It’s not too late for your end of the year online fundraising campaign!

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year-end-giving

According to Blackbaud’s 2013 Charitable Giving Report, more than one-third of overall charitable giving happens in the last three months of the year, with the highest percentage coming in December.

It is not too late to start an end of year campaign NOW!

Charity Navigator reports that 20% of annual giving occurs within the last two weeks of the year, often within the last 2 days of the year.   Online giving grew 10.7% in 2012 and 13.5% in 2013, with small organizations seeing the largest increase.

Is your online giving strategy ready to take advantage of these trends for 2014?  Here are a few tips and tricks for eTapestry customers to maximize online end-of-year donations:

Create a well-crafted fundraising appeal that includes links to your online donation form:
npENGAGE offers a checklist for building crafting an end-of-year ask that brings in more money to your organization.  Keep in mind the link to your donation form needs to be upfront and easy to find – even in your postal mailings!

Make sure your online donation forms are set up correctly and are easy to use:
If you are using an eTapestry DIY form for your donation, make sure you have it pointing to the correct fund, approach, and campaign in your database for your end-of-year donations.  You may want to consider building a separate form entirely for just your end-of-year appeal.  If DIY doesn’t meet your needs, you can request a new custom eCommerce form or an edit to an existing one.  For custom eCommerce pages, be sure to mention in the edit request details that this is for your EOY campaign and we will put your changes at the top of our queue!

Dec-1Make the branding between your website, online forms, and social media seamless:
Network for Good reports that online giving pages that are branded to match your website bring in 6x more money than generic giving pages.  When your online brand is consistent (and ideally matches your printed brand), the donor is confident that they can trust your organization.  With eTapestry DIY forms, you can embed the form into your website for a seamless user experience.  For custom eCommerce pages, you can request that your form be skinned to match your website.  Also, you can request new custom Cart (eStore) and Personal Fundraising templates to match your website!  Don’t forget to match your social media sites to your brand!

Be mobile-friendly:  
62% of “Generation Y” said they would give via their mobile phone, according to Blackbaud’s Generational Giving Report, yet in 2013 only 26% of online donation pages were optimized for mobile devices.  Is yours one of those?  eTapestry DIY forms are now mobile friendly, so all newly created forms will work with most devices but you should re-publish your older forms to take advantage of this feature.  Custom eCommerce pages, carts, and personal fundraisers can all be made fully responsive (resize and reformat for every device) as well!

Borrow from for-profits:
Online retailers and stores have long-since cornered the market on Holiday transactions.  Take note of their best practices and see what can be applied to your own end-of-year and Holiday campaigns!  If you have goods to sell, offering sales, rush shipping and discounts via your eTapestry cart can provide incentive for shoppers to purchase from you for their Holiday gifts.  Don’t forget to add another cart item where they can give you an additional donation!

Dec-2Finally, don’t forget to say thank you!
Your online giving forms in eTapestry automatically email the donor when they submit a transaction.  Did you know you can customize these responses?  Both DIY and custom eCommerce forms allow you to specify an email template to be used.  Your email template can be branded to match your organization and contain useful information for the donor.  A simple and sincere thank you and a report on how the donations are being put to use can often spur further donations and social media shares.

Don’t delay, contact us today if you need additional help with any of the above services!

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