Increase Your Revenue From Your Donors

According to an article in Network for Good, here is the reality for donor giving to nonprofits:

• Commercial business customer retention is 94 percent. It is 41 percent for nonprofits.
• New donor retention is 27 percent.
• Repeat donor retention in the sector is 70 percent.

If you are a development director or executive director, you need to know what your donor retention rate is and then you want to know how to increase it. There are several strategic and immediate steps you can take to improve retention, which will ultimately increase your donation revenue.

Say Thank You

A basic fundraising practice is to thank your donors. This is fundamental. However, organizations sometimes focus on thanking their major donors, cut costs by not thanking donors under a certain donation amount or are not creative enough in their appreciation of donors.

If you have a newsletter that goes out regularly or an annual report that gets disseminated, take the opportunity to acknowledge your donors. Of course, always ask them if you have permission to publish their names in any of your collateral material.

Take the time to make a call. If a donor has given you a significant gift, it deserves a phone call. Make it a point to have your organization, including board members and staff outside of the development office, spend a few days during the holidays each year calling a broader list of donors simply to say “thank you”. Thanking people will increase retention and their subsequent gifts.

Make It Easy

Donors today have more choices and opportunity to support their favorite organizations. Smart nonprofits are not only providing multiple ways for donors to donate by being on social media and using social media donation tools, for example, but they are also providing donors with easy and plentiful ways for donors to support the cause.

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