Maximizing Year-End Fundraising Success: Best Practices and Tips for Nonprofits
As the year draws to a close, nonprofits everywhere prepare for what is arguably the most critical time for fundraising—year-end giving season. The holiday spirit, combined with the urgency of tax deadlines, means that donors are often more inclined to give during this period. In fact, up to one-third of annual donations are made in December, with a significant portion coming in the final days of the year. If your nonprofit isn’t fully maximizing this opportunity, you could be leaving essential revenue on the table, limiting your organization's impact and mission advancement.
This guide highlights key strategies and actionable tips, backed by research and thousands of real-world fundraising experiments, to help you cut through the year-end clutter and achieve your fundraising goals.
Why Year-End Giving Matters
Year-end giving campaigns target the final 45 days of the year when donor generosity typically peaks. According to research by NextAfter, 37% of annual online fundraising revenue is generated during this short period. Understanding the importance of year-end giving is essential—it’s a time when your nonprofit has the potential to make up to a third of its annual revenue.
M+R’s 2023 Benchmark report echoes this, showing that 26% of total annual revenue comes from this period. The numbers highlight just how crucial it is to execute a well-planned, data-driven year-end giving campaign that engages your donors and motivates them to act.
7 Steps to a Successful Year-End Giving Campaign
Year-end fundraising can feel overwhelming, but it doesn’t have to be. By following this seven-step framework, you can plan and implement a year-end giving campaign that not only increases donations but also positions your organization for continued success in the year ahead.
1. Gather Year-End Campaign Ideas & Pick a Goal
Play with AI Prompts: Use AI tools to help you brainstorm new copy for appeals, come up with new themes, subject lines, or blog post titles, and get the brainstorming process going.
Focus on a goal: While fundraising is clearly the chief focus, what are your other goals? Do you want recruit new donors, target lapsed ones, or increase mid-level donors to major?
2. Update Websites & Donation Pages
In a sea of year-end appeals, your organization must stand out. Avoid the cookie-cutter approach many nonprofits take by simply reusing old messages. Instead, innovate by testing new website tactics based on real-world results. For example:
Sticky Bar on Donation Pages: A fundraising experiment showed that adding a sticky bar to donation pages increased donation rates by 50% and average gift size by 35%.
Exit-Intent Pop-ups: These pop-ups, triggered when a user attempts to leave the donation page, resulted in a 179% increase in donations in one year-end fundraising experiment.
Longer Emails: Don’t shy away from longer, more detailed fundraising emails. Research found that a more thorough email explanation can lead to a 27% increase in donations.
Tailor these tactics to your audience and campaign to stand out during the crowded year-end season
3. Identify Your Year-End Giving Channels
Successful year-end campaigns often employ a multichannel approach. Surprisingly, only 36% of nonprofits use more than one communication channel for their year-end appeals, but of those that do, 76% have higher donor retention rates.
Direct Mail + Email: Email and direct mail are the staples, but adding text messages and social media to your strategy can significantly boost results. One experiment found that following up direct mail with email increased donation rates by 132%.
Email + Text: Using both email and SMS together can result in an 80% increase in donations compared to using SMS alone.
Don’t rely on just one approach—utilize the full range of channels at your disposal to meet your donors where they are. By diversifying your outreach, you’ll increase your chances of connecting with different segments of your audience, ultimately raising more revenue.
4. Create a Year-End Campaign Timeline
Timing is everything when it comes to year-end fundraising. The final days of the year are the most critical, with 32% of online donations occurring in the last week of December. It’s crucial to structure your messaging to peak at the right time:
Giving Tuesday: This day kicks off the year-end giving season, and 4% of online revenue comes in on this day alone.
December 31st: 14% of online year-end revenue is earned on the last day of the year.
Be sure to ramp up your communications as the year progresses, with targeted pushes during these high-impact days.
5. Write Compelling Year-End Emails
Your year-end emails need to resonate with donors on a human level, driving them to take action. Use these best practices for email writing:
Personalize the Sender: People give to people, not organizations. Send your emails from a recognizable person at your nonprofit.
Focus on the Subject Line: This is your first chance to catch a donor’s attention. Write clear, compelling subject lines that entice readers to open the email.
Be Conversational: Address your donor by name, and write in a conversational tone that feels personal and relational.
Explain the Problem and Solution: Lay out the issue your nonprofit is addressing and explain how the donor’s contribution can make a tangible impact. Be upbeat and positive. Make people feel good about helping your organization and solving a problem.
Ensure your email content reflects the urgency of the campaign and conveys the difference their gift will make. Personalization and clear storytelling can make all the difference in gaining opens, clicks, and donations.
6. Build a Year-End Donation Page That Converts
Sending donors to a general donation page during your year-end campaign can result in missed opportunities. Instead, create a page tailored specifically to your year-end appeal. Here are some key elements to include:
Clean, straightforward design: Eliminate extra navigation and avoid distracting links that could take donors away from completing their donation. Clarity always trumps persuasion.
Add Urgency: Use a countdown or progress bar to highlight time-sensitive goals.
Clear, Impactful Headlines: Make it immediately clear what impact their donation will have.
Connect Your Donation Page to the Hook: Use strong, impactful copy that ties directly to the email or communication that led the donor to your page.
Use Powerful Images to Push your Storytelling: Images help make your successes stand out. Make sure you have compelling images to use on your donation pages and any other materials you are using for the end-of-the-year.
Research shows that nonprofits using custom donation pages for specific campaigns increase donation rates and overall revenue. Focus on creating a seamless, distraction-free giving experience.
7. Re-think Giving Tuesday
While 4% of all fundraising donations may come in on Giving Tuesday, it’s hard to stand out from all the nonprofits clamoring for attention.
Use Giving Tuesday for Thanks: Gather your staff and board members and use this day to thank supporters with phone calls, emails, social media updates, and hand-written notes. Seth Rosen of the American LGBTQ+ Museum suggests:
Instead of asking for money, he recommends using the occasion to express gratitude to your supporters from the past year. “Our staff, our board members, and our volunteers use Giving Tuesday just to thank our donors,” he says. It’s less expected and a more relaxed change of pace from the other appeals your donors will likely be receiving that day.
8. Handwrite a Personal Note
Holiday Cards & Thank Yous: Nothing breaks through the clutter of direct mail appeals like a hand-written thank you or holiday card.
Get your directors involved: Customize the first line of an appeal or have your executive director pen a personal note to direct mail appeals going to important donors.
Final Thoughts: Kick Off Your Year-End Fundraising Campaign Now
Year-end campaigns are your opportunity to engage supporters, exceed your goals, and set your nonprofit up for success in the year ahead. Start planning today!
With nearly one-third of annual donations coming in during the last 45 days of the year, it’s essential to start planning early. Implement a multichannel approach, focus on compelling storytelling, and create a timeline that ensures you reach donors at peak times. By following these five steps, you’ll be well on your way to cutting through the clutter and earning more revenue for your mission.
Implement these proven strategies, and you’ll not only raise more money but also deepen your relationships with donors, setting your nonprofit up for success in the year ahead. Now is the time to plan, execute, and deliver your most impactful year-end campaign yet!