Here’s something that successful nonprofit leaders and development directors understand when it comes to making the ask: It’s all about the relationship! The more you can connect your cause to the donor’s specific passions and interests, the more successful you will be when it comes time to engage them as a donor ask them to support your organization.
Last week we highlighted a more traditional approach to build your fundraising strategy around your donors’ interest. This week, we wanted to share how nonprofits are implementing some of the latest trends and technologies to connect with current and prospective donors.
How the Latest Trends Reveal Donor Interest can Dramatically Impact Fundraising
Over the past several years, the team at Pursuant has been working with clients to implement innovative strategies designed to proactively identify the passions and interests of a donor. This growing trend allows organizations to connect on a more personal level with their donors by creating a two-way dialog. By offering playful ways for the individual to share passions and interests, the organization can then reflect that information back to the individual making the ultimate ask more personal and relevant.
Here’s a look at one specific campaign that highlights this growing trend and demonstrates how technologies can help reveal a donor’s interest in a way to dramatically improve results:
The Approach:
Our approach for the campaign was designed to track several aspects of the donor’s behavior with the intention of better understanding their passions and interests. Instead of approaching potential donors directly with literal questions, we engaged them through a series of playful quizzes and questions using a variety of digital communication channels. This allowed us to gather responses that were more natural.
From there, individuals were segmented for follow-up communication based on the results of the engagement (i.e. – the answers they provided, frequency of engagement, volume of sharing, etc.). Over the next two weeks, we began sending out strategic appeals based on the information gathered through our initial outreach.
The Result:
By leveraging engagement tools that felt more organic to their daily life, and reflecting back to them information they had voluntarily shared, in less than two weeks, one of our clients engaged 24,521 individuals and acquired 21,330 unique email addresses.
Building from that foundation we were then able to foster a stronger connection in the time between the first touch and the first gift. This more innovative and dynamic approach allowed the organization to raise more than $46,000 from 615 donors — most whom were first-time donors to the organization.
Don’t Underestimate the Power of Revealing Your Donor’s Interest
When it comes to engaging donors, the temptation for many nonprofits is to make the conversation all about your mission. However, taking the time to understand the passions and interests of your donors, and then connecting those interests more directly to your cause can often lead to a much greater results.
Has your organization attempted to leverage the latest trends and technologies to connect the passions and interests of your donors to the cause? If so… what were some of the “wins” you experienced?