5 Ways To Boost Church Donations At The End-Of-Year

It’s that time of the year again when you and your peers work to cap off your annual donation revenue.  Donors give about $48 billion during November and December every year.

If you aren’t already planning, then your donation efforts could fall short.

Thankfully, there’s still time to plan! And with these 5 tips you can boost church donations & you’ll end this year’s fundraising campaign with a bang!

1. Modernize your fundraising system with online donation

We cannot repeat it enough: adaptation is the key!

More than 760 million Americans were predicted to make online payments in 2020- a habit that is firmly rooted in our daily lives. Online payment has also been invited for several years in fundraising.

For donors, the advantages of online donation are obvious: no more checks to sign and letters to send: the donation is made in seconds, from a computer or even on a mobile, safely.

Best of all, online payment for your association will greatly facilitate the management of donations – your account manager will certainly thank you!

2. Update the home page of your website

The website of your church is a real asset for your communication. You can share information about your mission, your events, your members and other important activities. You can also let your donors know how to make the donation and who is your payment processor.
It may sound obvious, but don’t forget to make your giving link accessible from your top of the page!

Potential donors who visit your website should easily find the link to the donation form on your website. For this, nothing could be easier than inserting a button on your website. Prefer a button with a bright color, possibly with an effect to attract the eye.

3. Appeal to your former donors

If you’ve ever done a fundraiser, I hope you’ve kept your list of past donors carefully! GiveCentral lets you manage your donor and donation information- all at one place with pre-built performance reports that you can access right at your dashboard.

Take this list and build on it: rewrite to your donors in order to boost church donations this year as well.
These generous people have donated to your church in the past. It is therefore a safe bet that your mission still interests them.

GiveCentral users have access to smart token emails for Christmas and year end fundraising that the parish can send to help increase participation in Christmas giving. Smart Token buttons that are included in the message are linked directly to the donor’s GiveCentral account so there is no need to remember login information. They can take immediate action. Find out more by logging in your GiveCentral account.

4. Relay the information on your social networks

According to the Non Profit Tech for Good report , 25% of donors say social media is the most popular communication tool for them to donate.
So I’m not teaching you anything by telling you that social networks are your precious allies when you need to communicate.

It’s hard to imagine that donations will flow in without communication. As for your website, relay your campaign on your social networks through an event communication campaign.

5. Send a thank you email after fundraising

When it comes to giving, “Thank you” is at least as important as “Please”. Being thanked is an integral part of the donor’s journey.

Once the donation has been received, express your gratitude and send an email to your donor to thank them for their generosity .

If you have many donors, you obviously don’t have to send a personalized email to each of them! For example, you can very easily automate emailing campaigns with GiveCentral to thank them.

Your thank you email can hide other levers to boost your church donations at the end of the year.

A simple example: you can encourage your donor to forward the link to your fundraising campaign to their contacts sensitive to your cause or to share it on social networks. This is how virality is born.

Your thank you email is also an opportunity to engage your donors over time. For example, invite them to subscribe to your newsletter to follow the progress of your projects.

You can also register your donors in your GiveCentral donor management software. That way, identifying them and getting back to them for your next fundraiser will be a snap! Finally, if you have few donors but they greatly help your church, take a look at our article to find out how to retain your major donors .

Over to you now, we wish you success in your campaign!

We wanted to share a brief overview of our recent GivingTuesday results….. Community donation blitz! Archdiocese of Cincinnati raises more than $ 1.4 million with GiveCentral on Giving Tuesday

This was done using GiveCentral’s Crowdfunding platform. Reach out to us at support to get started with your own custom fundraising campaigns.