2020 at noon EST.
To Take Part
- Download and read the file above.
- Choose one of the profiled communities and try it out: visit their website, sign up to their platform, join a newsletter.
- Pick one element that you could apply to your own fundraising program right away. Prepare to share your thoughts!
Sign up here to get the Zoom details (I check that all participants are from legitimate fundraising organizations):
Join Us
Tilghman Moyer, Vice President at Development at University of Arizona Foundation
Hawken Brackett, Executive Director of Strategic Engagement at The University of Alabama
Grant Kelly, Senior Director of Development at The Johns Hopkins University
Noah Maier, National Principal Gifts at OneforDemocracy.org
Michael Spicer, Director of Alumni and Parent Engagement at Pomona College
Colt Chambers, Director of Development at Georgia Ballet
Ivan Alekhin, Development Coordinator at National Parks Foundation
You could easily call the last 10 years “the lost decade” in alumni engagement. Based on VSE data I analyzed, US higher ed lost 285,293 alumni donors on an annual basis.
The heroes of this lost decade are schools that increased both the number of alumni donors AND their participation percentage (number of alumni giving / alumni of record). How did they achieve this feat? Here are the top 10.
