“Every time we remove a barrier, giving goes up.” Yes! Or, as I like to say, “The easier you make it for someone to give, the more apt they are to give.”
Recently, The Chronicle of Philanthropy, one of the leading think tanks for charitable giving, produced a guide. This guide revealed that if you want to increase giving, you should make it easy for donors to give. Their small guide, What Donors Want: A Practical Guide for Lifting Donations By Asking Supporters for Their Feedback, shared key findings as several charities asked their donors their giving preferences. If you are serious about improving giving, the study is worth purchasing.
One key finding was the importance of making online giving donor-friendly. What is the one key to making giving donor-friendly? Make the giving process quick and easy.
One fundraiser said, “It has to be ridiculously easy for someone to give their money, be it to buy something or give to a cause.” Is it ridiculously easy for someone attending your church or landing on your sites to give to your cause? If not, you may be losing out on dollars and engaging long-term with your donors.
If you are wondering whether this is important, here are a few statistics What Donors Want gives about the current state of online commerce in America. They report:
- 51% of web searches occur on mobile devices,
- 96% of people use their mobile phones as their primary device,
- 54% of emails from nonprofits are read on a mobile device,
- 17% of online giving is made from mobile devices.1.
One thing is certain: donors are quickly moving towards online and mobile methods of giving. As donors increasingly use online giving, one thing is clear about what they want: a quick and easy process. To meet this growing trend, churches provide all the current methods for giving, making giving easy. Is your church ready for this new trend?
If you are uncertain if your church is ready, contact us today at (615) 206-4000 or email us at support@onlinegiving.org, and we will show you how our 10 + easy ways we provide for your members to give.
When it comes to easy, we make giving quick and easy for your members and attendees. The largest way people access our church partners’ giving websites is through biometrics. This allows the donor to set up their giving without remembering a password. The password-less experience allows people to use their Touch ID-enabled devices or mobile phone numbers to register and access their accounts without the need to provide or remember a password. Touch ID uses a smart device fingerprint reader or Face ID scanner to safely, securely, and quickly access user accounts.
Read more about the quick and easy process we provide to our clients at: https://www.onlinegiving.org/support/seriously-secure-giving
Let’s get back to unpacking what donors want. The premise for the paper, What Donors Want, was truly asking donors what their preferences are. The paper reports on several non-profits who spent time surveying their donors about their giving preferences. Then, based on their findings, they adjusted how they interacted with their donors and how they could give. The bottom line was donors wanted an easier process. These charities would have never known this if they hadn’t asked.
Most churches I know would not know how to garner this information. Most assume it is beyond their capability to do this kind of inquiry. Perhaps for your church, this is true. Our church partners at OnlineGiving.org use our Custom Forms tool to accomplish polls and surveys easily to better determine their effectiveness and what their donors want. Does your digital giving provider offer this?
Our Custom Forms feature is designed to help you easily and quickly engage with your members. You can use our form builder to query your members about their preferred options. And a new feature we just added uses a conditional logo to direct people to the right questions. For instance, if a member answered no to a particular question, the next question would be different if they had said yes. This feature allows you to survey your members better.
The Custom Forms feature can also be used for guest sign-ups, prayer requests, sermon notes, and event sign-ups from baptisms to attending camp; our forms allow for easy sign-up and payment if required. Our Custom Forms can be gathered and stored in your ChMs, making your job easier and more effective.
Read more about how our Custom Forms can help you communicate better with your donors at: https://www.onlinegiving.org/support/remarkably-custom-forms
One more time, let me ask: Does your online provider give you the tools to engage with your donors better? One thing is a constant in giving; the better you communicate and engage with your donors, the more likely they will continue to give to support your cause. Let us show you how our platform and tools can help you know and provide the giving experience your donors want by contacting us at (615) 206-4000 or emailing us at support@onlinegiving.org. We can help make your donor-giving experience quick, easy, and meaningful.
The Stewardship Coach
A leading think tank for charitable giving recently published a helpful guide on donors' giving preferences. Make sure your church accepts the right giving methods to provide What Donors Want.https://t.co/LFBTKB0ZUG pic.twitter.com/SV3CqMSWJZ
— Online Giving (@onlinegivingorg) January 25, 2024
1. https://store.philanthropy.com/collections/reports/products/what-donors-want-online-giving
