Part of creating a transformational donor experience is through meeting your donors where they are every step of the way. Each day, I spend time thinking about ways to improve my relationships with others involved with my consultancy. Have you ever heard relationship coaches share, “each day you need to find a new way to love your partner?” The funny thing is donor engagement is the same way. Each day is an opportunity to evaluate your previous year’s retention rates, review surveys from events, and metrics from digital communications, and use those revelations to build your strategy and mindset when curating new events and projects. The 8 ways that I am going to share are not one-size-fits-all, so you do have to evaluate which one works best for you; however, if you are in a place to implement each of these, GREAT! I know and believe your ability to be more in touch with where your donors are in their interactions with you will only lead to increased giving.

1. Bring in your businesses

Develop a routine way to thank and engage your corporate and foundation donors (including sponsors) and include them in your ongoing activities. Consider hosting a virtual lunch and learn that allows them to hear updates.

2. Ditch the society

If you fell into the loop of giving societies, now is the time to get out. Spend some time and evaluate what are they actually receiving from this society and please don’t say gifts. It’s okay to do behind-the-scenes segmentation to build out your audiences that don’t have to be published into a society. But if you have to stay with your giving societies, once again ask yourself, what does it actually mean to be part of the Eagles Society? Sometimes the best segmentation happens behind the scenes that are not published so your donors can take delight in special moments that are intentionally designed for them. It also removes this “equal than less than” mentality that societies tend to perpetuate.

3. Make Milestones

Develop creative ways to recognize your donors on their birthdays, anniversaries, children’s birthday, whatever special milestone moment in their life, if you’ve built a relationship with them, which I trust that you have, say hello!

4. Meet Them Where They Are

Expand your engagement opportunities beyond events. Spend time with your team identifying opportunities to connect your community of advocates throughout the year. Are you a nonprofit focused on mental health awareness? Take time to schedule check-in calls that focus on listening to others’ hearts. University? Step outside of the athletics box and invite your donors to engage in University 101 or even serve as a guest lecturer. There is power in getting to know your donors to know what opportunities would be impactful.

5. Paid in Full

Pledges and recurring giving needs love too. When your donor completes a pledge or is in the process of paying off a pledge, don’t just send the same form letter over and over again. Turn those boring invoices and letters into impact video messaging and impact updates. Celebrate with them when their pledge is completed! Recurring gift? No problem. Outside of tax statements, find those special moments to show them you care

6. Go Digital

Maximize your connecting opportunities by going digital and highlighting your online giving channels. Create a giving site that is easy to navigate and offers multiple ways to give (Apple Pay, Paypal, GooglePay, etc.) You have 30 seconds to capture the gift.

7. The Gift that Keeps Giving

If your organization has an Endowment, be sure that you are providing performance updates at least once a year. If the Endowment is for a specific program area, share with the donor the growth and impact of that particular program. Even if you are a smaller organization, do not shy away from communicating the impact of gifts through annual reports.

8. Lead the way

Be transparent and willing to pivot. There are a lot of changes happening; especially in terms of DEI efforts, lead the way in communicating to your donors how your organization WILL change and communicate those changes effectively. It’s okay if you have advocates that walk away from you, change is hard. But you must lead the way in doing what is right and just.

8 Ways you can Improve donor Engagement