WEBINAR RECAP
The Giving Day Playbook
Bring your supporter community together and make a massive difference to your income in a limited time period with Giving Days.
"A great new concept to discuss"
Recommended 10/10 by attendees
Speakers
Victoria Read
Customer Success Manager at Funraisin
Paul Parker
Digital Partnership Manager at Funraisin
Natalie Lamont
Technical Projects Manager at Funraisin
Check out the latest global Giving Day trends with hosts Paul and Victoria and our guest Natalie from the Australia team
In the session, we covered:
- Essential ingredients of a giving day before, during and after
- How to use giving days across the whole fundraising department
- Trends, insights and learnings from your charity peers
Don’t have time to watch the full webinar? Check out our takeaways below or download the presentation.
Summary
Bring your supporter community together and make a massive difference to your income in a limited time period with Giving Days.
Since 2019 there’s been a 3-4x increase in the number of giving days around the globe and we didn’t want you to miss out on the new global trend. A giving day can be centered completely around your cause, anytime in the year, and there’s no one size fits all!
It’s a dedicated day where a charity’s community is focused on hitting a specific fundraising goal, and it can be used by any team in your fundraising department - from event teams to community and individual giving.
The Giving Day Playbook
All the greatest stories have a beginning, middle and an end, and so should your giving day - and we’ve outlined the key chapters for you in our Giving Day Playbook.
Before: Everything you need to cover in the lead up to the campaign
During: The time to get your head in the game when your momentum starts to pay off
After: A strong finish to thank, celebrate and follow up with your community
Design: Essentials from best practices we’ve seen from around the world
Teams: How you can apply Giving Days throughout the fundraising department
Jeans for Genes: The brilliant tactics and top advice behind their double denim dollar match day
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Takeaways
🧑💻 Know your audience
Know your audience and how to engage them and meet them where they’re at, what media are they receptive to and make them as excited as you are.
⏳ Give yourself enough time
They can be as simple or complex as you want them to be, just give them time, be familiar with what’s happening on the day (what needs changing ahead of time or on the day). Make it a frictionless experience to make their donation and be on their way.
💬 Create a personalised experience
Give them a more tailored experience with personalisation tags and personalised urls. Engage high value teams by name such as 'Natalie your donation makes this impact' to make them feel appreciated.
🔍 Know your user experience inside-out
Save yourself the stress and hassle by planning ahead and knowing exactly what's happening at each part of your giving day - and what this looks like for your supporters.
For example, Jeans for Genes turned matched giving on at an off-peak time to alleviate pressure on the day, and optimised the mobile experience to include donation buttons above the fold.
Big campaigns take big planning, so make it easier for yourself by thinking ahead of each change you need to make, and testing out your the user experience for yourself.
Q&A
Are there any examples of when a giving day should occur? In line with key dates, world days, anniversaries? Is it very much a charity decision. Is it easier to say when to avoid?
The answer is both. A charity can set a day that matters to the charity itself, or cause driven, such as mental health day. The one thing to watch on national/global days is the noise that occurs and getting cut through vs leveraging the noise with smart content and CTAs… In short, both can be successful.
You could try and test both within a year, or test across various audience types.
Is there any insight into when in the year giving days work best in terms of funds raised?
If you look at the spike to direct donations to charity across various market insight reports, they generally lean towards November and December (Christmas) due to generosity, reflection and appeals.
We also know that there could be religious moments within a year, and even the end of the year for tax returns for tax purposes (popular in AU).
With that said, they can be used to complement other events and campaigns that your charity has where you are rallying your community.
Can I clarify match funding. A company, trust, major donor donate a certain amount of money and then this is used to match fund donations from the public? So Mrs Smith could donate £50 and £50 is taken from that match fund pot, to match Mrs Smith's donation. Am I understanding correctly?
That's correct, you can set the multiplier £1=£1 matched, and £1=£2 matched.
What is important is you can/should cap the matched amount so the pot isn’t used with one donation and can be spread across everyone.
Do you need to have matched giving to run a giving day?
It’s a nice to have, you don’t need to have it to have a successful campaign, but jackpot if you can turn it on.
Was there any fundraising feature that Jeans for Genes used for great effect?
Personalisation with a user’s name - they had personalisation for returning users to preset the donation amount for specific users for most previous donation. They knew their audience and what to ask them.
Can giving days be used as a way of getting fundraisers to activate fundraising pages earlier, without offering matched giving? And if so, would you recommend the same process?
Absolutely! You can use the same process but offer a different reason or incentive to donate on a particular day. Whether it’s a specific donation amount, a mini challenge you set for a gamification badge, or something you do for a reward like merchandise or an unlockable asset. It’s all about gathering momentum and a limited time reason why they should donate now so they don’t miss out. FOMO all round!
How regularly do Giving Days take place on average, is this once a year or bi-annually?
It’s completely up to you and when it makes sense in your fundraising portfolio. Some charities use them to fill gaps in their calendar to help build momentum to hit their targets, or to amplify an existing campaign or event.
You can also look at specific key calendar dates of significance for your cause like an awareness day, or tie it to specific messages or goals you have. If you want to have more than one, go for it!
We know not all charities will have the resources to manage that though, so choose what feels doable for you - you can always keep it simple if you need to and work with what you already have available.
