Council Post: 10 Ways Nonprofits Can Retain More New Donors In 2021

Andrew Olsen, CFRE is President of ResourceOne Fundraising Group, a best-selling author, and host of a top-rated nonprofit podcast. 

Many nonprofits received a massive influx of new supporters in 2020. Some of the nonprofits I advise saw increases of thousands or tens of thousands of new supporters. These new supporters collectively gave hundreds of millions of charitable dollars in 2020.

Unfortunately, many nonprofits don’t have a plan or the infrastructure necessary to retain new supporters. Looking at the hundreds of organizations my team and I work with, I’ve observed that many donors acquired in 2020 behave differently than those acquired before the pandemic. It’s too early to tell how different these supporters are, but it’s likely these donors might behave more like disaster-response donors than typical mission-driven donors.

Nonprofits need a plan to retain these important donors because I believe societal needs will continue to increase in the coming year (or years). Follow these 10 steps to help ensure you retain more of these new donors and maximize their charitable giving:

1. Understand that retention begins long before a new donor is acquired. Keeping donors engaged begins with selecting the right audience. Not all potential donors are equal. Some are invested and eager to connect deeply with a cause. Others give out of impulse and are less likely to stick around for the long term. Understanding the difference is essential to successfully planning a new donor acquisition effort. That level of insight requires access to the right data and the talent (in-house or via partners) to understand how to translate that data into action.

2. Thank all donors, regardless of gift level. Many new givers offer a gift to test a nonprofit. Those that respond well stand a fair shot at securing additional gifts over time. So, thank every donor as quickly as possible, and do not shy away from saying thank you frequently. In my 21 years of working with nonprofits and their supporters, I’ve never met a donor who stopped giving because they were thanked too much. However, I’ve met plenty who stopped giving because they felt underappreciated.

3. Overinvest in the best new supporters. This often causes friction in organizations because leaders are reluctant to classify one group of donors as more important than another. But when deciding how to invest limited resources, it’s essential to prioritize investment in the donors who can make the greatest impact. Understanding the potential value of new donors is challenging but not impossible. That’s why you should model new donors to help better understand the donor’s likely potential to upgrade and retain over time. These external inputs can shape an organization’s future investment strategy.

4. Relevance increases engagement. The relevance of a message, channel, offer and timing can bring supporters closer to the nonprofits they support and increase ongoing giving. Focus on crafting messages that resonate with donors, and deliver those messages in channels to which the donor is most likely to respond.

5. Optimize the new donor onboarding experience. Design a thoughtful process to welcome new donors into the organization, thank them, and showcase the impact they’ve made with a first gift and how their ongoing giving will continue to make an impact. Engaging donors in two-way conversation through surveys helps organizations better understand what motivated donors to give initially, what excites them most about your work and what their communication preferences are.

6. Incorporate video into your communication plan. Every day brings with it an increase in the use of video for consumer and nonprofit marketing. Using video to thank donors for their support, showcase the impact of their giving and present new opportunities to stay involved helps bond new donors to the cause. Incorporate video into your donation confirmation page, email welcome series and solicitation efforts. I’d also strongly encourage organizations to share short, real-time video updates with their supporters.

7. Invite new donors to become monthly supporters. In testing over the past 21 years, I’ve found the ideal time to invite new donors to become monthly supporters is in the first 45 to 90 days of their initial gift. In this honeymoon period, new donors are excited about supporting an organization and more willing to engage at higher levels. 

8. Ask new donors to give again sooner than you might feel is appropriate. In my experience, donors who recently gave to an organization are more likely to give again than those who have not given recently. Resting new donors before your next solicitation might cause a few of your new donors to forget about you. Try to present them with an opportunity to give to the same (or similar) offer that they responded to initially, as I’ve found this can yield responses as well.

9. Don’t limit solicitation frequency in a donor’s first year. When a new supporter gives for the first time, they aren’t committed to your cause yet. The key to building long-term giving behavior is securing that all-important second (and third) gift. A mistake nonprofits make is reducing solicitation frequency for new supporters for fear they might offend them. However, this can result in donors feeling abandoned or forgotten by the charities they thought wanted their support. Presenting a monthly opportunity for new donors to consider another gift is a key to secure ongoing support.

10. Create a strategy to reengage donors who don’t give a second gift within six months. Through my time in the space, I’ve seen that if a new supporter doesn’t give a second gift in the first six months of their first gift, they are unlikely to donate again. Set up special triggers that launch unique email asks spanning months six through nine in the relationship, designed to excite the one-time supporter and invite them to give again. A similar approach can be used in direct mail.

Donors acquired in 2020 can be valuable over time — but only if the nonprofits they support get them to stick around and give again. The 10 steps outlined above won’t solve the problem completely, but they can help you keep more donors engaged than you otherwise might not have.

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