Charities of all kinds have been forced to rethink the way they deliver their missions and connect with supporters because of Covid-19.
On May 5, many groups will hitch their appeals and messages to #GivingTuesdayNow, a special flash fundraising day to encourage donations and generosity of all kinds in response to the pandemic.
Announced just five weeks in advance, the nonprofit GivingTuesday and its global network of community leaders hope the day will bring people together while helping nonprofits recover revenue losses and meet increased demand for services caused by the pandemic.
Asha Curran, CEO of Giving Tuesday, said people are looking for ways to help, so they will appreciate the direction of the daylong focus on giving. But she said the effort also was designed to reinforce the importance of collaboration.
“We hope that organizations will be able to use this day as a moment to rally additional support, a moment to link arms with other organizations,” she said.
What’s more, she said, she hopes the day makes “a broader statement about the importance of the nonprofit economy, too often forgotten when we talk about the sectors that are suffering from this crisis.”
GivingTuesday was started eight years ago as a kickoff to year-end giving. Typically it is held following the big shopping days of Black Friday and CyberMonday.
While many groups use the day to encourage donations, others focus on volunteering, thanking supporters, and telling stories about their work. Curran said she hopes people will use next Tuesday that way, too.
“If it nets funds, terrific. And if it doesn’t, you’ve used the day as a megaphone and a focal point to tell your story.”
Making Up for Lost Revenue
Some groups had already started organizing Covid-related giving days ahead of GivingTuesday’s announcement.
GiveMN, a giving platform and organization that helps Minnesota nonprofits build fundraising capacity and organizes an annual giving day in November, had been holding Zoom calls with nonprofits to help them adjust their fundraising strategies to the new reality of changing needs, canceled spring fundraising events, or losses in revenue from theater performances, gift-shop sales, and other activities.
The group recognized that charities in its network would benefit from having a spring giving drive.
“We started hearing a very consistent drum of organizations needing a reason to engage with their donors that allowed them flexibility and allowed them some justification to build a campaign that they could fit a number of different messages under,” said Jake Blumberg, executive director of GiveMN.
#GiveAtHomeMN will take place from May 1 through 8, overlapping with #GivingTuesdayNow. US Bank and the Bush Foundation provided $68,000 in bonus grants to encourage donors to give.
Participating nonprofits are taking a variety of approaches.
Community Emergency Assistance Program, a family-services organization that also provides food and financial assistance, for example, created a campaign to encourage people to be good neighbors. It’s asking supporters to create their own online fundraising pages tied to the appeal to raise money from friends, relatives, and others.
While online fundraising has been a major part of giving days, many have in-person events to rally support. This won’t be possible next week, but nonprofits “still have the captive audience that you normally get at a fundraising event,” Blumberg said. “We’re just all at our own locations.”
GiveMN is encouraging participating organizations to consider “going a little bit more old school,” he said. Many groups will be making phone calls and mailing letters as a component of their #GiveAtHomeMN campaigns.
The GiveMN platform has seen a surge in giving during the pandemic. But Blumberg has a word of caution as groups make pitches to donors.
“If organizations are leading with the story about how they change the world and then providing context of how the world is different right now, they’ll be able to sustain donor relationships,” he said. “If organizations are building a narrative that is totally crisis based, then giving will fall off,” he said. “You can’t sustain that over the long term.”
Growth in New Donors
Some groups were already addressing crises before Covid-19’s global spread, and urgent appeals are part of their GivingTuesdayNow plan. The World Food Program was providing assistance to an estimated 100 million people in 83 countries and helping the United Nations and other international organizations deal with the challenges of getting food to the needy.
“Covid-19 has really amplified what was already a global crisis,” said Kevin Reeds, vice president of development at World Food Program USA. Now, he said, “We’re really looking at sort of the twin threats of Covid-19 and hunger. The combining of those two has really set up some catastrophic conditions.”
The organization estimates need will more than double in the coming weeks and months. An estimated 30 million people rely on the World Food Program as their sole source of food, and an estimated 300,000 people a day will die of hunger as a result of Covid-19, Reeds said.
It’s becoming increasingly difficult for the organization to get people and supplies into and out of countries as they close off their borders. So the World Food Program is trying to get up to three months of food and supplies in places where the group anticipates greater need further down the road.
That requires additional funds, and #GivingTuesdayNow is part of the strategy.
When Reeds and his team of 14 other fundraisers began working from home nearly two months ago, they set a $5 million goal for the end of April. Three weeks in, they exceeded their goal and increased it to $8 million by the end of May.
Then two weeks ago, they created a day-by-day plan for communicating with donors every day starting this coming weekend through GivingTuesdayNow and next week. Fundraising and marketing staff have already started testing #GivingTuesdayNow messages on social media. They’re asking corporate and foundation donors to help amplify their appeals on social media during the week. And everybody who has given to the organization will start getting emails over the weekend.
World Food Program’s fundraisers are also finding it easier to check in with their wealthy supporters now that so many people are at home.
“Some of those donors who had been previously reluctant to have a lot of conversations with our major-gift fundraisers are quite anxious to talk to somebody right now because they’re stuck at home, too,” Reeds said. “They’re being very receptive to and appreciative that we’re reaching out and just having those conversations.”
The organization hasn’t set a financial goal for next week, but it hopes to bring in contributions from at least 500 new donors. The charity is already seeing a sharp increase in the number of gifts from new donors — about 10 percent more than in a normal year — and many of those donors are electing to give monthly. To encourage giving, the group is offering matching donations.
December’s Annual Event Still On
While many of the efforts underway will resemble what groups do at year end, Tuesday’s event lacks an incentive that has helped drive donations on Giving Tuesday: For the past two years, Facebook has offered to match the first $7 million in gifts to fundraising drives on the social-media site. The social-media giant has not announced a financial contribution for #GivingTuesdayNow.
Naomi Geilt, the company’s vice president of social good, will host a live fireside chat with Curran to rally viewers to give to local groups in whatever way they’re able on #GivingTuesdayNow and beyond.
Tuesday is not a replacement for GivingTuesday on December 1, 2020, said Curran.
“We don’t know what the world will look like, but I think that we do know that it won’t look great,” Curran said. “If anything, the sense of economic and social collapse, the sense of isolation, the sense of uncertainty will likely be even greater. Even if the pandemic is passed, which is questionable, there will be consequences for a really long time.”
She hopes the May 5 event provides a spotlight on the many ways people can give back to their communities at this time. “Sometimes people think of generosity as nice to have,” Curran said. “In this moment, it’s critical and urgent. By December, we think it will be more needed than ever.”
