By Edgar Rodriguez

Is Giving Tuesday a waste of time? Good question, right?

First of all, the data says it’s been hugely successful in the past. Over 15,000 nonprofits participated last year, raising over $45 million.

Yes, some nonprofits probably raised very little money. But Giving Tuesday is NOT just a 24-hour fundraising campaign. It’s a movement that your supporters are embracing, more and more each year.

How did your nonprofit do last year?

If you participated in Giving Tuesday before, you can look at several metrics to judge your past success.

Depending on your goals, you can look at:

• Total donations ($)
• Number of new donors acquired
• Number of current donors who gave
• Number of new emails acquired
• Number of people who engaged with campaign (clicks, conversions, shares)
• Engagement with follow up messages (email, social, etc)
• You get the idea

So should you participate? I asked a few peers this exact question:

The comments I received are valuable recommendations and pearls of wisdom about Giving Tuesday, broken out into: CONS, PROS, PEARLS OF WISDOM.

Giving Tuesday CONS (WARNINGS)

Mary Cahalane

The one-off, or even one day a year, habit is bad for developing relationships between donors and organizations. If you can’t keep donors’ attention with good communications, a giving day isn’t likely to successfully fill that void, anyway.

I suspect strong organizations, with good fundraising programs already in place, could do well with Giving Tuesday as an addition. They’re ready with a strong message. They’ve got the staff to devote to that one day. And they’ve got systems in place to build on the relationships started with the one day.

Smaller organizations? Unless there’s a strong community-wide awareness of and participation in Giving Tuesday, I wouldn’t recommend putting a year-long program aside in order to participate. It’s a tool, and not every tool is right for every organization.

I’d ask:

• Do you have time for a bootcamp? What will get put aside while you’re doing it?
• What will the results of making that time be? Will they be lasting results?

Dennis Fischman

I wrote about ten reasons a nonprofit should not be on Facebook, and it all boiled down to what your nonprofit can and should do first. (https://dennisfischman.com/ten-reasons-your-nonprofit-should-not-be-on-facebook/)

I feel the same way about Giving Tuesday. IF you already take care of your donors as if they were your best friends, and you want to invite them to a party that you and other nonprofits are throwing, then great! But how many nonprofits are really showing the #donorlove that way?

Giving Tuesday PROS (CHEERLEADING)

PRO:

Caroline Avakian

I think one of the best parts of GivingTuesday are the collaborations and partnerships that are forged because of it. I was working at Trickle Up, a global poverty alleviation organization, when GivingTuesday started and we got to publish a few pieces in the Huffington Post based on HuffPo’s partnership with the GivingTuesday campaign and the NGO alliance group, InterAction. It gives smaller NGOs a chance to be a part of something bigger than them. We also forged partnerships with other orgs we were on GivingTuesday coordination calls with. It’s a win-win all around. @CarolineAvakian

Rob Wu

At CauseVox, we have seen the sheer growth of GivingTuesday as the motivating factor to nonprofits trying online fundraising for the first time. By taking part in GivingTuesday, nonprofits learn, in a very short amount of time, how to set impact-based fundraising goals, tell a compelling story, and use social media.

A few case studies from CauseXox:

• Movers & Shakers: National Domestic Violence Hotline’s GivingTuesday Campaign
• Project Renewal Raises Over $77,000 on Giving Tuesday
• Movers & Shakers: Danielle Festa of Grey2k

Kivi Leroux Miller

I was hired last year by a handful of community foundations to teach nonprofits basic communications planning and donor stewardship using both Giving Tuesday and Give Local America as hook. It’s a totally new concepts to at least 75% of orgs in training.

From the Nonprofit Marketing Guide: 5 Ways to Harness the Awesome Fundraising Potential of #GivingTuesday

Joe Waters

I think it’s great at getting nonprofits focused on building a real audience – an army! – and communicating with them via social media.

Pamela Grow

If they’re already focused on the right things, especially building a solid email list, go for it. I love what one of my subscribers did last year for Giving Tuesday.

Julia Campbell

GivingTuesday is a national day of giving and it gets a TON of media coverage. People search on the hashtag all day long. People that may never have made a donation online give for the first time on that day.

It is not something your org should overlook, or sneeze at! You may not raise millions, but you may get new eyeballs on your cause, new ambassadors to spread the word and best of all – new donors!

Buffy Beaudoin-Schwartz

GivingTuesday has grown such that nonprofits have an opportunity to embrace it, and leverage the day as part of a well-planned, overall yearly communications, outreach and development strategy.

Giving Tuesday: PEARLS OF WISDOM

Noland Hoshino

Giving Tuesday and other giving days force a nonprofit organization to sharpen and fine tune their message while competing with other organizations.

Most nonprofit organizations have campaigns that last days or months. Keeping donors attention for that long can be tiresome. A giving day campaign condenses your tactics to just 24-hours with immediate results.

Farra Trompeter

Giving Tuesday has grown in popularity, recognition, and success to a point where I don’t think nonprofits can afford to ignore it.

The challenge lies in figuring out how to plug it into the rest of your communications, especially if you are implementing a year-end appeal or annual fund campaign at the same time.

Rather than create a separate Giving Tuesday campaign, I think most orgs should integrate it into their overall calendar. If you are worried that it might take away from other efforts, consider testing a single channel ask–such as a 24-hour match promoted on Facebook or a selfie sharing campaign (giving voice over money) on Instagram.

If you are worried that asking for money on this day can hurt other efforts, ask for something else. Use Giving Tuesday to ask for time, passion, activism, and other efforts that might engage your donors beyond giving money.

Ehren Foss

A successful Giving Tuesday campaign depends on:

• How much the nonprofit has already adopted these kinds of tactics and technologies (how valuable is learning/training?)
• How well it aligns with their existing strategies and programs.
• How well they can segment and steward their constituents to make sure to ask the right constituents to join them in GivingTuesday in the right ways.

Practice working together as online communications, online fundraising, and major gifts teams. What happens if a major prospect gives to Giving Tuesday or comments on a post? Does your team know how to work together?

Mickey Gomez

Taking part in a broader effort can bring new attention to your nonprofit, whether through donations, education or simple awareness. The messaging around national, state or regional giving is also quite inspiring, and confirms the power of philanthropy by amplifying giving on a single day to maximize quantifiable impact.

Where the sector needs to focus, in my opinion, is on maintaining the momentum AND further developing ongoing communication strategies that respect how donors would like to receive information after taking part in such an initiative.

The Takeaway

Giving Tuesday, like any campaign, is much more successful if you do your homework.

If you’re community isn’t as engaged as you like, maybe Giving Tuesday can be a catalyst to build a stronger community. Success largely depends on how well you plan, your definition of successful participation, and what investment (and sacrifices) you’ll need to make.

Check out these related articles:

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Black Friday sales were down 11% while #GivingTuesday had a banner year!

By Ritu Sharma

The final numbers are rolling in, and by all accounts the three-year-old day dedicated to giving known as #GivingTuesday, is proving once again that Black Friday and Cyber Monday aren’t the only spending days top of mind in our communities.

That the long weekend of frenzied indulgence and gluttony kicked off by Thanksgiving can be bookended with such generosity is heartening.

And the generosity is evident in the numbers. Here are the results from some of the day’s top campaigns:

Nonprofit leaders are humbled and overwhelmed by the results, which continue to be record-breaking: All this while U.S. Black Friday sales dropped 11.3% and Cyber Monday sales were up less than expected at only 8% (despite an increase in online sales), as noted by Mashable.

We reached out to leaders in our network to see their reactions on the success of #GivingTuesday and insights gained from this year’s giving day:

“#GivingTuesday 2014 saw a 36% increase in online giving compared to 2013 with Blackbaud processing more than $26.1m in online donations. There was a 15% increase in the number of nonprofits that received an online donation versus last year and overall transaction volume saw a 50% jump on a year over year basis. 17% of the forms were viewed on mobile platforms indicating the modern donor is increasingly mobile.” – Steven R. MacLaughlin, Director of Product Management at Blackbaud

“Network4Good processed slightly over $4.5 million across all our platforms which is 148% increase in donations over last year. We credit this increase in part to our dedicated efforts this year in enabling and supporting small and medium size nonprofit organizations who can’t participate at the same level as nonprofits with large marketing budgets. We provided extensive training, tools and resources to small and medium size nonprofits to enable them to participate in the annual day of giving.” – Jamie McDonald, Chief Giving Officer, Network for Good

“Each year for Razoo’s #GivingTuesday we try to improve the effectiveness of the prize structure to maximize nonprofit and donor engagement. Compared to last year’s results, with 30% more nonprofits participating, we experienced a 67% increase in the number of donors, a 62% increase in online donations and a 49% increase in the average number of visitors per hour, all contributing to a $1,775,511 day – a 56% increase over last year.” – Robert Lotinsky, Executive Director, Razoo Foundation

Crowdrise has been a really good, very effective partner in getting the word out for, and raising money for, a bunch of good orgs. The combined effort with #givingTuesday has been even more successful. I’ve got a really good team, and they let me know this is solidly in my wheelhouse, that’s how it started for me. – Craig Newmark, Founder of Craigslist and Craigconnects

“Nonprofits who raised money through Salsa on #GivingTuesday in both 2013 and 2014 saw an incredible increase of 47% year-over-year. Even though we have done a lot of education in the community and published data demonstrating that #GivingTuesday works and doesn’t share shift year-end dollars, we still are only seeing about 10% of Salsa client participating this year. We’d like to see that number and the overall #GivingTuesday movement continue to grow.” –Christine Schaefer, VP, Community, Product & Marketing for Salsa.

Henry Timms, executive director of the 92Y and founder of Giving Tuesday, told Mashable. “Around the world people came together for causes they care about. This is enabled by social media, but driven by compassion.”

Indeed, compassion is the motivator, but the democratization of philanthropy social media offers has expanded the reach of all nonprofits who understand that many small donations are as important as a few extraordinary gifts.

But not everyone is inspired.

Critics Seek “Perfect” Solutions

Tom Watson, president of CauseWired LLC, calls himself a “friendly skeptic” in thepiece he wrote for Forbes, but does admit he may have been “under-valuing one key factor: people are participating.” That fact is clear.

Peter Panepento, principal at Panepento Strategies, formerly with The Chronicle of Philanthropy and the Council on Foundations isn’t content to accept the success of #GivingTuesday without pushing for more.

He writes on LinkedIn:

“…GivingTuesday rewards the charities that already have the biggest networks, the most prominent corporate supporters and celebrity spokespeople, or the most clever attention-grabbing gimmick. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing. But it’s also not going to cure cancer, reduce hunger, or improve pre-K education.”

Actually, #GivingTuesday may ultimately do all of those things – who’s to say? – though not overnight. But that wasn’t what the day was designed for anyway. The idea, right from the #GivingTuesday website, was to create a global movement, a “day dedicated to giving back… to celebrate generosity and to give.”

And to that end the day has succeeded, and everyone who took to social media, opened their hearts, opened their wallets, and made the time to volunteer, to donate, and to CARE deserves to celebrate that success without having to ask, “Did I do enough?” Because if you did SOMETHING where before you did nothing, then the answer is yes.

#GivingTuesday is not strictly about money.

Then, there are those who are concerned about donor fatigue from being asked to donate repeatedly by hundreds of causes and bombarded on social channels. To them, I say, it hasn’t stopped people from celebrating Thanksgiving and over-indulging that day or stopped people from spending on things they really don’t need. GivingTuesday as a day to celebrate giving and caring provides a balance to all that consumerism that we usually kick off our holidays with. It is an alternative way, though in our face, to bring back the spirit of caring and giving to the holidays. I’d personally rather be tired from giving and making a difference than getting obese or spending beyond my means.

Celebrating the Broader Impact

Beth Kanter notes, “GivingTuesday founder Henry Timms and Aaron Sherinian and the #GT early leaders approached it with a true network mindset. They did not wish to prescribe how nonprofits, individuals, companies, and others should participate – but they held the space, facilitated connections, and provided the platform for the network to participate in the way that was the right fit to celebrate the day. They offered us a buffet of options – and allowed us to pick and choose how to celebrate.”

In other words, there are other ways to be of service.

For example, we at Social Media for Nonprofits did not fundraise this year. We opted instead to participate by amplifying and supporting our partners in their efforts, rather than competing with them.

It was a thoughtful and deliberate decision on our part to use our resources in this way, lending our voice and perspective to several conversations that were taking place in the sector – including a Google Hangout on Air hosted by the #GivingTuesday folks on Growth of Philanthropy Through Digital Media, a community conversation with NTEN (Nonprofit Technology Enterprise Network), and conversations with leaders like Beth Kanter and more.

We gave our full-fledged marketing support to our network and all nonprofits that reached out to us by tweeting their campaigns, retweeting and posting on FB on their behalves.

We expect to launch our own campaign in the spring to provide an opportunity for our community of event attendees, blog post readers, speakers, sponsors, partners and more to participate and support us so we can continue to be a resource to the sector.

We have no doubt that in this way the spirit of #GivingTuesday will continue to reach us and others throughout the year. And we’re celebrating that.

How did you do, nonprofits? Was #GivingTuesday all you hoped for and more? What strategies worked or didn’t work? Share your success with us!

—

Ritu Sharma is the CEO of Social Media for Nonprofits, an organization committed to bringing social media education to nonprofits worldwide. She speaks frequently around the world on a variety of topics in the nonprofit and social media spheres with a passion for effecting social change through social technologies. She blogs at the Huffington Post on the intersection of social media, social change and leadership and at Social Media for Nonprofits. Follow Ritu at here LinkedIn or on Twitter at @ritusharma1

The post Initial reports for #GivingTuesday indicate astounding success! appeared first on Socialbrite.

Leverage the power of #GivingTuesday to raise awareness & funds

Today charities, families, businesses and folks like you will come together to help create #GivingTuesday. This creates an opportunity to join a massive trending conversation on social media that will surely create more awareness for your cause.

How can your nonprofit join #GivingTuesday? After you become a #GivingTuesday partner, create a Partner Page to be featured on the GivingTuesday website.

Then use your existing social channels to tell your people about #GivingTuesday:

• Encourage your supporters to join the #GivingTuesday community.
• Email your people with sample tweets and Facebook updates they can use to talk about your cause. (Make sure you keep these short and sweet, and include the hashtag #GivingTuesday.)
• Tweet with the hashtag #GivingTuesday to drive people to your #GivingTuesday page.
• Create a few #GivingTuesday pictures you can post on your page with conditional sharing.
• Share these ideas with your sponsors and other local businesses.

Get more ideas on #GivingTuesday

Check out these ideas for local businesses and families, and see what other nonprofits are doing today. Share your ideas for #GivingTuesday below!

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