Michael Stein: Internet Strategy for the Nonprofit Sector

A Consumers Guide to Low Cost Donor Management Systems

Idealware and NTEN, with the support of NPower, have announced the publication of their new Consumers Guide to Low Cost Donor Management Systems. This report looks at 33 different donor management systems that cost less than $4,250 in the first year.  The research is broken up into two different actual reports.  The first, the Consumers Guide, outlines the functionality that donor management systems provide, summarizes each of the 33 systems, recommends useful systems for each of a set of specific scenarios, a high level comparison of 10 systems, and lists consultants who can help you select or implement software.  The second, Detailed Reviews, provides six-to-eight-page reviews of each of twelve different systems. This is one of the most useful reports I've seen in years. 

Download a copy

Using RSS tools to feed your information needs

Peter Campbell offers an excellent review of how best to use RSS tools to feed your information needs in an article on Idealware.org in March 2009:

"The Internet gives you access to a virtual smorgasbord of information. From the consequential to the trivial, the astonishing to the mundane, it's all within your reach. This means you can keep up with the headlines, policies, trends, and tools that interest your nonprofit, and keep informed about what people are saying about your organization online. But the sheer volume of information can pose challenges, too: namely, how do you separate the useful data from all the rest? One way is to use RSS, which brings the information you want to you. Many of the Web sites that interest you are syndicated. With RSS, or Really Simple Syndication, you subscribe to them, and when they're updated, the content is delivered to you --- much like a daily newspaper, except you choose the content. On the Web, you can not only get most of what the newspapers offer, but also additional, vital information that informs your organizational and mission-related strategies. You subscribe only to the articles and features that you want to read. It's absolutely free, and the only difficult part is deciding what to do with all the time you used to spend surfing."

Read Peter Campbell's full article on using RSS

Donation usability: Increasing online giving to nonprofits

Usability guru Jakob Nielsen's has an excellent article in his Alertbox report on March 30, 2009.  He writes that user research finds significant deficiencies in non-profit organizations' website content, which often fails to provide the info people need to make donation decisions:

"Non-profits would collect much more from their websites if only they'd clearly state what they are about and how they use donations. Our new usability studies revealed considerable frustration as potential donors visited sites and tried to discern various organizations' missions and goals — which are key factors in their decisions about whether to give money. In 2008, non-profits got about 10% of their donations online, according to a survey by Target Analytics. Given the high growth rate for Internet donations, we estimate that they'll constitute the majority of donations by 2020. If non-profit organizations get their sites into shape, that is. Well-designed non-profit websites are particularly suited for attracting new donors and efficiently supporting small-scale impulse giving. Websites are less effective at sustaining long-term donor relationships. For encouraging customer (or donor) loyalty, e-mail newsletters remain the Internet tool of choice."

Read Jakob Nielsen's full article on donation usability

Fundraising with a mobile phone

MobileActive's Katrin Verclas has written a great up-to-date overview of mobile fundraising around the world in an article published on February 23, 2009 on the MobileActive.org website:

"Mobile fundraising is taking off -- or so at least hope nonprofits hard hit by the economic downturn. Organizations are looking for a new channel for people to give on the spot, wherever they are, with their phones and a quick text message. There are a growing number of campaigns -- and lots of experimentation.  For example, some of the more interesting campaigns used mobiles to draw attention to their brand, or used mobiles as part of a one-time holiday campaign."

Read Katrin's full article on fundraising with a mobile phone

Integrating text messaging with fundraising = more dough

The mobile marketing agency Mobile Commons spent a lot of time at the end of 2008 working with one of its clients, the Humane Society of the United States, and their friends at the Watershed Company to come up with a nice mobile test for end of year fundraising. They wanted to give mobile subscribers an option to donate over the phone via an inbound call center after they received a text message promoting the call. It didn’t quite work out the way they planned; they received no donations over the phone. It did, however, produce a very interesting result: people who got the text message gave online with an increased response rate of 77%! They suppressed a third of their list to see if the text had any effect on online giving, and it turned out to have a huge impact. I share their excitement about all the different ways people are pushing mobile fundraising and hope that this integrated approach becomes another effective fundraising technique.

Download the PDF of the full case study

2008 donorCentrics Internet giving analysis

Target Analytics, a Blackbaud Company, released its 2008 donorCentrics™ Internet Giving Benchmarking Analysis back on March 18, 2009. This was a follow-up to their groundbreaking 2006 report and provides insights into the online and offline trends of donors. The findings represent analysis of information from over 9.5 million donors and more than $747 million in donations to the nonprofits in the study.

Key findings in the report:

• Online giving continues to grow rapidly in 2007 and 2008, even in the absence of major disasters which fueled the growth of online giving for relief and animal welfare organizations in previous years.
• Over the past few years, online giving has become an increasingly significant source of new donor acquisition. These online donors give much larger gifts but have slightly lower retention rates than traditional donors.
• Online giving is not a strong renewal channel; every year, large numbers of online donors migrate away from online giving and to other channels, primarily direct mail.
• Donors to direct mail – the primary giving source for most organizations – rarely give online. In the relatively rare cases when mail donors do give online, they tend to give higher average gifts – both before and after their first online gift.
• Offline donors who have an email address on file, and who have no record of giving online, give far more per year and retain and reactivate at higher rates than those who do not have an email address on file.
• Donors in the southwest and mountain regions of the United States are disproportionately more likely to give online.

Read the full 2008 donorCentrics Internet Giving Benchmarking Analysis

Online giving in a down economy

2009 presents nonprofits with unique challenges in raising money, both online and offline, and many nonprofits are seeing a tightening of charitable donations as a result of the declining economy. In my article this month for the Mal Warwick Associates e-newsletter, I report that for several clients at Donordigital, average gifts were down 20% to 35% in December 2008 compared to December 2007, even though the number of donations was about the same. The good news is that most donors continue to believe in the organizations they support. They continue to give, but—no surprise—they’re not giving as much as they did last year, especially at higher giving levels. The growth of many nonprofit institutions will depend more than ever on creative, carefully targeted online campaigns to smaller donors, and ongoing Web-based marketing to a wide array of potential new supporters in an effort to grow their lists.

Read my article in the Mal Warwick Associates e-newsletter

How do gift premiums impact online giving?

The folks at M+R Strategic Services have published a timely study on gift premiums which offers some useful data on their impact on online giving.  M+R teamed up with four nonprofits, each of whom tested a premium offer to prospective donors against a no-premium control. Here are some of the highlights on how the premium offer performed on average:

• Response rates were up 95%
• Average gift sized increased by 37%
• Net revenue grew by 51%

Of course, what you offer and how you offer it makes a huge difference.  This study adds new data into the conversation on maximizing giving. 

Download the M+R study on premiums

Average open rates and response rates for email appeals

A colleague of mine asked me today about the average open rates and response rates for email appeals.  For large email lists (50,000 and up) I use the benchmarks that are published in the Convio Online Marketing Nonprofit Benchmarks Index Study.

• The average open rate for email appeals is 14%.  There are some variances noted by different vertical, see the Study for details (page 16-17).
  
• The average email appeal response rate across all verticals in 0.07%.  There are some variances noted by different vertical, see the Study for details (page 18).

A few good donor management tools

The right donor management software can make a big difference in your ability to raise funds. Eric Leland writing for Idealware.org asked six different nonprofit technology experts about donor management software that have worked well for their nonprofit colleagues.

Eric advises to make sure you have a good handle on what you need - and not just what other organizations use, or what vendors would like to sell you. This should include:

• Understand how you work with donors
• Think through your numbers
• Consider your resources
• Script what you'd like to see in software packages

Eric Leland then reviews no less than 12 software packages and online services: eTapestry, Donor Perfect Online, Neon by Z2 Systems, The Databank, Exceed Basic by Telosa, GiftWorks by Mission Research, Exceed Premier by Telosa, Fundraising 50 by Sage, Salesforce.com, Raiser's Edge by Blackbaud, Fundraising 100 by Sage, Donor2.

Read "A few good donor management tools" by Eric Leland on Idealware.org