Digital fundraising is an excellent support channel for nonprofit organizations. There are three digital fundraising fundamentals: strong calls to action, optimized website donation pages, and search engine optimization. Nonprofits should test different digital fundraising tactics like email appeal content, donation page layouts, and language in calls to action. Testing can help nonprofits improve key metrics like conversion rates and donations. Facebook advertising showed promise for generating leads for gifts in wills through videos, with older donors responding well through mobile formats.

1. Let digital enhance your
fundraising
FIA Tasmania Forum 2021
Shanelle Newton Clapham
30 April 2021

2. On a mission

3. Who Am I?
• Exclusive Not-for-Profit sector
✔ We consult
✔ We educate
✔ We research
✔ We create
✔ We write

4. Digital is an excellent support channel
 For your organisation and
 For your fundraising Appeals
 For your Gift in Wills program

5. Digital Fundraising Fundamentals
 Strong calls to action within content
 Website donation pages
 Search

6. Fundamental #1
Strong calls to action

7. WWF Australia
Contextually relevant CTA within content

8. Takes supporter to a customised donation landing page
(different to main donate button)

10. Asylum Seeker Resource Centre
Ideally, you
wouldn’t
stack CTA’s
like this.

11. Calls to action within
Website content –
on MEDIA/ News articles,
on standard web pages.

12. Fundamental #2
Website donation pages

13.  Speed is key
 Easy is just as important as
fast
 Keep form fields to a minimum
 Suggest how much to donate (dollar handles)
 Give your donors payment options
 LOVE your donors and design the experience for THEM (not the org)

14. How to get more web donations?
Keep the form simple
Make it fast
Tell your organisation’s mission and provide the
solution on the donation page
Use visuals to tell your story
Make it secure
Say Thank You well
Build a relationship with your donor

15. The
Nature
Conservancy
Step 1
Step 2
Quick & Easy donation page
- Absolute minimum form fields

16. Social proof
+ visual
+ minimum
form fields
X ?

17. If you want more – download the research

https://parachutedigitalmarketing.com.au/
resources-and-free-stuff/

18. Fundamental #3
Search
 Organic
 Paid
 Grant

19. Why search?
Website
$ Donation $
93% of internet sessions in
Australia start with a Google search.

20. Search is the best digital INCOME
channel for all of these orgs (+
more)
1. Search
1. Organic
2. Paid
2. Email
3. SMS
4. Social
Search is
#1 for income
#1 for ROI
#1 for volume
#1 for average gift

21. Spend as much budget in
search as you can – then
delegate to other channels
Organic
Rank #1
#2
#3
#4
#5
#6
#7
Paid #1
#2
#3
#4

22. Paid #1
Organic
Rank #1
Organic

23. Search Ad
extensions

24. What you need to do
1. Keyword research
1. Searches by volume (per month)
2. Competition for a search ‘term’
3. Strategy – what you can rank for organically and what you
need to use Paid search for
2. Optimise your website for your “key” words
3. Audit/ Restructure or Set up Google Grant
(if you don’t have it - for brand + ‘owned’ terms)
4. Audit/ Restructure or Set up a PAID Google ads account
5. Assign budget and resource to manage it
6. Set KPIs and actually report on it and look at ROI.
Search is a long game! But worthwhile.

25. Appeals
 Email
 Personalisation
 Pre-filled forms
 Test

26. Send eDMs to your donors
Researcher:
23.6% Open rate
Only 2% CTR
But 22% CVR
134 donations
31% of total income
Researcher:
19.5% Open
5.5% CTR
33 donations
Amber:
19% Open
2.5% CTR
7 donations
Husband: 19% Open
2.75% CTR
8.9% CVR on send 1
16.5% CVR on resend
58 donations

27. Personalise it the same
way
you would in DM

28. Personalise the donation page
from the email

29. eAppeal Test Strategy
Christmas Appeal Test Plan
2020 Xmas
Appeal
TEST GOALS
Supporters feel positive about the communication
Inform Better Donor Segments for future appeals
More people engaging with the content
More people Clicking to the Donation Page
Increase Donation CVR%
More Donations

30. eAppeal – Test Plan x 6
Test early (first 2 emails) and apply winners
Metrics Context Assumptions & Instructions
Tests A B Winning Objective Hypothesis Outcome/ Results Notes
1 Theme Emotional Case Study
MS Research
(Science focus)
Donations/ Conversion Rate
Click through rate of Emails
Longer term MS Research donors and supporters have a closer connection
to MS as a disease and are more motivated by the research progress than
emotional case studies
Personalise content and ASK by donor
segment
a eDM1 - THANK YOU from Person From Researcher Open & Click through rate Test segment preference assumptions
Score response by segment to inform future
content
b Donations/ CVR %
People will give off a thank you message - but at a lower rate.
More people will click through with a soft ask (hyperlink only, no mention of
giving) than with "donate" button CTA
Insight into behaviour
c1
Funraisin Donation Page
(CARDS Layout)
from Person From Researcher Donations/ CVR %
Longer term MS Research donors and supporters have a closer connection to
MS as a disease and are more motivated by the research progress than
emotional case studies
Personalise LP and ASK by donor segment
c2 50/ 50 Layout Cards Layout Donations/ CVR % See below Test 2/ eDM2 Score response by segment to inform future LP
d
eDM2 - YOUR/ DONOR
IMPACT
from Person From Researcher Donations/ CVR % Personalise content and ASK by donor segment
2 Donation page Layout 50/ 50 Layout Cards Layout Donations/ CVR %
eDM2 - YOUR/ DONOR IMPACT from Person From Researcher Donations/ CVR %
3 Suggested ASKs No $ amount Personalised $ Asks
Donations/ Conversion Rate
Click through rate of Emails
Based on previous testing with other organisations, making a generic ASK
TO DONATE without a suggested amount, generated higher ave gifts than
when suggesting the gift array amounts based on their last gift
Score response by segment to inform future
email + LP tactics & personalisation
eDM3 - URGENT Research
timeline
4 Tone & Imagery LACK IMPACT Donations/ CVR %
Less "Happy" imagery and tone that shows the LACK of funding/ the
PROBLEM will perform better for Donations and income
eDM4 - We Need YOU Email Click through rate
Less "Happy" imagery and tone that shows the LACK of funding/ the
PROBLEM will perform better for Email click rates, as well as Donations and
income
5 # of emails sent
5 + resends
to unopens
3 - resend only
on key emails
Likelihood to donate improves
Insight into behaviour. Set future fundraising
approach & "rules"
P2P
MSRA Donors
RGs
GIW
Newsletter
Researchers
Channel
TEST
6 SMS Donations/ CVR %
A "conversational SMS" approach will deliver more donations than the
standard broadcast send approach
Validate the opportunity the SMS channel
offers to fundraising
SMS has performed poorly in the last 2 appeal tests. By trying a new tactic we want
to see if it’s a reluctance in the channel, or the approach?
Campaign Monitor Segments Why? These segmentswill get ALL communications
MSRA Christmas Appeal Test Plan
Tactic
Tactic
Insight into behaviour. Set future fundraising
approach & "rules"
2020 Xmas Appeal
TEST GOALS
Element
Very SOFT ask
The 50/ 50 Large image layout will work better for an emotional case study
The CARDS layout with more copy will work better for a research focused
audience
Supporters feel positive about the communication
Inform Better Donor Segments for future appeals
More people engaging with the content
More people Clicking to the Donation Page
Increase Donation CVR%
More Donations
MS Research - Christmas Appeal 2020
- Overall test is to understand donor segment preferences for type of content.
- Test approach by segment in first couple of communications to set baseline
- Use THANK YOU message with soft ask as a gentle way to launch the appeal and
test content approach with donor segments
- Remylination MS Research is the case for support
- Using Kaylene as Researcher and AMBER as person with MS case study
-
CARDS Layout has been used for the past 2 appeals and will set CVR benchmark.
Testing 50/ 50 layout goes nicely with the emotion vs science test.
Tactic
Conventional fundraising wisdom tells us that donors give more when the PROBLEM
or LACK is more pronounced (than if we show the positive solutions).
This can go against MS Research's brand and comms approach and needs to be
rigorously testing to set future Fundraising guidelines and philosophy.
Appeal
CONTENT
TEST
2020 Tax Appeal showed that more emails sent / opened increased the likelihood of a
person to donate. We want to re-test this, being mindful of insights of more
established donor segments not being used to high volumes of comms.
Longer term MS donors will respond better with less communications.
However, for the MAJORITY of people in the database - the more asks
made/ emails opened, will increase the overall likelihood to donate
Tactic
Conventional fundraising wisdom (in DM) is that suggested dollar amounts increase
conversions - but testing in digital does not confirm this
Score response by segment to inform future
LP
1. Person vs Research
2. Donation page
3. Tone & imagery
4. Dollar handles/ Ave $
5. # of emails/ comms
6. SMS

31. Test approach = BIG YoY Growth
MS Research Email income YoY Growth
Funraisin eAppeal
Xmas 2019 Tax 2020 Xmas 2020
YoY
Growth
Appeal Income $ 13,226.60 $17,383.25 $ 55,082.24 316%
# of Donations 100 149 416 316%
Ave Gift $ $ 132.27 $ 116.67 $ 132.41 0%
Conversion Rate %
6.0% 5.9% 12.4% 107%

32. Test: Donation page layout

33. Test: Dollar handles
Increase bottom ask < > Remove lowest $69 dollar amount
eDM4 resend – $170 ave gift >>
<< eDM4 – $85 ave gift

34. Leads for Gifts in Wills
 Prospecting in Facebook

35. GIW - Facebook audience reached
Remarketing to page visitors
Bequest look-a-like audience

36. GIW Lead creative
LONG VIDEO–
68 leads
CPL Total $26.73
LF Campaign Only:
66 leads
CPL $22.37
✘ DOREEN VIDEO–
5 leads
CPL Total $47.04
LF Campaign Only:
4 leads
CPL $48.55
✘ DOREEN STEEL–
4 leads
CPL Total $62.68
LF Campaign Only:
4 leads
CPL $52.88
✘ HELEN–
6 leads
CPL Total $47.32
LF Campaign Only:
4 leads
CPL $43.91

37. Message testing
Shared values ACF Mission
and Vision
ACF credibility

38.  Proof of Concept – YES
 Benchmarks set - YES
.
• Confirm call to action and medium
• ACF Mission & Vision
• Long-form video
• Lead Conversion Rate
• Cost per lead
• Validate target audience – 77% of leads were age 65+
• Validate channel strategy
• 95% of leads came from Facebook (not Instagram)
• Older donors ARE using mobile – 0.75% desktop leads VS 99.25%
mobile leads

39. That’s it! We’re done
Thank you 
Shanelle Newton Clapham
Shanelle@parachutedigital.com.au
0406 691 030
www.parachutedigital.com.au