It’s all about clicks. It’s all about likes. It’s all about engagement.
As Jeff Stanger of Cause Geek said at the Association of Fundraising Professionals International Fundraising Conference, it’s all about fundraising, and the world of digital fundraising is constantly evolving.
For example, Stanger said that it is no longer about: Community, Engagement, Transparency or Likes & Followers. Why? Because we can’t measure the first three in a way that is meaningful to boards, CEOs and development directors and because we can’t fully trust the fourth.
He said a digital fundraising strategy should have three goals:
- Easy to measure;
- Easy to show return on investment (ROI);
- Easy to show causation vs. correlation.
Achieving these three goals will:
- Increase the number of subscribers to email (more people still check their email than use Facebook);
- Increase the number of monthly givers (monthly givers give an average of two to three additional appeals throughout the year); and,
- Increase the number of volunteers (volunteers give and raise money).
Finally, Stanger offered the following tips for implementing a digital fundraising strategy:
- Ask. No, really. ASK!;
- Create a plan that includes regular messages for each of the goals;
- Use landing pages and free offers to gain subscribers;
- Create a “Sign Up For Emails” button in Tweets; and,
- Make monthly giving special.
