Tens of millions of donors came together on Giving Tuesday 2023 to raise funds for nonprofits, collectively. However, compared to 2022, GivingTuesday reports a 10% decline in overall donor participation. Meanwhile, gifts remained flat, at an estimated $3.1 billion.
Before the downward and flat trends were announced, GivingTuesday CEO, Asha Curran told The Chronicle of Philanthropy, “Donation trends are very volatile right now, and there’s a lot that’s going on that’s very concerning, including a decrease in donor participation.”
On the AFP Connect Open Forum, fundraisers were quick to comment on their campaign results. Choosing to comment anonymously, some of these comments and questions included:
“Our Giving Tuesday campaign this year ended with about $5,000 less than our 2022 campaign. The number of donors contributing went down about 30% as well. How did results go for your organization?” - Anonymous AFP Open Forum Member
“Our Giving Tuesday donors were down 13% and our dollars were down 56%. That dollar decline is because most of our larger 2022 Giving Tuesday donors gave or are planning to give at a different time. We are still analyzing how many 2022 donors repeated a GT gift this year, but at a glance, it looks like most of our 2023 GT donations were not from repeat GT donors.” - Anonymous AFP Open Forum Member
“Ours was also lower (about 40% over 2022). The thing was, we had 3X as many replies to our email saying that they would help if we didn't get enough, that the story just made them want help. That being said, it didn't inspire them to click the donate button. Thankfully, GT isn't our main EOY strategy, so we'll just keep asking and will be adding another mailed appeal before month end.” - Anonymous AFP Open Forum Member
Unfortunately, receiving a verbal commitment or some sort of positive confirmation that a donor will give does not always translate into an actual gift. This can not only be frustrating for a campaign, it can also lead to falling short of your goals without prior warning.
One solution to this Giving Tuesday shortcoming is to formalize and document gift intent with a Digital Gift Agreement.
Formalizing gift intent takes only a single click from your donors with Givzey. And, it greatly improves the chances that a gift will come in as planned, because the formality not only secures a donor’s buy-in, but it also generates automated payment reminders for the donor. Furthermore, for fundraisers and leadership by formally documenting a donor’s intent to give, you are able to book revenue, immediately.
Many forward-thinking fundraisers even take their Giving Tuesday donor interactions a step further with gift documentation. In addition to expressing gratitude for a donor’s intent to give in the current year, fundraisers are successfully asking donors if they’d be willing to pledge a gift for Giving Tuesday next year, as well – creating multi-year donors on the spot and proactively addressing Giving Tuesday donor attrition.