Nonprofits raised nearly $2 billion on GivingTuesday in 2019. And yet, we hear a lot of complaints every year about how it doesn’t work. If you aren’t getting the return you want, Julia Campbell joins us today to encourage you to assess your approach to Giving Tuesday. (Did your GivingTuesday go well? See Julia’s top tips for wrapping up a successful GivingTuesday campaign) ~Kristina
Guest Post by Julia Campbell
Did your campaign succeed on GivingTuesday? If not, it’s time for an honest evaluation!
Here are 3 reasons why your GivingTuesday may not have gone well:
1) You didn’t have an engaged community ready to go BEFORE GivingTuesday.
Successful GivingTuesday campaigns work hard for weeks and months before the big day to prime the pump – to build trust, convey their impact, and share compelling stories and other helpful information to get the audience excited and ready to go.
2) You make it difficult to give.
Was your donation process too cumbersome? What did your landing page look like? Did you leverage Facebook giving tools or send people to an outside website (which reduces conversions coming from Facebook)? Examine your online donation process. On a day like GivingTuesday with many demands for your donors’ dollars and attention, the process to make a donation has to be quick and SEAMLESS.
3) Your messaging was off.
Did you explain where the money was going? Did you simply say “give to us because it’s GivingTuesday”? Was there a timely, urgent, relevant, and compelling reason for your donors to pay attention and to give?
There are many things that go into a successful GivingTuesday campaign – planning and preparation are key elements.
Don’t wait until December to communicate with donors. Start planning for next year NOW and be sure to communicate with your donors throughout the year.
Thank them, share stories of impact, and be sure to ask them what they want to hear from you.
Julia Campbell has run her digital marketing consulting business for almost a decade, focused exclusively on mission-driven organizations. A mom of 2 and a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer, she is the author of Storytelling in the Digital Age: A Guide for Nonprofits, a call-to-action for nonprofits to use stories to accomplish their missions.
Her passion is to get nonprofits of all sizes to stop spinning their wheels on social media and to start getting real results using digital tools. You can check out her thoughts and ideas on all things nonprofit digital storytelling and social media at www.jcsocialmarketing.com/blog.
