Is Your Donor Retention Rate Above or Below 70%?
Donor Retention Rates Need Your Attention
Only 2.5% of charities have a donor retention rate of 70 percent based on the Association of Fundraising Professionals study. Did you get that? Two and a half percent! That means more than a quarter of your donors won’t be back.
Why should you care about this? Because it’s a trend that is heading in a direction that is not likely to turn around in our industry. Here’s the good news, though. YOU can change this trend in your own organization. It’s a simple tweak of your mindset. Consider your donors as a valuable keepsake that you want to have forever.
If you can change your mindset and adopt donor retention practices, you will add thousands of dollars to your bottomline. (Click to tweet)
First, you need to understand where you get new donors. For me, this is the number one question: Is your marketing tight? Do you have a steady stream of communications that you share, either in newsletters, e-news or emails, social media? Do you promote your events, host open houses, have donor opportunities to interact with your organization?
Remember, this is not a one-way conversation. We need to constantly invite interaction with each of these channels…and in person.
The next question is where did your donor come from? Was it in response to your marketing efforts, were they invited or referred by a friend, did they bounce over from another organization that ran them off? This is not only interesting data, but seriously insightful. It brings you tons of information about how to interact with them going forward.
The long-term success of your organization depends on how you manage the relationship once the donor enters your door. (Click to tweet)
Unfortunately, all too often we focus all of our energy (time and money) into obtaining new donors and ignore the fact that more than half of them give once, then leave. When planning your annual fundraising strategy, be sure you’ve got categories that address “retention”. Let’s keep your keepsake box filled with retained, valuable donors.
