Nearly four years since its inception, Giving Tuesday continues to gain traction as the “opening day” of the all-important year-end giving season. The event is still a “learning experiment,” organizers say, even though it raised about $46 million for nonprofits last year, up from $28 million the year before. The number of participating nonprofits grew 55 percent.
The global day of philanthropy, which follows Black Friday and Cyber Monday on the first Tuesday after Thanksgiving, falls this year on December 1. Organizers anticipate continued growth on all fronts, with more collaboration across regions and causes, more corporate partnerships, more participants, and lots of creative campaigns.
“For most organizations, a good Giving Tuesday campaign will lead into a more robust season of giving,” says Asha Curran, director of the Center for Innovation & Social Impact at the 92nd Street Y, which helped launch the first Giving Tuesday with the United Nations Foundation in 2012.
Rather than thinking of the day as a stand-alone event, she and others say, organizations should think about how Giving Tuesday works with their year-end campaigns and incorporate the day into their fourth-quarter fundraising and marketing strategies.
“I don’t think there’s any kind of organization that doesn’t stand to benefit,” Ms. Curran says. “The more people join, the stronger the conversation gets.”
While money raised is important, charities should also seize the opportunity to get their cause in front of a bigger audience, say experts.
“Giving days are really a moment to bring attention to something that charities are doing anyway,” says Eileen Heisman, president of the National Philanthropic Trust, a nonprofit that manages donor-advised funds and a founding partner of Giving Tuesday. “You’re taking something that you’re doing and trying to put a spotlight on it.”
Here’s a look at what’s ahead and some advice for making the most of Giving Tuesday:
Set goals.
Before joining in, Ms. Curran says organizations should decide what a successful Giving Tuesday means for them. For some nonprofits, that may mean raising a specific amount of money, attracting a certain number of new donors, or securing matching gifts. Others might set a goal related to participation in their cause, like how many volunteers or board members engaged with the campaign, she says.
Still others may measure success by media reach — the number of social-media shares, favorites, or the open and click-through rates of an online appeal.
“Decide what success looks like in general, and then home in on specific goals and targets,” says Ms. Curran. “We encourage people to be ambitious.”
Craft a strong message.
Last year, the all-volunteer group Badass Brooklyn Animal Rescue had recently received nonprofit status and was looking for ways to generate steady revenue. In late October 2014, the new charity launched a program to get donors to give monthly gifts. The group used Giving Tuesday to push that effort and to kick off its holiday campaign.
“When you’re dealing with limited resources, it’s very important to take a moment in your planning to identify what your strengths are to shape the most effective campaign,” says Candace Brown, the nonprofit’s managing director.
For the rescue group, that meant a few things: a strong social-media presence, a group of committed volunteers, and cute dogs. The charity’s clear message, bolstered with attitude — “Saving badass dogs from idiot humans” — certainly didn’t hurt.
Starting in September, Ms. Brown says, volunteers began planning a visual and social campaign, bringing together 11 dogs rescued from a Georgia shelter with a high rate of euthanizing its animals. They created a Facebook event for the day and kicked off their campaign with a video. Each of 11 dogs was introduced on social media with a call to action “Give a Little. Save a Life.”
Throughout Giving Tuesday, nonprofits volunteers posted on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, showing the rescue of the dogs, offering a clear picture of a gift’s impact with the message “donations saved my life.” The group asked supporters to donate, spread the word, and set up a recurring gift.
The effort broadened Badass Brooklyn Animal Rescue’s donor pool and increased its exposure. The group raised $6,190 from 92 donors, nearly tripled enrollment in its monthly giving program, and raised more than half of its holiday campaign goal on Giving Tuesday alone.
This year, with two volunteers devoted to fundraising, the group plans to reach out to more supporters in advance, Ms. Brown says, asking them to use their social and business connections to get more people to give.
Go ‘all in.’
Thanksgiving is a crucial fundraising time for anti-hunger groups. For the Alameda County Community Food Bank, about 60 percent of annual donations come in from November to early January.
“We have to take full advantage of that time,” says Michael Altfest, the food bank’s communications manager.
Last year, the nonprofit decided to go “all in” on Giving Tuesday, he says. The charity pushed back the date of its usual pre-Thanksgiving email appeal to remind donors that Giving Tuesday was the next week. The food bank’s staff secured a corporate matching donation, announced the day before Giving Tuesday, and followed up with an email on the day itself.
Online, the day involved “a complete takeover of our online presence,” Mr. Altfest says, with a Giving Tuesday pop-up window on the website; the staff maintained a much heavier social-media presence than on a typical day. Posts featured client stories, reminders to donate, and #UNselfies, photos of donors that Giving Tuesday encouraged them to post, along with the hashtag, when they made a gift.
The group raised more than $85,000 online from 300 donors — more than any other charity running its campaign on the online gift-processing platform Network for Good. Additional funds were brought in offline. “In terms of a single day, it was on par with New Year’s Eve for us,” says Mr. Altfest. The food bank is planning to continue its successful strategy again this year.
Keep the campaign flexible.
Unlike other giving days, which may be run through community foundations for a set amount of time, Giving Tuesday is less restrictive.
Some organizations that Lindsey Talerico-Hedren, a consultant with the direct-marketing firm Russ Reid, has worked with have successfully run Giving Tuesday campaigns over a five-day period.
Black Friday might be a good day to start, she says: “Launch the effort when it makes most sense.” But, she cautions, avoid complicating Thanksgiving messages with a request for donations.
Seek collaboration.
Organizations that focus on similar issues are finding new ways to collaborate on Giving Tuesday. Twelve zoos, for example, will promote the event under the banner of Giving ZooDay.
In addition, more cities, states, and counties are coming together to rally around the idea of giving to local organizations. Ms. Curran sees these events becoming “the 21st-century version of the county fair.”
In Oregon, for example, more than 400 nonprofits have joined the #OregoniansGive campaign, which is being supported by a growing group of foundation and corporate donors that call the state home. They hope to raise $3.9 million on Giving Tuesday, or an average of $1 from every Oregonian.
In other states, cities including Charlotte, N.C., Lansing, Mich., and Somerville, Mass., are all planning local Giving Tuesday campaigns.
In Allentown, Penn., seven arts and cultural organizations came together ahead of Giving Tuesday last year to plan a collaborative campaign. The groups aimed to underscore the importance of the arts to the community and raise awareness about the fundraising challenges such groups face. The idea was that “we’ll come a little bit further in collaboration than we would if we were doing this ourselves,” says Sean King, director of marketing with Youth Education in the Arts, one of the seven participating nonprofits.
The group, which also included the Allentown Symphony Association and the Civic Theatre of Allentown, created the website iheARTallentown.org. Donors had the option to give directly to specific organizations or to divide their gift equally among seven groups. Supporters could also give $10 via text message. Local restaurants created a special Giving Tuesday-tini cocktail, with a portion of the profits supporting the campaign.
The goal was more about promoting a message than raising a certain amount of money, though the campaign did bring in around $10,000. The group is planning to emphasize the advocacy component of the campaign again this year.
Says Mr. King: “This is a public-relations campaign that paid us.”
