Digital fundraising is growing massively. In fact, it’s becoming one of the most popular strategies to raise money.
In the last two years, digital fundraising grew by 24%, of which 65% of traffic was on mobile.
While it’s likely that you have a donation page on your website, there’s more digital fundraising ideas that you can take advantage of to deliver a positive giving experience for your donors and grow your revenue.
With a solid digital fundraising strategy in place, there’s no telling what your nonprofit can accomplish.
What Is Digital Fundraising?
Digital fundraising is much more than slapping a donate button on your website.
At CauseVox, we believe in a “process-oriented” approach when it comes to digital fundraising.
Digital fundraising involves using your supporters’ voices to help elevate your cause. By taking a “process-oriented” approach and leveraging peer networks, digital fundraising builds a sustainable fundraising model towards individual gifts. At its core, this approach to digital fundraising boils down to three simple steps: Attract, Nurture, and Convert.
The Digital Fundraising Process
Attract:
The first step of the digital fundraising process is to get your potential through the door with strategies like SEO, digital ads, and more in order to encourage your audience to engage with you (sign up for an email list, follow you on social media, etc).
Nurture:
Now that you’ve attracted potential donors, your next step is to nurture them. When you nurture your supporters, you’ll want to employ strategies like email campaigns, social media blasts, and storytelling-driven and impact-oriented content, so you can educate and inspire your supporters to take action.
Convert:
Convert is the call to action. Get your supporters to complete a donation by making a strong ask across multiple channels. Make sure your donors have a seamless giving experience on any device by choosing the right tech.
Repeat:
Now that you have acquired a new donor, it’s time to repeat the process. Continue to attract them to your cause, nurture them through storytelling, and convert them again so they continue to donate.
In this way, the Digital Fundraising Cycle helps you create a process that allows you to develop predictable and sustainable growth at your organization while meeting your donor’s needs.
You can easily start growing your digital fundraising with these digital fundraising ideas:
10 Digital Fundraising Ideas To Grow Your Digital Fundraising
1. Amp-Up Your Donation Page
You may have already set up a donation page but here’s a few simple tips to boost your page’s conversion rates:
- Brand your page: Having branded donation pages is fairly low-hanging fruit. By branding and customizing your donation page, you have the potential to raise six times more compared to using a generic form. In fact, supporters are 70% more likely to give again if they gave on a branded donation page the first time.
- Limit the number of fields: When a donor gets to your donation page, the last thing you want is for them to get frustrated or confused and leave. One of the easiest ways to avoid this is to limit the number of fields on your donation form by asking only for the most necessary information. You can always ask for more information later and it serves as an additional touchpoint to nurture the existing relationship.
- Add donation tiers: Donation tiers (or giving levels) show your donors the real impact of their contribution. It’s a lot easier to visualize impact with “$10 will pay for one student’s textbooks, materials, etc.” compared to “$10 will help support an underserved school”.
- Mobile Optimization + Mobile Payments: With 65%+ of fundraising site traffic on mobile, optimizing the mobile giving experience with a mobile-friendly donation page can help boost conversion rates. Plus, adding Apple Pay and Google Pay options can help streamline the giving experience on any device.
Looking for an easy way to create a donation page optimized for conversion?
You can create a donation page on CauseVox that converts more donors and raises more money, without a hassle or a headache.
Learn more about using CauseVox for your donation page.
2. Recurring Giving
For a more predictable revenue stream, have a monthly recurring giving option enabled on your donation page, or consider running a recurring giving fundraising campaign. With a recurring giving option, donors only have to enter their information in once and are automatically converted without being repeatedly promoted.
On average, recurring donors have a 90% retention rate, as opposed to 46% for one-time donors. Moreover, recurring donors also give more over time. With recurring donations, donors contribute an amount that makes sense to them and over time, it’s easier to encourage them to give more.
3. UnGala
If your nonprofit is still relying on the gala model (which can be a costly time suck), it’s time to rethink your strategy.
If you’re wondering if a gala is worth the investment, consider forgoing an event or gala, and replacing it with an unGala, which has a higher ROI. An UnGala is essentially a peer-to-peer fundraising campaign that replaces the pricey tangible (space, catering, etc.) and intangible (staff time) components of a live event.
Since an unGala is online, you’re saving money on a venue and you have no space restrictions, which means individuals from virtually anywhere can learn about your cause in the comfort and convenience of their own home.
Consideration: When planning a live event, a good rule of thumb is to make sure that your expenses come out to 35 percent or less of your gross revenue.
4. Virtual Race or ‘No Run Run’
Virtual races, or ‘No Run Runs’ are great for individuals of all fitness levels and can be done at any location. For this non-event, a virtual race allows your supporters to register to “run” alone or with a group of friends while fundraising.
Alternatively, we’ve seen massive success with ‘No Run Runs’ — which gets your community together to NOT run for your cause. Since your “finish line” is whatever you determine your fundraising goal to be, there’s a lot of flexibility in designing a virtual race.
For instance, check out how St. Francis Neighborhood Center goes the distance to help end generational poverty. For their virtual run, each team pledges to raise at least $1,000, with opportunities to earn prizes along the way – all without breaking a sweat!
(Ex: St. Francis Neighborhood Center’s “No Run” Run to a $200K finish line)
5. Board Campaign
If you haven’t already, a board giving campaign is a digital fundraising idea to consider. Your board members are some of your biggest and most passionate advocates so encourage them to help raise money on your nonprofit’s behalf. Tap into their peer networks to attract, nurture, and convert new supporters to your cause.
(Ex: NTEN’s 2019 Board Member Campaign)
Consideration: There’s no denying that your board members have a host of other responsibilities so fundraising probably isn’t on the top of their priority list. But fundraising doesn’t have to be a chore. Set your board members up for success and help them fundraise with ease by creating a digital fundraising toolkit.
6. Livestream Fundraiser
Hosting a live-stream fundraiser is an excellent way to attract, nurture, and convert your audience over the course of a day. Livestream fundraisers can be done with Facebook Live and Instagram.
Also, live-stream fundraisers work. The Motherhood Collective, an organization that offers free programming to women from preconception to postpartum, hosted a day-long live-streamed #GivingTuesday campaign. Using a merchandise stand as their backdrop, donors were acknowledged and thanked in real-time as donations came in. By live-streaming their campaign, it promoted a culture of inclusivity, fun, and community.
Consideration: Make sure to promote your live-stream fundraiser well ahead of time through all the normal channels (social media, email, etc).
7. Corporate Partner Campaign
For a well-rounded fundraising plan, corporate engagement shouldn’t be overlooked. Corporate partners make great candidates for digital fundraising campaigns because they have a captive audience (their employees and partners) and, depending on the company, they might also have a corporate matching program.
Since 2015, the North Texas Food Bank (NTFB) has raised hundreds of thousands of dollars by partnering with other agencies and companies using CauseVox. If you’re looking for a corporate success story, this is it.
8. Dedicate Your Birthday
In lieu of presents this year, ask your supporters to “dedicate their birthday” with a DIY digital fundraiser. This digital fundraising idea can be run year round. Your supporters can ask for donations to your cause on their special day. With CauseVox, your supporters can easily to set up a donation page where their friends can make a donation.
(Ex: Fred’s Footsteps: Madelyn’s Birthday Bash Fundraiser)
Consideration: This versatile DIY digital fundraising idea isn’t limited to just birthdays. Supporters can also “dedicate” their wedding, a baby shower, or anniversary, etc.
9. Project Crowdfunding
With project crowdfunding, select a particular project or program and raise funds for it with a crowdfunding page. For this digital fundraiser, it’s important to set a goal in a specified timeframe.
Take HLS Paltrek. Looking to organize a week-long trek to Palestine, a group of Harvard Law students is using CauseVox to raise funds.
Consideration: Amplify your crowdfunding efforts through your social media channels or email contacts to spread the word about your campaign. Don’t forget to get your local media outlets involved too for added visibility.
10. #GivingTuesday
As a global day of giving, Giving Tuesday (commonly stylized as #GivingTuesday) is an opportunity to rally supporters. Typically landing right at the start of the giving season, you can use Giving Tuesday to kick off your year-end fundraising.
This year, Giving Tuesday falls on December 1, 2020. While that’s still a ways away, it’s always a good idea to have that date bookmarked on your calendar.
(Ex: Fiver Children’s Foundation: Fiver’s #GivingTuesday Campaign)
Consideration: Make sure you have an easy to use crowdfunding or peer-to-peer campaign set up to receive donations. CauseVox can help. Check out how our platform helped Fiver Children’s Foundation raise over $40K this past #GivingTuesday.
Attract, Nurture, and Convert Donors Using CauseVox For Digital Fundraising.
Here at CauseVox we want to provide you with the tools to pull off any digital fundraising idea.
Whether you’re running a year round, DIY, or one-day event, successful digital fundraisers all start with having the right software. No matter what stage you’re at in the digital fundraising process, raise more money this year with less complexity and frustration.
