Is your nonprofit's #Giving Tuesday campaign set to achieve the best possible results?
This coming November 28th nonprofits all over the world will be presented with an opportunity to reach new donors. Donors are both in the form of volunteers and those who pledge financial gifts. You may be asking yourself what is so special about November 28, 2017, vs any other day of the year? The answer is that it is #Giving Tuesday. #Giving Tuesday is a national movement to create a day of giving going into the holiday season. The holiday season is one of the most charitable times of the year.
Last year alone the #Giving Tuesday movement raised over $177,000,000 in over 98 countries. This figure does not include all the volunteer hours that were also fulfilled by the campaign. So, the question for you and your nonprofit is how are you planning to engage donors this upcoming #Giving Tuesday? And what steps have you taken to strategically develop a campaign?
If you have not already planned a campaign for #Giving Tuesday here are a few tips to get started (you only have 2 months ?)
Allocate the Responsibility of Representing Your Nonprofit Wisely
As mentioned earlier in the post #Giving Tuesday and the holiday season offer tremendous potential for nonprofits to create engagement around their brand, mission, and values. Make sure that your nonprofit has the right team in place and has identified who is going to serve as the point person for the campaign.
It is also important to consider which of your supporters you are going to recruit to push your message to the masses. The person or people that you choose for the job should be creative, strategic, and responsive.
Here are a few additional traits to look for when selecting a team to represent your #Giving Tuesday initiative:
- Your point person or team should respect accountability for the success of the campaign
- Your point person or team should be able to adapt to changes and be quick to adjust the strategy.
- Your point person or team should be donor-centric (remember, volunteers are donors too)
- Your point person or team should be strong leaders who can see opportunity and chase it
Understand Your #Giving Tuesday Goals Ahead of Time
Every nonprofit that is creating a #Giving Tuesday campaign should have goals and benchmarks of success. If your organization has not set clear-cut goals how will you know if your campaign was successful? Your nonprofit should have an identified target for both fundraising and volunteer outreach post #Giving Tuesday.
Here are a few metrics to consider when setting goals for your #Giving Tuesday campaign efforts:
- How many monetary donors does your organization plan to reach? How many will be new donors who have not provided your organization with a financial contribution in the past?
- How many opportunities were filled by volunteers due to your #Giving Tuesday campaign?
- How much social engagement and brand exposure has been created because of the campaign?
- How will your organization measure donor / new donor activity? Can your nonprofit use your CRM system, donor database, or volunteer management platform to pull results?
It’s All About Content, Context, Marketing Channels, and Targeting
A successful #Giving Tuesday campaign all comes down to strategic planning, engaging content, on-point context, and the right targeting. Focus your effort on producing campaign pieces that are shareable and provide a clear-cut CTA (call to action).
Remember to focus on the goals that you determined previously as they should dictate the direction that you take your campaign messaging, the channels and sources you use to promote, and the actions you want your target audience to take. Remember to utilize social media in your nonprofit's promotion efforts and the hashtag #GivingTuesday.
Analyze Results and Optimize
Understanding how your #Giving Tuesday campaign is performing and making optimizations on the go to yield higher results is just as important as the initial campaign setup. The point person and team responsible for the success of the campaign should be consistently reviewing the campaign performance and looking for additional ways to gain exposure.
Takeaways
#Giving Tuesday is a few short months away. Careful planning, allocating responsibility, determining goals, creating engaging content, understanding performance indicators, and analyzing results can put your nonprofit in a situation geared toward success. How will your organization make the biggest impact on this end-of-year opportunity?
