I am an avid coffee drinker — five cups a day at a minimum and one decaf at night. We have a big coffeemaker with a timer, so our coffee is ready when we wake up in the morning. It’s one of those old fashioned multi-cup machines. The slow drip-by-drip process makes it so worthwhile, and it creates the amount of coffee I like. That coffee maker and a recent Seth Godin blog made me think how the drip-by-drip approach is so utterly true when it...

The expression, “Make monthly giving a thing,” came from Cara Schwalbach of One Tail at a Time in Chicago. She and I were scheduled to co-present on monthly giving at an upcoming animal welfare conference, but that was canceled. Cara was going to share her amazing story of how she grew from 200 to 1,600 monthly donors in a few years by literally making monthly giving a thing.  Most recently, she was interviewed by Funraise, and you can watch...

When I first started working in monthly giving 27 years ago, generating monthly gifts and processing their monthly payments was a long and time-intense process. Now if a donor makes a monthly gift online, completes their information and clicks the button, the gift is processed in seconds, real-time. And the payment processor will continue to process that gift amount every month. Acquiring new monthly donors doesn’t have to be a long drawn out...

I love hearing from nonprofit organizations that share how they’re doing with their monthly giving campaigns. Earlier this week, a nonprofit shared its socially-distanced monthly giving video interview with me. It launched the video the day before #GivingTuesdayNow, and it already generated 20 new monthly donors. While it took a bit of time to create the video, the cost was virtually nothing, and it’s now there to be shared for quite a while. I...

A few months ago, I taught the “Recurring Revolution” training for members of The Fundraisingology Lab, by Moceanic. It was a lot of fun. Several members responded to a question about how best to keep their monthly donors. One of those members was Natalie Lanoville from Jewish Family Services  in Vancouver, Canada. I was impressed with her response. I talked with her some more so I can share some of her great experiences and approach. Natalie...

The M+R Benchmarks research has always been one of my favorite studies, and often one of the very few go-to statistics on monthly giving trends. That’s why I’m really excited that the “2020 M+R Benchmarks Study” is here. It’s very interactive, so you can find the most amazing trends in all things digitally. The M+R Benchmarks studies are based on the results from 201 different organizations and millions of records. Of course, I want...

First, let me start by asking: I hope you’re doing okay?  I hope your event cancellations; the staying at home; the working from home; with or without kids who now must be homeschooled; and perhaps worries about parents or other family members aren’t driving you totally crazy. Take good care of yourself and give yourself a break. Then, let’s spend a bit of time looking at some of the ways you can make up for the lost revenue from those events...

A few weeks ago, Harvey McKinnon published a wonderful new book called “How to Create Lifelong Donors Through Monthly Giving.” I’m tremendously honored to be mentioned in it — thank you, Harvey. I read the book in one sitting. It’s very well written and easy to read. You can probably finish it in just about an hour. Harvey has really made the process of monthly giving very easy to understand, and the book includes too many wonderful nuggets to...

If you asked me how many times I’ve seen the word “pivot” in an email, a webinar or a virtual conference, I simply couldn’t tell you. I know this word from ballroom dancing classes. I know it as part of my excel sheets. But I had never heard it used in conjunction with fundraising. As you may know, I’m Dutch. And even though I’ve lived in the U.S. for 27 years, I occasionally have to look up the meaning of a word, so here’s what I found:...

This is a time when everyone feels overwhelmed, with email inboxes exploding with nonstop news of the pandemic and the pressure of having to homeschool kids who might not want to be homeschooled. Many fundraisers are trying to figure out how to work from home in the middle of all the family distractions. And then, of course, there’s the worry about how to make up for the fundraising difference with postponed events, or in some cases, canceled...

As you know I’ve been advocating for a while now to make small changes to your overall fundraising program and to start including monthly giving wherever possible. I know that you simply may not be in the position to go after monthly donors in a big way or you may be hesitant.  (For some reason I’m still puzzled about that, so I hope you don’t mind me to continue to motivate you to try it). You probably also know that monthly giving takes a...

If the past few weeks are any indication, it’s going to get worse before it gets better. But I’m hoping that we’ll be able to somewhat get back to normal sooner rather than later. I’ve been working from home for over 15 years, so for me personally, that’s nothing new. What is new now is that I’m putting my yoga mat in my office, and I turn on my computer to participate in my barre class, using cans of soup as weights and laundry detergent as my...

There I was, sitting on a plane on my way to a presentation. But when I landed, I found out the committee had just canceled the meeting. Not the end of the world, so I made the best of it, did a bit of sightseeing, practiced social distancing, and got caught up on some work and some books. Of course, it’s all about being safe and staying healthy. That’s the number one priority, and I totally understand. But it made me think about what happened...

OK — there’s no official monthly donor retention day (yet), but I think it’s time we started one. After all, with Daylight Savings Time, St. Patricks’ Day, World Wildlife Day and so many other special days on the calendar, why not create yet one more special day? Except, it should not be a special day! If you’re serious about your monthly donor program, every day should be a monthly donor retention day. When should that day be? Well, that...

Life is busy. Life is messy. Time can get away from us all — no matter how perfect we are at multitasking. Donors are no different. Especially donors with kids and/or grandkids. Having just spent the weekend with our grandkids (ages two, three and 11), I can totally relate. You can’t leave them alone one minute, and they love having you sit with them when they’re watching the next repeat of “Minions,” “Blaze” or “Umizoomi”! I had virtually no...

As you know, I’ve been advocating for a while to make small changes to your overall fundraising program and to start including monthly giving wherever possible. I know that you simply may not be in the position to go after monthly donors in a big way, or you may be hesitant.  (For some reason I’m still puzzled about that, so I hope you don’t mind me continuing to motivate you to try it.) You probably also know that monthly giving takes a while...

Every year in February, my husband and I escape from the cold (and usually snow) and go to Phoenix for some sunshine, a little bit of golf and pickleball, and a drive-in movie. My husband is a private pilot, and he absolutely loves to fly. He is on cloud nine every time he goes for a flight. And every time we go on our trip, he realizes how people in some parts of the country are so lucky. They can fly (almost) 365 days a year and maybe miss...

I just wrote an ebook on how monthly donors provide important unrestricted revenue nonprofits need to support their operating costs. If you’re using terms like annual fund or annual appeals to identify your operating revenue, please realize that monthly gifts are typically part of this. Monthly donors support your annual fund. Monthly donors support your ongoing operating needs and your mission. One of the questions fundraisers immediately ask...

This just in! Monthly donor statistics are hard to come by, so I was excited when Bloomerang ran some top line statistics for the organizations they serve. They looked at almost 300,000 monthly gifts generating more than $15,000,000 a year. Of course, everything was totally confidential, so we’re just looking at averages here but let’s look at some very exciting key findings: The average monthly gift is $51 for credit cards and $60 for those...

Sustainer programs have grown substantially over the past few years, especially for those organizations that took advantage of generating new donors before, during and after the 2016 elections. In this article, I’m going to address two questions: Why has sustainer giving become so popular? How can you create a winning sustainer program? Why Has Sustainer Giving Become Popular? It’s all around us: subscription programs, small amounts taken...

The decision to add monthly giving to your annual fundraising plan is probably one of the most important ones you’ll ever make. It’s probably also one of the best you’ll ever make. Now if it were two decades ago, it would have been a costly one. But now, with the internet, email marketing, social media and the numerous ways giving has been made easy, adding monthly giving has become a ‘no brainer’. Adding monthly giving to your fundraising plan...

As you know, I do a ton of blogging and presenting on monthly giving. I talk to organizations about their monthly donor programs all the time. But I haven’t been able to solve the biggest monthly giving mystery: “What’s holding organizations back to start or grow their monthly donor program?” I’d love to find out from you what you think it is, because I’ve not yet been able to answer that question. I can guess at some of the reasons (or...

I still come across nonprofits that have virtually no sustainers. Why? Because they weren’t pushed to do it, or they didn’t know that they could do it. Sadly, some organizations had the bad luck of agencies and consultants not thinking that monthly giving was a “big deal.” Some worried it would take away from their direct mail numbers and revenue. It made me think of the movie “Pretty Woman.” Do you remember the scene where Julia Roberts needs...

To start the year and decade off right, I thought I’d share 20 ideas and intentions to help you grow your monthly donor program to the next level. No matter what your current number of monthly donors is, you can always use more. No matter what your current overall communication schedule is, you should be able to fit these into the mix. No matter how many donors you have, you can always apply these tips. Virtually, all of these are low in cost;...

If you haven’t started focusing on monthly and sustainer giving yet, think again. At the start of the new year, it’s a good time to take a fresh look at this tremendously sustainable way for donors to make a difference to your organization in ways that are most comfortable for their budget. When I ask monthly donors the question, why they like giving that way, most indicate they like to support the organization. They care about the mission....

As you’re going into the next decade, it might be a good time to take stock of some old ideas that can be new again. But how do you find those old ideas? Go back to some of your old packages and emails, and retest them. See what happens. When I worked at Reader’s Digest in Amsterdam several decades ago, we took two approaches that worked over and over again: We had a huge stock room of samples of prior campaigns. And every seven years or so,...

Blog by Michael W. Kahn, Nacha Did you finally clear out your inbox from Giving Tuesday? Congratulations. And if you helped a cause or two that’s near and dear to your heart, good on you! But now’s a great time to take the next step and help those charitable organizations make the most of Giving Tuesday. That means converting one-time donors into sustaining donors who give more frequently by ACH. Some experts in the field of giving believe the...

As we’re getting ready for Thanksgiving, I wanted to talk about something not often talked about:  how nonprofit clients move from one fundraising agency or consultant to another, and how this can be a smooth transition or a difficult one. I’m very fortunate that I was recently asked to start working with an organization where its “old” agency was extremely gracious, supportive and forthcoming with any and all information. It made the...

This past weekend, I spent several hours going through the stack of direct mail packs I had  received in the past two weeks. I reviewed each one, identified organizations I’d like to donate to and then I scanned in those that could help give me some new ideas for year-end giving appeals for organizations I work with. Every year around this time, I talk to nonprofits, struggling to decide if they should send out a direct mail appeal at year-end....

I’m not going to write about monthly donors for a change. Instead, now is the time to get as many one-time gifts, which will help feed your monthly donor program next year. The year-end appeal season is here. The clock is ticking… The mail pile is growing… The inbox is overflowing… The question is: How do you stand out from the crowd? The second question is: Must you stand out from the crowd, or is it more important you get my attention at the...