Creating Compelling Year-End Appeals: 4 Best Practices
Year-end is an extremely important time for nonprofits due to the elevated generosity of the season. After all, 17-20% of the average nonprofit’s revenue is raised in December alone. That’s why a lot of nonprofits host dedicated year-end giving campaigns, complete with engaging fundraising events, online marketing blasts, and more.
To maximize the success of your fundraising, you must craft engaging, compelling appeals to your supporters for gifts. With so many nonprofits vying for their attention during this season, it’s only natural that you want your appeals to stand out to meet your year-end giving goals.
In this guide, we’ll discuss four best practices your nonprofit should adopt to craft compelling year-end appeals that will inspire your supporters to give. Let’s take a look at how you can make this year-end season your most successful yet!
1. Start as early as possible.
Although year-end giving campaigns are executed in the last few months of the year, that doesn’t mean you should start crafting your campaign strategy and fundraising appeals during that time. Here’s an example of a year-end planning calendar from OneCause:
- Summer and fall: Start planning your campaigns by mapping out timelines, nailing down event details, and preparing your marketing strategies.
- October: Build excitement for your year-end campaigns and get the ball rolling early by promoting your upcoming events and sending key information to your audiences.
- November: Focus your campaigns on GivingTuesday, Black Friday, and Cyber Monday to boost visibility for your efforts.
- December: Focus on the holidays and leverage them to inspire generosity. Tap into the altruistic message of this month to capture your audience’s interest.
- Spring: Steward relationships with supporters, new and old, by creating multiple touchpoints. Thank them for their year-end gifts and explain what they helped your nonprofit achieve.
Plan out what your year-end marketing and appeals will look like as early as possible. Use the data collected from previous year-end campaigns to help you determine what themes and messages are most effective for your audience. For example, if your nonprofit serves the local Indian community, you might highlight Diwali in your early year-end appeals and host a community event to help them celebrate.
2. Personalize appeals.
If you’re notorious among your friends for disliking animals and loving plants, would they have more success asking you to take care of their pet dog or potted monstera during their week-long vacation?
To secure the donations your nonprofit needs to power its mission, your appeals must reach the right people, at the right time, with the right messaging. If they don’t, your supporters won’t feel compelled to take action and may even disengage from your organization entirely.
The best way to ensure that your messages resonate is by customizing your appeals to each audience group. Separate your audience into different groups, also known as segments. Here are a few examples of common nonprofit segments:
- One-time donors
- Recurring donors
- Mid-level donors
- Major donors
- Legacy or planned donors
- Volunteers
- Staff members
Identify the key characteristics, interests, motivations, and past giving behavior of these groups with the data stored in your nonprofit constituent relationship management (CRM) system. Use this information as the foundation for personalizing your appeals.
Let’s take volunteers, for example. As they regularly donate their time and efforts to support your organization, it’s clear that they’re loyal to your cause and want to help your mission as best they can. In your appeals, thank your volunteers for the support they’ve already given to your nonprofit. Then, frame your ask as an additional way they can make a difference for your organization and highlight where your year-end funds are going. Make sure to be specific! Finally, direct them to your donation page so they can make their gift.
3. Secure emotional buy-in with storytelling.
Adding storytelling elements to your nonprofit’s year-end appeals enables you to secure emotional buy-in, boost interest, and ultimately increase donations. Not convinced? Let’s look at this example of two approaches to discussing an animal shelter’s impact:
- Recently, we nursed a sick cat back to health and gave him basic behavioral training. Now, he can go to a family that needs a pet.
- When Chester first came to us, he was malnourished and untrusting of humans. Over our time together, we’ve helped him gain three pounds to reach a healthy weight. With lots of socialization and behavioral training, he’s regained his confidence. Now, Chester’s ready to find a loving family to be his forever home!
Ultimately, both approaches provide the same information. However, the latter takes a narrative-driven angle that keeps the reader engaged and helps them connect emotionally with the impact the nonprofit has made. That’s the power of storytelling—and you can leverage it for your year-end appeals!
According to UpMetrics, these are the key elements of nonprofit storytelling:
- Character: the who or what the narrative is centered around, usually a person, animal, or place
- Setting: where your story takes place
- Plot: the sequence of events that takes place
- Conflict: the obstacle(s) your character faces in the story
- Resolution: the final outcome of the narrative
Think back on your year, including the projects you’ve funded, the campaigns you’ve pushed forward, the events you’ve hosted, and the beneficiaries you’ve helped. In all these moments, select a few of the most compelling ones to feature in your year-end appeals. Communicate them using the storytelling elements above to demonstrate your impact to donors and highlight how giving to your organization is a worthwhile investment.
4. Create a sense of urgency.
Leverage the time-sensitive nature of your year-end fundraising goals to create a sense of urgency within your appeals. This is a highly effective tactic, as it encourages your donors to act quickly or even at that moment. When your supporters put off or delay making their gifts, you risk them forgetting to make it entirely. Having an urgent year-end appeal helps you secure their gifts, effectively boosting your fundraising revenue.
Here are a few ways you can create a sense of urgency within your year-end appeals:
- Time-sensitive language: Use time-sensitive language to emphasize the urgency of your appeal. Highlight how much time supporters have to donate and use vocabulary associated with immediacy, such as “now” or “today.” For example, you might say: “Donate now to help us meet our fundraising goals!”
- Countdown imagery: Include countdown imagery in your messaging and on your website. For example, have a countdown clock next to a fundraising thermometer that displays how close you are to your goals. Supporters who see this visual will feel compelled to donate to fill up your thermometer.
- Strong, clear calls to action: Make it clear what action you want your donors to take through clear, succinct calls to action. Additionally, if supporters need to navigate to your donation page or campaign page to make a gift, include those links in your messages for a streamlined process.
- Remind supporters about tax deductions: For donors who itemize their taxes and look to minimize their tax burden, a reminder about the deadline to donate to claim the deduction on that year’s taxes can spur extra gifts.
Send your messages through multiple channels to maximize the number of donors who see your urgent appeals and increase conversions. Your website, email newsletters, and social media posts are great places to start, as they allow you to connect with loyal supporters and potential new ones.
Year-end is not just a time for fundraising—it’s also a prime opportunity for you to strengthen new and existing donor relationships. With the right year-end appeals, you’ll boost donations for your mission and help your audience connect more deeply with your cause, resulting in more support in the future!
