0:00

This show is sponsored by Bloomerang, a solution that helps

0:03

nonprofits like Shower up, which is a nonprofit

0:07

providing mobile showers and personal care for those experiencing

0:10

homelessness to efficiently manage their volunteers and donors in

0:14

one place. And thanks to Bloomerang, Showerup increased their

0:17

volunteer signups by 60% and first

0:21

time donors by making it easy to give right on their site.

0:25

Showerups executive director Paul Schmidt said

0:29

Bloomerang is an ideal marriage of volunteer and donor management.

0:32

The deeper we get into it, the more we love it. And if you want

0:35

to see how Showerup easily manages their volunteers and

0:39

donors with Bloomerang, just go to

0:42

jcsocialmarketing.com

0:46

bloomerang. That's jcsocialmarketing.com

0:51

b l o o M e r a n

0:55

g or visit the link in the show notes to

0:59

learn more. All right, let's get to the show.

1:04

Hello and welcome to nonprofit Nation. I'm your host, Julia

1:08

Campbell, and I'm going to sit down with nonprofit industry

1:11

experts, fundraisers, marketers and everyone in

1:15

between to get real and discuss what it takes to

1:18

build that movement that you've been dreaming of. I created

1:22

the nonprofit nation podcast to share practical wisdom and

1:26

strategies to help you confidently find your voice,

1:30

definitively grow your audience, and effectively build your

1:34

movement. If you're a nonprofit newbie or an experienced

1:37

professional who's looking to get more visibility, reach more

1:41

people, and create even more impact, then you're in the

1:44

right place. Let's get started.

1:53

Hello. Hi everyone. Welcome back. Or welcome to

1:57

Nonprofit Nation. So excited to have you here today on the

2:00

podcast. And the question we are discussing, we're

2:04

answering, we're unpacking, how can we build

2:07

deeper relationships with our corporate

2:10

partners? And how can we expand our corporate

2:14

partnership program? How can we cultivate them? How can we

2:17

attract them? How can we just really engage them

2:21

in what we're doing to create even more impact?

2:25

And my guest today is Matt Nash, based in

2:29

North Carolina. Matt previously served as the senior

2:32

vice president of marketing and donor experience for fidelity

2:36

charitable. He's now executive director of the

2:39

Blackbaud Giving Fund, the charitable arm of Blackbaud,

2:43

which is the cloud computing provider that serves nonprofits,

2:46

foundations, schools and other social change

2:50

organizations. And the Blackbaud Giving fund has safely

2:53

dispersed over $1.6 billion

2:57

from generous donors to over 195,000

3:01

nonprofits around the globe and offers resources to

3:05

nonprofits to support their fundraising goals. That

3:09

is just absolutely incredible. So, Matt, welcome to the

3:12

podcast. Thank you. It's my pleasure to be here. Yes. So

3:16

we were talking about your hobby of woodworking.

3:20

But my guests, they probably love to hear about that. But I would love to

3:23

hear about your nonprofit journey, how you got into the

3:27

sector and how you got involved with Blackbaud.

3:31

So all careers have all kinds of moving

3:34

parts and changes to them. Mine was in

3:38

financial services for 25 years, much of that at fidelity

3:42

investments. And toward the end of the time that I was with Fidelity,

3:45

I joined the senior team of the big

3:49

philanthropic group that they have called Fidelity charitable, which is the largest

3:52

donor advised fund. And that's why you lived in Boston for so long. You said

3:56

I lived in Boston. Exactly. I didn't get the connection. Fidelity's in Boston. Okay. Yeah.

3:59

Yeah. So when I left Fidelity,

4:03

I was involved with a large philanthropic project that I actually

4:07

am still involved with, where we were looking to try to understand

4:11

why the number of people in America are giving has been going down for

4:14

the last generation and what we can do to turn that around.

4:18

And as part of that, I met some folks from Blackbaud, and they were going

4:22

to be opening up this donor advise fund that they had

4:26

actually outsourced that activity before, and they wanted to bring it in

4:29

house. And so I joined them to start the Blackbaud giving

4:33

fund back in August of 2020. You named some of the

4:37

statistics that we've done since. So it's tied to

4:40

Blackbaud's product that does workplace giving,

4:44

offers it to corporations all across the United States.

4:48

And the biggest part of what we do is to take the funds

4:52

in from those workplace giving

4:55

programs and move them to the charities of the choice

4:59

of where the employees want to send them, from financial services

5:02

to the donor advice fund sponsored fidelity

5:06

going way off on the philanthropic project itself

5:10

to understand more about how this whole ecosystem works and

5:14

what we can do to change it. And then coming back to

5:17

operating a group again, that feels good to me, to be able

5:21

to do the kind of good that we do every day. I love that.

5:24

So we should definitely talk about fundraising

5:28

statistics and sort of the outlook for

5:32

this year. But one statistic that I

5:35

found that's related to our topic today, two thirds of

5:39

Americans say they donate money to charitable causes,

5:43

and 26 million people work for companies

5:47

that offer company match programs to

5:50

employees. So in your opinion,

5:54

how do the statistics around charitable

5:58

donations a role in shaping the landscape for

6:01

fundraisers? And what role do you see company match

6:05

programs playing? Yeah. So we've

6:09

all seen the statistics, and particularly in this project that I worked

6:12

on, it's not recent. I mean, the decline in

6:16

donors has been going on for literally a generation, since before

6:19

2000. And that's not stopping. The

6:23

numbers keep showing that the number of people in

6:26

America that give declines every year, and I think it

6:30

declined again in 2022 when giving us a

6:34

producer report. But I think some of it's

6:38

been hidden because the wealthy donors have kind of made up for

6:41

that. So if you just look at the funds flowing through, and you

6:45

only looked at how much money was coming into the

6:48

nonprofit sector from individuals up until

6:52

2023, it was growing every year. And mainly that was

6:55

because the wealthy were making up for what was going on

6:59

underneath with the average donor people, just

7:03

average citizen not being as active as they were in the

7:06

past. So I think we're kind of at a

7:10

crossroads here, because 2023, at least if it wasn't a blip, was

7:13

the first time that the wealthy didn't overcome the

7:17

volume of people giving on a smaller way. And it

7:21

creates a challenge, I think, for all of us to say, well, how do we,

7:24

how do we do this? And at the same time, we're up to over

7:28

1.4 million charities in America that are registered with the I.

7:33

If you go back 20 years, that was less than a million. So there's more

7:36

and more and more charities that are looking to do good

7:40

in the world and fewer donors.

7:43

And what I come down to is, as I've looked at this is, to

7:47

me, a lot of giving is reactionary.

7:51

Your friend is doing a run. They send you a note and say, hey, would

7:55

you sponsor my run for me? And you do that. I think what

7:59

we need is more intentional giving, where somebody is picking

8:02

out a cause that's important to them. They're finding a charity

8:06

that, or multiple charities that do

8:10

those things and create the kind of outcomes that society

8:13

needs. And they become more invested, they become

8:17

more engaged. I don't call it strategic, I call it intentional. They think

8:21

about it. It's something that they proactively do.

8:24

And I think there's some sources of giving

8:28

that naturally lend themselves to intentional giving.

8:31

One is a lot of nonprofits go to

8:35

sustainers. They try to build more sustainers. Well, what is a sustainer? A

8:38

sustainer is somebody who's intentional about giving to that particular charity.

8:42

Yes, they do it every month. That's got to be intentional. It's

8:46

important to them. Donor advise funds are another

8:49

situation, because they put the money into this account to get

8:53

it to be charitable funds, and then they take a second step

8:57

and decide where they want to give it. I always talk about use of

9:01

donor advised funds is there's two decisions the donor makes. One is

9:04

the head decision, getting the tax deduction and figuring out what

9:08

funds you're going to put away for a given. And then there's the heart decision,

9:12

which is which now, which causes are important to me, which charities

9:16

are important to me. And then when they use the fund to do that, they're

9:19

basically exhibiting this, what I call intentional behavior. And then the

9:23

third one that we've seen as I've gotten involved with the

9:27

workplace giving is from the workplace. And the idea

9:30

there is that there's two reasons why a company

9:34

would want to get involved with this. One is they're trying to get employees

9:38

that are more engaged so they can have employees be

9:41

retained. That's just a key component. And that's generational as

9:45

well. That's generational, absolutely. Because

9:48

70% of employees say they would like to work for a company

9:52

that has purpose. And so if you

9:56

match that 70% of the workers that are

9:59

looking for some sense of purpose, the idea of having

10:03

a workplace giving program matches that pretty well, because now the

10:07

company can support people's causes more broadly, but

10:11

also target things that represent what the company thinks

10:14

itself thinks is important. Which is the second reason why somebody does

10:18

workplace giving is more. It's more brand loyalty, it's more

10:22

brand awareness. It's their stake in the communities

10:25

that they operate in, because they're trying to demonstrate that

10:29

they provide good or purpose to

10:33

a broader sense than just what might happen to be the product that

10:37

they're selling. So an employee that's joining the workplace

10:40

giving, often, number one, they're younger than the average

10:44

donor that most nonprofits have, because they're like, the

10:48

average age of american employee today is 38.

10:52

I didn't know that. I'm taking a lot of notes. Okay. Average

10:56

age of the american employee is 38. Okay,

11:00

38. Right. And I know that with most

11:04

nonprofits out there, looked at their database and said, well, how old is my average

11:07

donor? 50 or north of

11:11

that. And so there's a good opportunity

11:15

here. There's 30 million people that are involved in these

11:18

programs. Maybe you said 26. Yeah. There's

11:22

no definitive number, but they're in somewhere in that

11:25

area that are participating in these programs. They're

11:29

younger. Many of them are doing something intentional

11:33

about giving for the first time. Up until this, they've been

11:36

reacting, and now they're in the workplace,

11:40

and they get involved with the give back week, and there's

11:44

programs that they can jump into, volunteer projects

11:48

that they can work on with their coworkers, and they're getting

11:52

involved. They're doing it collaboratively with their

11:55

coworkers, so they're getting some social aspect back from it,

11:59

which is important since we've had COVID and we've all been working

12:03

holed up in our offices. But then they're also learning about these

12:06

nonprofits and learning how sophisticated they are and what great work that they do,

12:10

and they're beginning to get engaged. And so

12:14

from my perspective, the workplace giving is that third point

12:18

of finding more intentional givers, and the benefit of finding

12:22

younger givers who have the means to give and can grow into

12:25

your mid and major gift donors as time goes on.

12:29

So interesting and so important to understand, because

12:33

in my line of work, where I work with organizations

12:37

on digital fundraising and social media, they're

12:41

always saying to me, where can we find younger donors? Where can we find younger

12:44

donors? And this seems to me to be like an untapped

12:47

pool of people that you just said,

12:51

70% want to work for a company that has

12:54

purpose. People want to be more intentional, and they want to

12:58

be less reactionary. And I completely

13:02

agree with that. And also, it's very generational. I think

13:05

nonprofits tend to treat all of their pools of

13:08

donors the same. So they would treat their silent generation,

13:12

baby boomer donors the same as they would their younger

13:16

millennials or their Gen Z donors. And it seems

13:19

clear that we need to have a different approach. Another point

13:23

I wanted to make, because it is a point I always make, is you talked

13:26

about the heart giving and the head giving.

13:30

And I always reference Aristotle, which might

13:33

seem very literally antiquated, but

13:37

Aristotle talks about ethos, pathos, and

13:40

logos as the only way to influence

13:44

someone. And it's exactly what you're talking about. You need

13:47

credibility, you need logic, and you need heart. Like, you need

13:51

that emotion. So I think I completely agree with you that

13:55

donors, there are a lot of donors that are looking not just

13:59

for that reactionary heart feeling.

14:02

They're also looking for that sort of logical conclusion

14:06

to give as well. Yeah, they want whatever resources

14:10

they have, whether it be talent or money, they

14:14

want it to be able to create an outcome, to create an impact, make

14:17

good. To me, that's the purpose side of what they're

14:21

doing. They want the world to be a better place. They

14:25

want their efforts to do it to show up as being,

14:28

hey, I'm making a difference here. Okay.

14:32

So we kind of talked about the why. Definitely, we gave nonprofits

14:36

some food for thought around why this is important.

14:40

But could you outline, I mean, don't to give us too much

14:44

detail. I don't want to put you on the spot that you have to memorize

14:46

all of this, but can you outline you talk about the

14:50

five and key engagement tactics that

14:53

nonprofits can employ to build and nurture

14:57

relationships with donors who have access

15:01

to corporate match programs? So can you talk maybe about

15:04

some of the key engagement tactics? Sure. Yeah. Let me just sort

15:08

of summarize them, and we can dive into any details that

15:12

we go forward. I think there's just some, what I call key

15:16

engagement tactics. Yes. The first one

15:19

is, if you're a nonprofit, is to make sure that

15:23

your cause is aligned with what the corporate

15:27

social mission is that builds

15:30

connectivity and builds purpose between the

15:33

corporation and you. It would also open their eyes to who

15:37

you are because they would recognize that you're in line with

15:41

what is important to them. So that's 1 second

15:44

is because they're looking for employee

15:48

engagement. Creating great volunteer opportunities here is

15:51

key. And I know volunteering is not an easy thing for

15:55

nonprofits to manage because it's very complicated. But the

15:59

more that you have very interesting volunteer

16:02

opportunities for these employees to participate in, the

16:06

greater chance you're going to have for getting that engagement with both

16:10

at the corporation and engagement with you. Third is to

16:13

partner with the company and learn together, and we can talk a little bit more

16:17

about how to start with the companies. But what I've seen

16:21

in corporate partnerships that we're involved with

16:25

is that corporations get their employees involved with helping manage

16:28

it, because at the very top of these corporate social

16:31

responsibility organizations, there's very few people. So they have

16:35

to leverage the employees to get going. As you work with

16:39

these nonprofits and have your give back week or even

16:42

an ongoing thing throughout the year, you don't get it right the first time.

16:46

But if the nonprofit can work together with the company,

16:50

they each get better at this, and it creates more

16:54

engagement and more volunteer hours and more money will

16:58

flow. The fourth is to communicate your cause and impact. And

17:01

we just kind of talked about that, right. Employees are interested

17:05

in the purpose and the impact. It's

17:08

really important for the nonprofit to be able to articulate what that

17:12

is and make it visible to those

17:15

employees. And it could be as simple as make sure your

17:18

candid profile is up to date, because many of these programs

17:22

will import data from aggregators like

17:25

Candid to show the employees what

17:29

options that they've got. And maybe LinkedIn. Yeah,

17:32

yeah, LinkedIn. It's candid. It's charity

17:36

navigator. It's on your social media, help

17:40

people understand who you are and what you're about on your website, same

17:44

thing. Make sure it's all up to date. A consistent theme, and up to

17:47

date throughout. Throughout. Then once

17:51

you're communicating, the fifth would be steward the

17:54

relationships. Recognize the employees that

17:58

joined your cause, and they show

18:02

up in your databases. If they don't show up in your databases,

18:06

they show up in the databases of these organizations, like the Blackbaud Giving

18:10

Fund, that are the ones that send the funds to

18:13

the charity. We all have platforms that

18:17

inform the nonprofit, what

18:20

company was involved and which employees were involved, and

18:24

the contact information of the employees. So it's your

18:28

chance to, once you discover them, is to

18:31

begin thanking them, understanding more about them, inviting

18:35

them back in. All the stuff that nonprofits know how to do really well,

18:38

but know that we're the sources, know that they came through this

18:43

workplace program. So I think my next question would

18:46

be sort of where to start. So how do we find

18:50

these companies that are aligned with our mission? Yeah,

18:54

that's a really good question. So, like, let's say here in Chapel

18:58

Hill, North Carolina, where I am, there's a triangle of three

19:01

cities, Raleigh Durham and Chapel Hill. And right in the middle of it, there's this

19:05

thing called the research Triangle park. There's literally hundreds of companies,

19:09

most of them high tech companies, that are working there. They may not have

19:12

their headquarters there, but they got big operations. And so if I

19:16

were a charity in this area, the first thing

19:20

I would do is start looking at what these companies do

19:24

and get a sense of, are there things that would likely line

19:27

up with me? And then you can go in under their annual reports,

19:31

they all talk about their social mission. It's particularly

19:35

in the last couple of years, from, let's say, 2021 through

19:38

2023, almost every annual report

19:42

has a component in there about what their social mission is.

19:45

And you can see what they're all about and what they're trying to accomplish. And

19:49

that gives you a sense of, okay, am I lined up with that

19:53

approach? Would there be a connection there? A

19:56

lot of them even produce, literally, a corporate social

20:00

responsibility report that they'll publish. And

20:04

you can read in depth all the things, all the things that they do. So

20:06

I think, to me, that's a starting point. And then

20:10

to look at your own donors and say, do I have any donors that

20:14

work for those companies and go through those

20:17

donors? Or you could literally contact the firm and say,

20:21

who's managing the corporate social responsibility programs in your

20:25

firm? And there's usually a department, might be a small department, but

20:29

they'll, you know, you'll get the email and you can, you can say, here's what

20:32

we do. Here's what we're thinking about, and introduce yourself. So

20:36

they're, they're more aware of who you are. They

20:39

are all searching for voluntary

20:42

opportunities because. And they can't, you know,

20:46

create them themselves because it's like three people that might be handling

20:50

volunteer activities for a company of 100,000. I mean, it's literally that

20:54

kind of scale that we're talking about. And so the more that they can

20:57

understand what programs can be offered to their employees

21:01

and which ones match, I think that's a really good place to start because

21:05

they're dying for great ideas because they want to get their people engaged.

21:09

I have an example. When I was a development director, I worked

21:13

at a domestic violence shelter, pretty small, you know, under 5

21:16

million budget, in Norfolk, Virginia.

21:20

And we were looking for

21:24

grants, and we actually found that

21:27

target. I'm not sure if this is true now. That was a while

21:31

ago, but they supported programs around domestic

21:34

violence prevention, outreach and support. And we

21:38

actually really built a great relationship with the local target. But as

21:42

part of that, they wanted more than

21:45

just, you know, providing a check. They really did want some

21:49

kind of volunteer opportunity, whether it was painting or whether it

21:53

was providing supplies for a birthday party

21:56

or obviously, they could not necessarily come and work, like inside the

22:00

shelter unless they went through our training and our orientation,

22:03

but they were willing to schlep furniture

22:07

around or take in kind donations and bring them back and

22:11

forth. So having that, like, thinking through

22:15

what can these employees do that's going to connect them to the

22:19

mission? This is not about exploiting clients. I

22:23

think a lot of my listeners might have

22:26

that misconception. We're not going to parade around our

22:29

clients to these corporate employees, but it is more

22:33

thinking strategically and intentionally about what are some of the things

22:37

that they could do or help out with or participate

22:40

in that are going to be a good fit for both the

22:44

company but also both the nonprofit. And that's

22:48

the key. And when we talk with our clients about

22:52

what real success looks like, they always say it's

22:56

an engagement that improves my employees

22:59

life, gives them some skills, gives them an opportunity to

23:03

enjoy what they're doing. There's all kinds of things about that that

23:07

say, that improve and also help the

23:10

nonprofit with something that they needed to do. And if you can combine those

23:14

two, then you've got the right kind of volunteer

23:17

activity. Yes. So to review the engagement

23:21

tactics, we have, number one, make sure that it's

23:24

aligned. Your mission and vision and values are

23:28

aligned with the corporate social mission,

23:31

where let's not just say, oh, this is a big company, they should give

23:34

us money. Right. If it does align

23:38

and you send the corporate social responsibility person an

23:42

email, it's gonna resonate with them. Yes. Right. And that's step

23:46

one. You gotta get their interest. And then if it doesn't

23:49

align, it's okay. Then we just move on to the next one.

23:54

The volunteer opportunities is number two. We talked about

23:57

three, partner and learn together.

24:02

Do you want to elaborate more on that? Is that more sort of like developing

24:06

these partnerships together, rather than just us coming

24:09

and saying, here's what we want? I think there's two things to it. There's a

24:13

planning component to it which allows you to get

24:17

engaged and figure out how to work with the company in terms

24:20

of what are we going to offer. A lot of times what happens is that

24:24

they put the responsibility to an employee

24:27

volunteer who has been doing this for four or five

24:31

years and has learned how to run these

24:35

programs. And so you do some planning with them, and

24:38

then the big part is afterwards you debrief and you say, what worked? What

24:42

didn't work, what could we do differently next time? Because then two things

24:46

will happen. One, you'll get better. Two is there'll be a next time, right. Because

24:50

you're already planning for the following year. So that's what we mean

24:54

by working together, because as time goes on, then

24:57

they're able to get more people engaged. You might be able

25:01

to balance. What if you ran an

25:05

effort and you got way too many volunteers that came that time and you got

25:09

overloaded? Well, let's adjust that and make sure that it's going

25:12

to work better next time. Those are the things that you just learn as

25:16

you go. And I think it's just an important part to just have a learning

25:19

loop in any of these activities that you do. I love that. Playing the

25:23

long game, not just saying, let's just get a check this

25:27

year, like not making it transactional. And actually, I think that speaks to

25:30

a lot of fundraising practices. You know, let's play the long

25:34

game. Let's make it more of a partnership, let's make it more

25:37

intentional, and let's figure out how we can create this

25:41

relationship long term. And then number four is probably my favorite.

25:45

Communicate impact, make it visible. What are

25:49

some ways that we can communicate impact in this kind of partnership and

25:52

relationship? Well, one way is a lot of

25:56

times corporations themselves help you do that because they're

26:00

trying to also demonstrate how, what kind of impact

26:03

that they're having. So they do these CSR reports.

26:07

They want to put a story in there to say what kind of impact that

26:11

they had. So I think it's as simple as

26:14

helping people know. Okay, how are you

26:18

carrying out your mission? What good are you doing in the

26:21

communities that you're working in? You know, if you're, you know,

26:25

running up a food bank, how many families

26:29

are you helping? And it's not rocket science. It's just the

26:33

basic things that you're doing that can demonstrate to people

26:36

that you're making an impact in the community. Yep.

26:40

Because that's what the corporations want to be able to do. Because they want to

26:44

be able to tell others that they were involved and helped those

26:47

organizations do that. Absolutely. And let's not

26:51

overthink it as nonprofits. I'm the worst overthinker in the

26:55

world. I know a lot of nonprofits overthink

26:58

how to communicate impact. But let's just keep it simple.

27:02

Let's make it easy for our company partners, our

27:05

corporate partners, to communicate it out to the employees. Let's not

27:09

overcomplicate it. Okay. And then stewarding the

27:13

relationship is, number five, what are some either examples

27:17

or maybe some tips that you have, like, how do we keep this relationship going

27:20

and stop it from maybe turning stale? Or how do we

27:24

just really keep it fresh and inspiring? Yeah. Well,

27:28

you have a list of volunteers that work with you. Yes. So

27:31

those people should be a list that you're following up with and

27:35

talking to and. And keeping them engaged in volunteering,

27:39

because they might then come back and volunteer outside the corporate event thing.

27:42

Right. Maybe they'll be on your board. Maybe they'll, you know,

27:46

run the event committee or something. Right, right, exactly. They also

27:50

have a lot of coworkers that go back and talk

27:53

about their experience and, you know, so you

27:57

could learn, begin to learn more about how just helping

28:01

them articulate your story to their

28:04

network. So you're getting to know. To know them a little

28:08

bit better, and then you're putting them into

28:12

an ongoing process of how can they support

28:15

you over the long haul, which then gets you into the

28:19

standard kind of stewardship things that nonprofits have been

28:23

doing for a long time. But the key is to recognize who they are and

28:26

how they came to you. Who they are and how they came to you.

28:30

They came to you. Right. Because if they came through the workplace,

28:34

remember, that's a more intentional person than if they

28:38

reacted to an email that they got at the end of the

28:42

year, right? Absolutely. They're already

28:45

predisposed toward helping you. This

28:48

relates so much to a lot of what I teach,

28:52

where if someone is running like a peer to peer

28:55

fundraiser. So, for instance, my friend Maggie is

28:59

doing the pan mass challenge and raising money. And I

29:03

gave Maggie money because I love Maggie.

29:06

She's raising money, you know, to support cancer research because of her

29:10

niece. It's like her story, her journey. Not that I wouldn't support

29:14

the pan mask challenge, but if they came to me,

29:18

I would be more inclined to look the other way. So

29:21

with that, it's reactionary giving,

29:25

but there's an opportunity for this organization

29:29

to cultivate me in an intentional way. But I

29:33

agree with you. I think we tend to lump all donors in

29:37

the same pool. But what you just said is

29:40

who they are and how they came to

29:44

you is so vital. And we

29:48

need to really understand that if we're going to increase

29:52

donor retention in any way. Would you agree with that? Recognize who they are and

29:55

then begin to understand those behaviors of those, of that

29:59

type of donor, and then treat them along those ways

30:03

and then it will grow? Well, okay, another

30:07

statistic we're going to. I want to talk about donor retention just for a minute,

30:10

because I think it really fits in with what we're talking

30:14

about is how to attract younger donors. How do

30:17

we reach new donors? How do we cultivate

30:21

this next generation? How do we build more individual donors? Because we

30:25

can see that it's kind of decimated across the sector. The

30:29

donor retention rate is really pretty

30:32

pathetically bad. Okay, so we know, I mean, 40,

30:36

between 40 and 45%. And

30:40

then I read, I believe, on the Blackbaud giving

30:43

fund blog, 23% of donors

30:47

churn just six months after their first donation, which

30:50

means almost 70% of donors give

30:54

only once to an organization. So

30:58

how can we encourage ongoing support from our donors?

31:02

I come back to this. Who's reactionary and who's

31:06

intentional? If I were running a nonprofit,

31:09

which I'm involved with, a couple of them at the board level, the

31:13

first thing I do is let's talk to the people that are intentional with

31:17

us, and let's make sure that they're good,

31:21

that they're staying with us, and that if they have more to

31:24

give, let's work that, because I think that's step

31:28

one. And then step two is to look for

31:32

other areas where you can find intentional donors.

31:36

And that's why I like the workplace, because I think it

31:39

is a source of, of new

31:42

donors that may not be intentional. Now

31:46

to you because they don't know about you, but they're getting

31:49

involved because they want to be involved.

31:53

Remember, they. 70% of people want to work for a company that has a social

31:57

purpose. They want to be participating then in that social purpose.

32:01

So I think that, you know, there's no magic

32:04

bullet here for nonprofits can do this. And I know there's

32:08

tons of different great strategies that fundraisers have

32:12

been put together with online, social media and all those

32:16

kinds of things. But I kind of look at the human side of

32:19

it, and I'm looking for how do we find people that can be

32:23

intentional? And that's why I like the workplace giving. I also like

32:27

daft giving. If you find a daft giver that's in

32:31

your database, boy, they should be somebody you should go after

32:34

because they made a proactive decision to give to you,

32:38

and they have money banked to give

32:42

again. Right. And so those are intentional givers that

32:46

are people that should be heavy in the stewardship

32:50

process because you got a better chance of developing

32:53

relationship with them. Oh, absolutely. The person that

32:57

supported their friend in the pan master. I love it. So really thinking

33:00

through, we love our reactionary

33:04

givers. We love them, we support them, but we can't

33:07

build our foundation on reactionary giving. That's, I think, what the mind

33:11

shift change that needs to happen, we need to start

33:15

building our infrastructure with the intentional givers,

33:19

stewarding them, cultivating them, communicating with them.

33:23

This is really, I'm just, my wheels are turning here. I think this

33:27

is a total culture shift from what we've been

33:30

doing and from what we feel

33:34

like might be the easiest solution. Acquiring new

33:38

donors, attracting new donors, fundraising on social media. Like, let's just

33:41

get that quick donation. Sure. To keep the lights on. That's very

33:45

important to get the reactionary givers, but we cannot

33:49

sustain it. We cannot sustain what we're doing without the intentional

33:52

givers. So we need to look for the pockets of them as

33:56

well. Yeah. Here's an idea. Come up with a metric for what's the retention

34:00

of your intentional donors. I love that

34:03

idea. That might be a better metric for us.

34:07

It won't be the full amount that you're raising, but there's a. It's a

34:10

core, right? It's a core that you can depend on. Yeah. And this is

34:14

why I kind of have an issue with the donor retention numbers. I think

34:18

that a lot of us give because

34:22

there are emergencies, or we might give because

34:25

there's something in the news, or we might give because we feel very passionately

34:29

about a cause that has gotten a lot of headlines or maybe it's political

34:33

season or whatever it might be. Sure, we're not going to give to

34:37

that year after year after year because it might just not be

34:40

feasible. But how are we, as

34:44

the small little bootstrapping nonprofits, the local

34:48

community nonprofits, looking at their donors, really

34:51

looking at like, who are the long term ones? How can we

34:55

keep them so just be more strategic overall,

34:59

unless just kind of fly by night? I'll share

35:03

one more, another statistic with you, and this is true in the donor advice

35:06

fund area, too. Over half, or about half,

35:10

maybe slightly over half of workplace givers, or even deaf

35:14

donors give locally, and they give about half of what they

35:17

give locally. They'll, you know, they'll support their alma mater and some other

35:21

large, you know, like the crisis of the day and that

35:25

kind of thing. But they all like to focus locally,

35:29

and that's an important thing, too, because a lot of, as you described, the

35:33

smaller, you know, bootstrap nonprofits, they're going to depend on

35:36

local donors. Absolutely. But the good news is that most of

35:40

the donors want to focus locally.

35:43

Absolutely. Well, this has really been, it's

35:47

been kind of eye opening for me. I love that what

35:51

we're talking about can really be data driven.

35:54

And there are ways to become more,

35:58

I guess, on our side, the nonprofit side, more intentional and

36:02

less reactionary. And really look at

36:06

where people are, where they came from, what are their passions?

36:10

How are they giving? When are they giving? Who are they giving to?

36:14

What spurred them to give? And looking for trends

36:18

and seeing how we can reach these really

36:21

untapped pools of donors like we're talking about in the workplace

36:25

giving programs or the corporate sponsorship programs. These are, I

36:28

think, not as tapped resources

36:32

as a lot of organizations are looking to.

36:36

They send their annual appeal letter. They preach to the choir, if you will, which

36:39

I think you should. But we should always be looking outward for some

36:43

new audiences to reach. So I really appreciate it.

36:46

Matt, where can people reach you? Where can they learn

36:50

more about your work and connect with

36:54

you? Our website for the Black Belt Gaming Fund is

36:58

full of information. We're getting more. We just launched a

37:01

blog last year, and we're adding to

37:05

content to it all the time. It's blackbaud

37:08

baud givingfund.org dot.

37:12

Blackbodgivingfund.org dot. Fantastic. That's so just really,

37:16

really helpful. Thank you for coming on and sharing all of this

37:19

fantastic advice with us. Been my pleasure. It's

37:23

been fun. Well, hey there. I wanted to say thank you for tuning into my show

37:34

and for listening all the way to the end. If you really enjoyed

37:37

today's conversation, make sure to subscribe to the show in your favorite

37:41

podcast app, and you'll get new episodes downloaded as soon as they

37:45

come out. I would love if you left me a rating or a review,

37:49

because this tells other people that my podcast is worth

37:53

listening to, and then me and my guests can reach even more earbuds

37:56

and create even more impact. So that's pretty much it. I'll

38:00

be back soon with a brand new episode, but until then, you can

38:04

find me on Instagram. Uliacambel 77

38:08

keep changing the world, you nonprofit unicorn.