In a world where everyone has a smartphone, mobile giving isn’t something nonprofits can ignore. Adding mobile giving tools to your year-end fundraising is crucial to reaching a large audience, building relationships with donors, and raising more funds. This article will show you how.
Nonprofits can raise 17-31% of their online revenue in December, during year-end campaigns. As you develop your end-of-year fundraising campaign, it’s crucial to add mobile giving options whenever possible. In this article, we’ll discuss different ways to boost your year-end fundraising with mobile giving and discuss how you can make it easier for donors to give. As you learn more, determine which mobile giving tool will work best for your organization and supporters.
Mobile giving includes a variety of ways to donate, but the purpose behind all mobile giving tools is to make it easier for donors to support your mission. It’s a common complaint that Millennials and Gen Z use their smartphones for everything. Your nonprofit can use this to your advantage.
Mobile giving means your supporters can donate when they feel most connected to your organization and when your mission is at the top of their minds. Year-end events, church services, and eye-catching annual appeals and flyers are excellent ways to reach a new audience and tug at the heartstrings of your current donor base. Mobile giving makes it easy to solicit donations from supporters when you have their attention this giving season.
Mobile giving can also make it easier for people to support you. Everyone seems to have a smartphone and credit card, but hardly anyone carries cash. If your year-end donation appeals and events include ways for people to link to your donation page or form and give in only a few minutes, you will see an increase in donations.
Pro tip: Did you know only 33% of nonprofits include Apple Pay on their donation form? Only 24% include Google Pay. If you want to increase donations from younger supporters, adding Apple Pay, Google Pay, Venmo, and PayPal to your donation form will give you an immediate return on your investment. With Donorbox’s UltraSwift™ pay, your donors can use their preferred payment method for a 4x faster checkout!
You’ve probably heard of text-to-give, maybe even tried it, but didn’t find much success. Historically, larger organizations fundraising for emergency relief have raised the most money with text-to-give campaigns. But with the right strategy, all organizations can find success with text-to-give – and this year’s giving season is an excellent time to try again!
The average donation size for text-to-give is $107, meaning it can be a great addition to any campaign. Nonprofits can add a text-to-give campaign to any event, concert, food drive, or toy drive. Churches can also benefit from adding a text-to-give campaign to their weekly and holiday services.
Adding text-to-give to your end-of-year campaign helps you provide donors with more information about your organization’s mission and gives them a reason to give. Learn how to increase text donations with our ultimate guide to text-to-give fundraising.
Donorbox makes it easy to create a text-to-give campaign! Choose either the Basic or Short Code plans. The Basic plan is $19 a month and includes unlimited texts, a unique campaign ID, and a standard phone number. The Short Code plan includes access to the short code number, 80801, and allows you to create a custom keyword. This plan is $50 a month.
Once you choose your plan, you can create unlimited text-to-give campaigns! Simply share your campaign ID or custom keyword with your donors and they’ll text either the text-to-give number or short code. They’ll then receive a link to your online donation form. Here’s how it looks with the short code –
After they donate, Donorbox makes it even easier to send repeat donations without filling out the form again, all through a single text.
Pro tip: Make it as easy as possible for your donors to give again by activating QuickDonate™ in your Donorbox account. With QuickDonate™, donors simply log in to their donor portal, find your campaign, and click ‘Donate’ to repeat their gift.
Watch this webinar on text-to-give:
Have you noticed QR codes are everywhere now? Scan a QR code for a menu at your local restaurant, a train or bus schedule, and ingredients or recipes on food packaging. Nonprofits are jumping on this trend and using QR codes to raise funds during events, promote sponsors, send surveys to donors, and collect contact information and business cards.
An end-of-year fundraising campaign includes several ways to collect donations with QR codes. Nonprofits spend hundreds of dollars developing and sending out annual appeal letters to their donors. A QR code on your beautifully designed fundraising materials can catch donors’ attention and make it easy to give.
Churches can also benefit from using QR codes this holiday season. Before this end-of-year season, download 7 Ways Churches Should Use QR Codes to build connections with parishioners and collect tithes and offerings.
Donorbox automatically creates a free, unique QR code for each online campaign. On your Donorbox Dashboard, click on your campaign’s QR code and download a PNG or SVG file. You can also customize your link to suit your needs!
Another way to encourage mobile giving this fundraising season is with donation kiosks. Nonprofits can add donation kiosks to their indoor and outdoor fundraising events. Places of worship can place kiosks in their lobby or different rooms throughout their facility.
Food pantries, churches, and organizations that regularly receive visits from their supporters have a unique opportunity to strengthen donor relationships and raise more money. If you’re one of these organizations, you can add a donation kiosk next to a Christmas tree this holiday season. On the tree, you can add cards with gift ideas for different beneficiaries and let donors use the kiosk to donate the amount on the card.
Nonprofits will never hear the excuse, “I don’t have cash” again. Donorbox’s Live™ Kiosk is an app that lets you collect donations at any location with just a tablet and card reader. Unlike other donation-collecting apps, you’ll never have to manually type in donations. Donors simply select their donation amount and pay with a card, smartphone, or smartwatch. They have the option to include their email address for a donation receipt, meaning you can stay in touch and build a stronger relationship.
Last year, 57% of website visitors during the holiday season came from mobile devices. With this type of reach, you’d think nonprofits would see an equal increase in donations. Unfortunately, only 37% of donations came from mobile giving. As you add mobile giving to your year-end fundraising, it’s important to ensure it matches your supporters’ giving interests and abilities.
Donorbox has a suite of online fundraising tools to help you make donating easy for your supporters. Visit our website to learn more about Donorbox’s features and fundraising tools.
For more fundraising tips, check out the rest of our Nonprofit Blog. Subscribe to our newsletter to receive regular tips and resources to help you reach a larger audience and build solid relationships with your donor base.
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