Are you looking to win donors on the strength of your charity’s impact? Then you need to account for big differences in how different generations define the term, according to a new survey from the Better Business Bureau’s Wise Giving Alliance.
The definition is important because due to pressures from institutional donors, charities are increasingly soliciting contributions based on their ability “to make a difference” in a quantifiable way, according to the report released Wednesday. But the fluid nature of “impact” and the wide variety of metrics a charity can use make it a challenging goal.
Among members of Generation Z, a 40 percent plurality defined “charity impact” as “organizations reaching defined goals.” Among their older, millennial peers, the most common definition was “how efficient the organization was in its spending,” with 27 percent responding so. Among Generation X, 23 percent defined it as reaching defined goals. And among “matures” (people born before 1945) and baby boomers, “quality of programs” was the most popular definition, selected by 26 percent and 24 percent, respectively.
Elvia Castro, manager of regional charity reporting for the Wise Giving Alliance, said a mature might think charities have impact “if they create a good service’ A millennial might think they’re impactful if you’re getting more for your money. There’s a very noteworthy change in perceptions there.”
Forty-seven percent of those polled said they either did not know or were unclear on what the phrase “charity impact” means.
In other results, 32 percent said long-term results were highly important when rating a charity’s impact, while 21 percent said immediate results were highly important.
This pattern held across generations, but older donors were much more likely to prioritize long-term results over immediate. Approximately 28 percent of matures said they attribute high importance to long-term results, while only 12 percent attributed high importance to immediate results. But while all generations ranked long-term results as more important than immediate results, younger people placed relatively more importance on immediate results than other generations.
Roughly a quarter of Generation Z, millennial and Generation X respondents said immediate results were highly important.
Asked to consider program quantity — such as the number of homeless people who are fed — versus quality, 38 percent said quality is highly important, compared with 32 percent for quantity. This pattern of priority also held across generations, although older donors were much more likely to prioritize quality over quantity. Thirty-eight percent of donors born before 1945 said program quality was highly important. Only 15 percent of those older donors said program volume was highly important.
Over all, however, trust in specific nonprofits was the most popular “very important” priority among donors, with perceived charity impact the second most popular signal.
Castro said the goal of the report was to investigate how donors understood “charity impact,” a term she said has gained momentum in the world of fundraising over the past several years because of pressure for institutional donors to demonstrate the effectiveness of their charitable grants.
“For some donor types, particularly organizations, foundations and some businesses, it is very important to align their social investment strategies with the way they are spending their money and to even justify their spending in a very kind of measurable way,” said Castro. “I think that has trickled down into an assumption that donors are actively seeking to support highly impactful organizations”
Giving to Individuals vs. Nonprofits
More people, 27 percent, think giving to an individual directly is highly helpful compared with giving to a charity, but only slightly. Twenty-four percent of respondents said giving to a charity was highly helpful, while 22 percent said giving to a house of worship was highly helpful. This preference for direct individual giving over charitable giving was consistent across all generations except for those born before 1945, of whom 19 percent rated giving to churches as a highly helpful way to make a difference.
The survey tested a common phrase many charities use when trying to persuade donors to give; a promise that their donation will produce a “bang for your buck.” Nearly 18 percent of donors rated that language as untrustworthy, and only 16 percent said it was very trustworthy. Older generations were more suspicious of that type of solicitation, with 27 percent of matures and 22 percent of boomers rating it untrustworthy.
The group that distrusted “bang for your buck” solicitations the most were those who had not donated to charities the year before, with 37 percent rating such pitches as untrustworthy.
“For some people, it is actually a trustworthy, useful statement,” said Castro. “But what we wanted to point out with this finding is that if you are a charity, you should keep in mind that for some people it isn’t.”
Such a pitch, Castro said, might work with a millennial more likely to be concerned with spending efficiency, but it may be less effective with an older donor more concerned about program quality.
