BROWNE INNOVATION GROUP

Thursday, November 8, 2012

BIG’s Blog: The Election’s Over…

The election is over, but what is the takeaway for savvy fundraisers?

We learned, courtesy of Pew Research, that among the 13% of adult Americans who contributed to one of the presidential candidates in this year’s election:

67% donated in person, over the telephone, or by mail.
50% donated online or via email.
10% donated by sending a text message from their cell phone or using an app.

The percentage of online donations grew again this presidential election cycle and this was the first time that the Federal Election Commission allowed campaign contributions by text messaging.

What are the implications for charitable organizations seeking to make it easy for their supporters to donate?

Traditional mail and telephone still hold the lead, but if you add together online and text messaging donations and call them “digital,” they easily become the growth channel.

For charities, the question is this: How do your donation channel percentages compare to this last presidential cycle? If you’re like most groups I talk to, your online (or digital) might be a high of 10%. However, most fall into the 5% range.

The presidential election cycle provides a great comparison of what people are really choosing for contribution channels.

60% of the people who contributed to the presidential election choose a digital channel for one or more of their contributions. If your fundraising organization is at 10% or under in digital donations, then the question is: What are you missing in donations with such a low number?


-Mike

Welcome to BIG's Blog!  Please feel free to forward this post to your friends and coworkers...and email me a comment at: mike@big-db.com

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