VP of Market Engagement, Bloomerang
Capital campaigns require massive amounts of planning, resources, and energy to complete successfully. But after a capital campaign concludes, don’t hang up the towel just yet—shift your focus to your year-round, ongoing donor engagement efforts.
The effort you put into engaging donors between capital campaigns will pay off the next time you plan a significant fundraising initiative. By nurturing the goodwill you’ve established with your supporters, you can increase the likelihood that they will continue giving to your major fundraising efforts.
With that in mind, let’s review these four tips for maintaining donor engagement between fundraising campaigns:
- Provide ongoing impact updates.
- Invite donors to volunteer opportunities.
- Plan smaller-scale events and fundraising opportunities.
- Gather donor feedback.
According to Bloomerang’s donor engagement guide, “With a strong donor engagement strategy, you can focus your time and energy on cultivating and retaining the donors you already have, rather than continually reaching out to new donors.” These tips will help you increase donor retention rates, saving your organization time and money.
1. Provide ongoing impact updates.
Donors want and deserve to know how their gifts positively impacted your capital campaign.
After your campaign concludes, keep them in the loop by describing how your organization used their gifts to achieve your goals.
For example, let’s say your capital campaign goal was to raise enough funds to build a more extensive and modern library and computer lab for your school. Provide donors with various updates on your progress, such as details about the total amount you raised, photos of the construction process, and videos of students enjoying the new space.
Keep these additional tips in mind when sending donors impact updates:
- Make your impact communication tailored and precise. Be specific about how each supporter’s unique giving amount helped achieve your campaign goals. For instance, perhaps one donor contributed $1,000 to your campaign. Let them know how their contribution enabled you to purchase four new tablets for students to use in your library.
- Introduce donors to the individuals affected by your campaign. Donors will have an easier time connecting with your campaign when you show them the real people positively impacted by your efforts. For example, share photos and videos of teachers and students participating in a reading lesson in your library.
- Connect with donors on multiple platforms. Stay connected with donors across numerous communication channels to maintain an active presence in their lives. Leverage social media, email, phone calls, texts, and in-person meetings to stay on donors’ radars. However, be conscious of not overwhelming them; maintain a consistent but reasonable communication cadence. You could even send a survey asking donors how frequently they’d like to hear from your organization.
Use your nonprofit’s CRM database to add personal touches to all donor communications. Address your messages using donors’ preferred names and reference any additional interactions your staff has had with them, such as speaking with them at a campaign event.
Donors will appreciate your efforts to treat them as unique individuals who have made valuable contributions to your mission.
2. Gather donor feedback.
Collecting donor input about your campaigns is an excellent way to show them that you respect their opinions and want to improve the donor experience.
However, asking campaign donors for feedback doesn’t just make them feel appreciated and valued. It can also help your organization run a better campaign next time and engage more new donors.
Create a donor feedback survey with questions like:
- How did you hear about our campaign?
- What inspired you to give to our campaign?
- Did you have a clear idea of how we used your donation?
- Would you give to a similar campaign in the future?
- How often would you like to hear from us about the impact of your donation?
After gathering donors’ responses, your next steps are to:
- Thank donors for their input.
- Review responses and identify patterns and trends.
- Create actionable next steps for your team based on the most common feedback and team capacity.
- Follow up with donors by outlining your plans to incorporate their input into your next campaign.
Donors will be much more likely to engage with your nonprofit’s outreach efforts when they know you will take their insights seriously.
3. Invite donors to volunteer opportunities.
Volunteer opportunities help the average everyday donor feel more personally connected to your cause. Donors can see the impact of their gifts up close as they interact with your mission in a hands-on way.
Plus, your organization likely needs volunteer support year-round, so engaging donors in volunteering offers win-win benefits to everyone involved.
Engage donors in volunteering by taking these steps:
- Invite donors to opportunities that align with their interests. Reference your nonprofit’s CRM to understand the aspects of your mission that resonate with them most. For example, let’s say you’re gearing up to launch a capital campaign focused on expanding your nonprofit’s services to a nearby community. Donors interested in community outreach can volunteer to help spread the word about your upcoming campaign within their personal networks.
- Connect volunteerism to impact. At the start of every volunteer opportunity, explain how your volunteer program benefits from generous donations. For instance, perhaps donor gifts allow you to purchase the tools and supplies you need for your community garden. This information helps donors instantly connect their contributions to your ongoing charitable work.
- Organize volunteers using software solutions. A volunteer management tool can help you keep track of donors who volunteer more easily. You can schedule special volunteer events for donors, track volunteer availability and hours, and connect volunteers with experiences that match their interests and skills.
Volunteering is a great way to facilitate connections between staff members and donors and allow donors to connect with fellow supporters. As a result, donors will start to feel like they are part of your nonprofit’s larger community. This sense of belonging can inspire supporters to stay involved long-term.
4. Plan smaller-scale events and fundraising opportunities.
Capital campaigns likely aren’t the only fundraising avenues your nonprofit has. Other events and fundraising campaigns drive ongoing fundraising between major endeavors.
Here are a few ideas for a mix of fundraising and donor appreciation events your organization can host between major campaigns:
- Donor appreciation happy hour, picnic, or barbeque
- Peer-to-peer fundraising campaigns and events, such as a 5K race
- Giving Day events and year-end appeals
- Crowdfunding campaigns
- Live or online auctions
Personally invite capital campaign donors to get involved in these events by emailing or calling them to catch up. Explain how much you appreciate their support and the impact of giving to your smaller campaigns on your annual fundraising efforts.
For example, you could call a capital campaign donor and use this script:
“Hi [donor’s name]! This is [your name] from [your nonprofit’s name]. We greatly appreciate your dedication to our recent capital campaign. Your support helped [describe the impact of donor gifts].
I’m reaching out with another opportunity I thought you might be interested in. We’re planning a silent auction featuring tons of incredible items donated by local businesses. I don’t want you to miss this opportunity to win prizes and connect with fellow supporters.”
This type of outreach accomplishes several goals: it demonstrates appreciation to donors, conveys their unique impact on your campaign, and inspires a sense of FOMO (the fear of missing out) by highlighting a fantastic upcoming event to get involved in.
The Bottom Line
Your ongoing donor engagement strategy should be consistent, genuine, and personalized. Show donors that you care about building relationships with them that last for the long haul, not just for one campaign. With these tips, you can create stronger bonds with supporters that empower your mission.
Joshua Meyer is the VP of Market Engagement at Bloomerang, a nonprofit fundraising software company. He has over 24 years of experience in fundraising, volunteer management, software, and marketing. Josh is passionate about helping nonprofits strive to fulfill their mission. He believes that nonprofits are essential to our communities and that they deserve the best tools and resources to succeed.
In his role at Bloomerang, Josh helps nonprofits acquire and retain donors through innovative marketing and fundraising strategies. He is also a frequent speaker at nonprofit conferences and events and has previously presented at AFP ICON, Nonprofit Marketing Summit, RAISE, Nonprofit Storytelling conference and numerous other nonprofit gatherings. Josh is committed to helping nonprofits make a difference in the world. Connect with Joshua on LinkedIn.
Editorial Note: This article is a partner-contributed piece and does not necessarily reflect the views or strategic recommendations of the Winkler Group. We believe in engaging with a wide range of sector voices and encourage readers to consider this content as one of many perspectives in the philanthropic landscape.
