I recently presented a webinar as part of the two-day virtual summit, Nonprofit Changemakers, organized by Top Nonprofits. Afterward, I received the terrific visual (above) of the presentation. The artist really picked up the highlights of my message, and she did it live. One of the questions I always start with is how many monthly donors organizations have now. Then closer to the end, I ask them to write down their goals. Just like there’s...

A few years ago, I had the pleasure of presenting about sustainers with Tina Hudgins, who worked at the International Justice Mission at the time. She shared how the organization typically did a monthly donor direct mail and email invite campaign (including upgrades) in the month of September. And they’ve been doing this ever since. What a great idea! September is early enough in the giving season that it doesn’t detract from activities like...

A good friend asked me this question and, as good friends tend to do, I wanted to address this question right away before getting into the busy fundraising season. While I would love to tell you yes — go all out and ask for monthly gifts — the answer really should be: “It depends!” Let me explain with two approaches: First, if you’re sending out email appeals around #GivingTuesday and the last few weeks in December, I recommend you do some...

Monthly donor retention is probably the biggest challenge for nonprofits. In my nearly 30 years of monthly giving experience, I’ve seen three big reasons for this: Nobody feels responsible for tracking monthly donor dropouts and attrition (a fancier word for dropout percentage).  Believe it or not, while you think this may be more rampant in a bigger organization, it’s also a problem in smaller organizations. Unless someone is completely...

As a fundraising consultant, I’m always learning and researching. I do this by working with clients, vendor partners, databases, payment processors and so much more. I have many answers, but not all. That’s why I enjoy the research and experiments NextAfter does, especially when it comes to donation forms and emails. Even a small change can make a huge difference when it comes to donations and monthly gifts. Of course, every organization is...

Seth Godin’s blog always gives me inspiration. Recently, he wrote about the words I hear so much when it comes to monthly giving: “That’s a great idea!”  Seth says: “…after every good idea, there are at least 100 steps of iteration, learning, adjustment, innovation and effort. But not committing to the 100 steps is a waste of a good idea. The effort and investment and evolution made the difference.” In my experience working with nonprofits,...

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...

As we’re all slowly moving back to what is now considered “the new normal,” nonprofits are still struggling. When can they get back to the office? Who is going to pick up the mail? How can they send out thank-you letters? Some nonprofits haven’t missed a beat. Some had to step up their service levels to even higher levels than before. They kept working with other essential businesses — like printers, letter shops, post offices — to get their...

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...

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...

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...

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...

I recently traveled across several time zones, and it’s amazing how it impacts you — your body, your mood, your sleep pattern and your ability to concentrate. They say it takes one day to recuperate from a one-hour time change. So, with Daylight Savings Time around the corner, we’ll lose one whole hour, 60 minutes, 3,600 seconds. The good news is that the adjustment will be on a Sunday for most people, but the Monday morning after the clock...

I’m sitting on a plane, thinking about the coronavirus and a movie I watched a while back called “Contagion.” Scary. Totally realistic now! We’ve become world travelers. We’re on planes, trains, boats, buses, Uber and Lyft rides, etc., all the time. For this most recent trip, I packed some masks and gloves, and I am wiping down everything possible, hoping to stay healthy. (Whenever I travel, I swear by Airborne, sanitary wipes and hand...

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...

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,...

If you’ve heard me speak or read some of my blogs, you already know that I always advocate for the following:  The more opportunities you offer donors to give monthly, the more monthly donors you will find!  But for most organizations, there is always that fine line of having to bring in one-time short-term funds versus long-term sustainable monthly giving revenue. I get it. Trust me, I’ve been there. Let’s Start With A Monthly Giving Case...

As I’m getting ready for my second cataract surgery this week, it has started to dawn on me the tremendous eye-opening results I’ve already experienced from the first one. For me, going to the beach and swimming in the ocean was never an option, because I wouldn’t be able to find my spot unless there was nobody else there. Snorkeling was not possible, because I simply wouldn’t see anything. Now hopefully all that will be possible. I may have...

Donor-advised funds — a lot has been written about it.  Especially with the changes in tax laws, more and more donors have “flocked” to it. Just a few quick facts about donor-advised funds (DAFs): You don’t need to be super rich to start one — $5,000 is all it takes. A DAF is easy to set up. If you already have investments with an investment firm like Schwab or Fidelity, you’ll be able to create a DAF there, and it can all be done online in...

At the recent sustainer workshop, we asked people present about their biggest monthly gift challenges. You see that staff is a big challenge, along with prioritizing sustainers over donors and getting new monthly donors (acquisition). I was surprised to see that retention for this group was less challenging. It’s important to note that the sizes of monthly donor programs, time length sustainer programs in place and experience levels of...

I just got back from the 14th Bridge Conference, energized by new ideas, case studies and proven fundraising “old” basics that still work and will continue to work as long as donors are human beings. I was privileged to co-present a first sustainer, full day, pre-conference workshop with the “Sustainer Brains:” Charlotte Davidoff, Save the Children; Josef Kottler, Sage Communications; Liz Murphy, Beaconfire Red; Cameron Popp, WETA; Phil...

What Was A Monthly Giving Program Like Before Computers And The Internet?  It existed but it was a lot harder! The channels used were mail, phone and in-person. When I first started managing a monthly giving program, now many (26+) years ago, nonprofits’ websites didn’t exist! Emails were just used for internal communication and even that was still very new. Cell phones were only used in cars and nobody had even heard of smart phones. Computers...

Monthly giving is growing. Let me start by giving you some highlights and statistics: Recurring donors have grown by 52 percent, and revenue has increased by 94 percent over the past 3 years for the average organization; The average monthly gift is between $24 and $36, and the average annual gift is $275 to $425; Retention rate if giving by credit card is 87 percent, if giving by EFT/ACH, 94 percent, and if sending in checks after receiving...

Setting up a successful monthly giving program doesn’t have to be difficult, as long as you keep these key components in mind. Let me share the top 5 with you: Commitment Accountability Preparedness Detail orientation Persistence For a successful monthly giving program, these apply to the person who’s interested and willing to grow the program as well as to the program itself. Let’s take these key elements one by one. 1.  Commitment to Monthly...

Monthly giving programs can be a wonderful way to ensure your fundraising program sustains throughout the year. Although the concept of monthly giving is not new, the onset of subscription-based services, online giving programs and multiple digital tools make it easier than ever to provide this option to your donors. We spoke with Erica Waasdorp, the leading expert on monthly giving and president of A Direct Solution, about best practices in...

Of course in your organization, nothing ever goes wrong with your monthly donors. But what would you do if something did? Would you hide? Would you stick your head in the sand and let someone else handle it? Or would you consider your donors and confess? The reality is that most of your donors will understand that things go wrong at times. They’re human beings after all. The key is to act right away, fix the problem and prevent it from...

This past week I heard the expression “Drink Your Own Kool-Aid” several times, so I wanted to explain why it’s especially important when it comes to monthly giving. Let me start with the Wikipedia definition: “Drinking the Kool-Aid” is an expression commonly used in the United States that refers to a person who believes in a possibly doomed or dangerous idea because of perceived potential high rewards.” If your boss or board still...

People ask me this question a lot: “My monthly donors only make up 3 percent (or fill in another percentage) of my donors. Is that good? What’s the percentage I should strive for?” The answer is: “It depends!” Let’s look at a few different scenarios: If you have 100,000 donors who have made a gift in the past year and 3 percent of them are sustainers, it’s not bad. That’s 3,000 donors giving you between $24 and $35 a month—or between $864,000...