For the past few years, the Fiver Children’s Foundation has used CauseVox to grow their fundraising efforts. In particular, they have a track record of running incredible #GivingTuesday campaigns, exceeding their goal year after year.
To provide some background, #GivingTuesday is a global giving movement that builds off of Black Friday, Cyber Monday, and the overall spirit of generosity during the holiday season.
Started in 2012, this movement inspires millions of individuals to donate to their favorite causes annually. To put this in perspective, in 2018, 3.6 million gifts were given to charities participating in #GivingTuesday with $400 million raised online.
In 2023, #GivingTuesday falls on Tuesday, November 28th. Whether you have a #GivingTuesday strategy in the works or you’re starting fresh, check out some #GivingTuesday insights gleaned from The Fiver’s Children Foundation.
About The Fiver Children’s Foundation
The Fiver Children’s Foundation is a holistic youth development organization that makes a 10-year commitment to children, aged 8 to 18, from underserved communities in New York. Serving around 500 children and their families annually, Fiver provides out-of-school time programming and a two-week summer camp experience. Fiver’s goal is to empower children to make positive life choices, to become engaged citizens, and to succeed in school and beyond.
Why CauseVox?
CauseVox Declutters Your Peer-to-Peer Fundraising For #GivingTuesday
To create a culture of giving (and inspire others to give), Fiver understands that fundraising starts from the inside out. Fiver encourage their community create their own peer-to-peer fundraising page on CauseVox and to make a personal donation.
With CauseVox, peer-to-peer fundraising pages are easy to set up and easier to share.
Fiver engages their young professionals’ committee, mid-career advocates, program alumni, and board members to fundraise for them on #GivingTuesday, helping Fiver expand the reach of their campaign and acquire new donors.
CauseVox Helps You Raise More On Mobile
“CauseVox makes it so easy to donate on your phone.”
CauseVox campaigns and donation forms are all mobile optimized, empowering your donors to give on any device. With the new Apple and Google Payment options, it’s now quicker and easier than ever to make a mobile payment.
“You want to make it easy for your donors, especially because so many people are likely going to donate on their phones. You don’t want to deal with a page that doesn’t load right on mobile, and have to deal with those problems.”
With CauseVox, Melissa is able to text and email donors the link to their #GivingTuesday campaign with confidence, knowing that no matter where their donors are, they’ll be able to donate with ease.
CauseVox’s Reliability Helps You Raise More With Less Stress
After using other p2p platforms, Melissa Benjamin, Fiver’s Director of Development, recommends CauseVox because it’s “a service that works properly and serves [them] better.” She has confidence in the platform, and loves the ease of use it offers, particularly for a campaign like #GivingTuesday: “[Causevox] is easy to use, easy to share across social media platforms, and it’s easy to make quick updates,” she said.
For many organizations, #GivingTuesday is one of the largest giving day of the year, which is why it’s crucial to have the right technology in place. If your campaign page crashes or if there’s a long lag, it creates a negative donor experience that can potentially put future dollars at risk.
Unlike other platforms, CauseVox reliably handles the large volume of traffic on #GivingTuesday so you can focus on your campaign instead of any potential technological hiccups.
CauseVox’s Easy Reporting Helps You Spend Less Time On Admin Tasks
“We have an accounting team of one, and CauseVox helps us easily access the data we need in one downloadable file.”
CauseVox automatically keeps track of all your donor data for you, so you can access the information you need, no sweat.
Plus, customizable automatic receipting enables Fiver to make their receipts up to tax-deductible standards, helping them save paper and time.
CauseVox Helps You Raise More With Less Fees
Melissa also loves how CauseVox also gives donors the option to cover the processing fee, which in her experience, isn’t always offered by other platforms. With the number of donations processed on #GivingTuesday, these fees can definitely add up.
“With such a high volume of smaller amounts, it’s really helpful to have those fees covered.”
Fundraising During COVID-19
“Don’t reinvent the wheel,” says Melissa, noting that she always makes sure her #GivingTuesday campaign is in alignment with the branding, look, and feel of Fiver’s year-end appeal.
As Fiver pivoted to offer digital services in the wake of COVID-19, the fundraising team took the opportunity to craft a narrative around how donated funds directly impacted things like Camp WiFiver, a live-streamed camp experience.
Melissa pointed out that they talked about “how we came together as a community and harnessed our creativity to come up with virtual offerings for our programming.” Fiver used their story of Camp WiFiver to inform their 2021 #GivingTuesday campaign.
Insights From Fiver
Based on our conversation with Melissa, we’ve also distilled some key insights to think about when building your #GivingTuesday campaign strategy:
1. Set A Goal
Having a dollar amount goal is important when measuring success. Fiver budgets a whopping $80,000 to raise each year. For many organizations, this is not a realistic target. $80K is fairly lofty so set a goal that sounds reasonable to you and your organization. As you meet (and crush) your goals, you can always build up to something bigger.
2. Get Your Donations Matched
You can’t go wrong with including a match into your campaign. In fact, when there’s a match in place, donors tend to give about 50% more. For Fiver, $40,000 is raised online while the other half is matched by major donors such as current and former board members. In their experience, they found that while younger donors generally give smaller gifts (i.e. $25, $50, etc.), a match can double (or even triple) their donation.
“It’s an opportunity to encourage [younger donors] to bump it up to $25 instead of $15, knowing that it’s going to be matched,” said Melissa.
3. Engage A Wide Audience/Create A Culture Of Giving
For your #GivingTuesday campaign, don’t put all your eggs in one basket by relying solely on a select group of people. Instead, spread the word by engaging a diverse audience. For example, Fiver casts a wide net with a “mix of their Fiver community” consisting of their young professionals’ committee, mid-career advocates, program alumni, and board members.
4. Develop A Toolkit
We get it. The fundraisers you recruit probably have a lot on their plate. That’s why a toolkit of templated social media and email language is crucial.
Prepare content well in advance and make it easy to customize. Some fundraisers might use the tools you provide as-is and some might go the extra mile to add their two cents.
Either way, this keeps your messaging consistent and gives your fundraiser a great jumping-off point.
Tip: If you have a match, remember to always include language about the match in all templated communications.
5. Craft A Strong Appeal
Craft a strong appeal by sourcing your content early. For Fiver, this means pulling client testimonials from thank you letters written by program participants or through phone interviews with families.
The neat thing about Fiver is that there is time is built in for program staff to collect and story bank client testimonials, which means they’re not scrambling at the end. A good story is an incredible tool and whatever quote or story you decide to use, make sure it’s relatable and clear.
Along with including a story, conveying your impact upfront and providing a strong call to action are two other enduring best practices when it comes to writing a persuasive appeal.
6. Ask In-Person
While blanket email blasts are always an option, never underestimate the power of direct outreach or an in-person ask. To do that, you need to cultivate a relationship with your donor beforehand.
This means doing your research, genuinely getting to know them, and consistently engaging them throughout the year. When it comes time to make your ask, remember to practice your pitch and specific.
7. Promote Often And Promote Early
Start promoting your #GivingTuesday campaign early – ideally at least a couple weeks before Thanksgiving. Since it’s peer-to-peer, there’s no hard start.
You have the flexibility to engage donors early on, which, in turn gives them more opportunities to donate and share your campaign with others. With CauseVox’s social share options, spreading the word across different platforms has never been easier.
8. Don’t Immediately Close Your Campaign After #GivingTuesday
Leave the campaign open even after #GivingTuesday is over to capture any additional donations. You never know if someone simply missed the boat or just wants to give later.
Learn more from Melissa about how Fiver successfully incorporated their 2021 #GivingTuesday campaign with their year-end appeal!
Raise More For #GivingTuesday + Beyond
CauseVox can help you knock your fundraising campaigns out of the park and raise more with less effort.
Whether you’re raising funds for #GivingTuesday or you’re looking for a long-term solution to help grow your fundraising, CauseVox can help you raise more donations with less uncertainty.
