Do you have plans to celebrate national nonprofit day? If you don't, it's time to reconsider! This day uplifts and celebrates organizations like yours, reminding your community to give and support your important work. In this article, we'll walk you through six of the best ways to celebrate and encourage more donations.
National Nonprofit Day was declared a national holiday on August 17, 2017. Sherita J Herring, a speaker, author, and business strategist, promoted this holiday to recognize nonprofits’ impacts on their communities and the world. She had chosen this day as the National Nonprofit Day because the Tariff Act was signed on August 17, 1894. This law taxed corporations but excluded nonprofits because of their importance to the population.
Despite all these efforts, to this day, many people have little to no knowledge about nonprofits and their work. They don’t know how to help and if they can help at all.
But nonprofits are busy and unless a day carries real significance to their work, they wouldn’t have a lot of time and resources to invest in it. Let’s have a look at why National Nonprofit Day should matter to your nonprofit.
Nonprofits have a significant impact on the world. Donors and volunteers support these organizations because they want to be part of the change they bring about. Businesses often join nonprofits because they see how essential and effective nonprofits are for the economy.
But the problem remains: are there enough donors or volunteers, are people well aware of their local nonprofits and are those willing to help make a difference abreast of the ways to support?
56% of people in the United States donated to charity in 2021. Others have given time and expertise to help a local charity. Still, there are a majority of people who have little knowledge about your organization or any for that matter. They don’t know what you’re doing and when asked, would hesitate to give.
A celebration of the National Nonprofit Day would excite philanthropic people and encourage them to be a part of your big day. It may also intrigue others in the community. After all, a celebration is loved by one and all. This day becomes your best opportunity to let them know about your work and beneficiaries.
Support for nonprofit organizations is an excellent way for companies to humanize them in the eyes of their employees and customers. Sponsoring or donating to nonprofits helps promote the company’s involvement in bettering the world. You can reach out to local businesses through a sponsorship letter for your upcoming event on the occasion of National Nonprofit Day and seek support. Since this event will involve the whole community and potentially, many people from outside it, businesses will be inclined to join in.
Your whole community, as well as local businesses, are going to be a part of the celebration. This means you’ll get a good chance to solicit donations from them. Many of those present at the event will be knowing about your work and the beneficiaries for the first time. They’ll see your impact, find out about your programs, and know about other people who are volunteering or donating to your nonprofit. This will inspire most people to come forward and make donations to help.
Of course, as you get more donations, you’ll also be gaining new donors. In turn, you’ll be collecting their information including their email addresses, phone numbers, employer details, and more. Your donor management system will do it automatically as and when the donations are made online. It should also allow you to add offline donation details.
Finally, all these details will enable you to get in touch with these new donors and begin new relationships. These are people whom you can segment as per their giving abilities or interests and personalize your approach to strengthen these relationships in the future.
Nonprofits need donations to continue running. It’s expensive to own a building and land, pay qualified employees, and manage patient care or education or animal treatment or everything else they do to create a better world.
These expenses are not as easy to raise. National Nonprofit day can be an excellent way to share their needs with the community and the world. And the easiest and most cost-effective way to make that happen is an online fundraising campaign. These campaigns are easy to market online and you can reach people outside of your community.
Look at how National Drowning Prevention Allowance (NDPA) is raising money on National Nonprofit Day with an online crowdfunding campaign. It is equipped with a popup form that lets people make recurring donations and also find their employers to help double/triple the donations. Check out the page to learn more about the campaign and take inspiration.
Nonprofits looking to connect with local companies can use their online fundraising campaign to share sponsorship and matching gift opportunities (like in the above campaign). You can also create a separate page with a donation form for your potential sponsors. Add this page link to your sponsorship letter to businesses to help them learn about the benefits and packages, and make donations. Here’s an example to help you understand better –
Does your nonprofit already have a summer event? Nonprofits can use this holiday as an event theme and excite more people to participate. Adding this theme allows your nonprofit to piggyback on donors’ interest in giving while spreading the word to other community members.
Create an online event page. Brainstorm with your team and volunteers a ticket pricing strategy to raise more funds and add multiple ticket levels to your event page. The best way to earn the trust of your community members is to highlight the tax-deductibility of each ticket level. Donorbox Events lets you do all that and more. You can also accept donations from the event page. Your attendees will receive the ticket as well as a receipt in their email as soon as the ticket is purchased. Here’s an example of an online event page created on Donorbox.
Nonprofits that share their mission and programs during events have a greater chance of raising funds and continuing relationships with attendees.
Pro tip: Sell more tickets by adding a fun factor to your summer event for National Nonprofit Day. Include games like raffles and trivia, add a silent auction, or add challenges like a cook-off, etc. to grab more eyes. You should also have games and activities for kids, as well as snacks, beverages, drinks, and food stalls for all. Remember to mention these add-ons on your online event page to encourage more people to buy the tickets.
National Nonprofit Day is also an excellent time to create a loyal donor base for your nonprofit. By starting an online recurring donor campaign and making it a part of your celebration event, your nonprofit can promote an easy way to give weekly, monthly, or quarterly.
The best way to encourage more donations with a recurring donation program is to add suggested giving amounts to your recurring donation form. This can be achieved by segmenting your existing donors and finding out the most frequent donation amounts.
Here’s an example of a recurring donation form embedded in a nonprofit donation page. They have also added impact descriptions under each suggested amount.
You can also start a membership program for your nonprofit on this special day. A lot of people will be participating in your event. Talk to them about your new membership campaign and the benefits. Create an online membership campaign page, add multiple membership tiers, and share this link with your attendees on the event day.
The below membership campaign page is created using Donorbox Memberships. It lets you add monthly and annual membership options. You can add unlimited membership tiers to the form. As you can see, the nonprofit has also added membership benefits to the description. Finally, you can manage all your members and membership payments at the backend to strengthen your relationships with them – an excellent way to build an army of supporters!
People love to get involved in popular events and activities. National Nonprofit Day has become a popular fundraising day with its own hashtag, #NationalNonprofitDay, to spread awareness online. By creating a peer-to-peer campaign starting or ending on August 17, you can get volunteers, staff, board members, and even your most ardent donors involved in raising operational funds for your organization.
Donorbox Peer-to-Peer lets you easily turn an online campaign into a peer-to-peer fundraising campaign. All you have to do is toggle a switch on the tool and invite your supporters to fundraise. Your invitees will receive an email from Donorbox that will guide them to create and customize their fundraising campaigns. You can help them with additional details of the campaign, images, videos, etc. But Donorbox automates most of the process anyway to offer ease of use and efficacy.
Donors are more likely to give when they see how their gifts have an effect. Your National Nonprofit Day celebration is a great opportunity to share stories about the same. On the event day, invite some of your beneficiaries to the venue. Encourage donors and attendees to interact with them. If you’re an animal shelter, you can instead invite attendees to your shelter home. They can spend time with animals. Your volunteers can tell people about their past and how they landed in the shelter.
Let the day be about the lives you’re supporting, not just about you. This way, more people will connect with your cause and mission. They will feel more inspired to make a donation, become a member, or agree to make recurring donations. Some will even end up following you on social media to keep tabs on your day-to-day activities and then make a decision to give.
Volunteers are some of your most passionate supporters. Many volunteers provide financial gifts, but even those that don’t help nonprofits limit expenses. According to Independent Sector, a volunteer’s time is worth $28.54/hr. That’s almost $30 an hour that organizations can save instead of hiring more staff.
Nonprofits use volunteers for nearly everything, including board members, event committees, third-party events, maintenance, administration, etc. Volunteers entirely run some nonprofits, yet thanking volunteers is often pushed to the background. Make the National Nonprofit Day about honoring these people who make good work possible.
There are several inexpensive ways to thank your volunteers on this day –
National Nonprofit Day is an opportunity for nonprofits to spread the word, find more supporters, and inspire them to help. They can easily turn this day into a celebration event and give out sponsorship opportunities to businesses. But for all this to happen, you need an online system that helps sell tickets, raise money online, and store donor information for further use.
Donorbox has been helping nonprofits raise more donations online and manage donors with ease. 80,000+ nonprofits across 96+ countries are choosing us for their online fundraising campaigns, online event ticketing, membership campaigns, recurring donations, text-to-give campaigns, crowdfunding, peer-to-peer, and more. Learn about these simple-to-use and powerful features on the website here. You can start for free with no monthly contracts!
Donorbox Premium helps you break through that stubborn donation ceiling and raise more money to continue the good work. You get expert fundraising coaching, a dedicated account ambassador, highly knowledgeable techies, and premium tools – all meant to give your fundraising efforts a boost! Our pricing is personalized for every nonprofit. Contact the sales team to learn more.
Want to learn more about fundraising, event ideas, best practices, etc., and find downloadable free resources? Explore the Donorbox Nonprofit Blog, like this article that features more awareness days to celebrate with your nonprofit. Subscribe to our newsletter to receive a curated list of our best resources, including blogs, podcast episodes, webinars, new releases, and more in your inbox every month.
Kristine Ensor is a freelance writer with over a decade of experience working with local and international nonprofits. As a nonprofit professional she has specialized in fundraising, marketing, event planning, volunteer management, and board development.
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Kristine Ensor