Future Fundraising Now

Digital fundraising crash in December?

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by

Jeff Brooks
in

This might be disturbing. For the first time in a long time, December online fundraising was down, at least for many.

M+R Lab notes What the heck just happened? Riding the December digital fundraising rollercoaster: exciting, scary, a little nausea-inducing!:

December was not quite the celebratory, champagne-popping, record-breaking year-end digital experience that many nonprofits have grown used to over the past few years.

Was it down for you?

Some possible explanations:

  • The new tax law.
  • The stock market.
  • Political fatigue and/or noise.
  • The increased focus on Giving Tuesday.
  • Technical challenges, especially email deliverability.
  • A return to normal after a very strong 2017.

Or some terrible combination of these things. Or something we don’t even know about yet?

If you experienced a weak December, you are not alone. Stay tuned as the number-crunchers work on this!

    Comments

    4 responses to “Digital fundraising crash in December?”

    1. Gregory Warner Avatar
      Gregory Warner

      Jeff, I hope you don’t mind me posting a link here but, coincidentally, I wrote an article on this that was posted today titled: Why Your Year-End Fundraising Failed
      https://imarketsmart.com/why-your-year-end-fundraising-failed-to-generate-as-much-revenue-as-you-hoped/

    2. Gregory Warner Avatar
      Gregory Warner

      Jeff, I hope you don’t mind me posting a link here but, coincidentally, I wrote an article on this that was posted today titled: Why Your Year-End Fundraising Failed
      https://imarketsmart.com/why-your-year-end-fundraising-failed-to-generate-as-much-revenue-as-you-hoped/

    3. Ronald Pruitt Avatar
      Ronald Pruitt

      Jeff, you mentioned the new tax law. I think it is interesting the advice that is being given to tax filers as they do their taxes this year. If they do not go past the standard deduction they are told to “bunch” their deductions from multiple years into a single year so they can get a year where their itemized deductions rise past the standard amount. This “bunching” includes charitable donations. This is the advice that appears in the H&R Block tax prep software for example — “Make charitable donations every 2 to 3 years so you total deduction is higher.” Millions of people are seeing this advice. I wonder how it will impact giving.

    4. Ronald Pruitt Avatar
      Ronald Pruitt

      Jeff, you mentioned the new tax law. I think it is interesting the advice that is being given to tax filers as they do their taxes this year. If they do not go past the standard deduction they are told to “bunch” their deductions from multiple years into a single year so they can get a year where their itemized deductions rise past the standard amount. This “bunching” includes charitable donations. This is the advice that appears in the H&R Block tax prep software for example — “Make charitable donations every 2 to 3 years so you total deduction is higher.” Millions of people are seeing this advice. I wonder how it will impact giving.

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    The future of fundraising is not about social media, online video, or SEM. It’s not about any technology, medium, or technique. It’s about donors. If you need to raise funds from donors, you need to study them, respect them, and build everything you do around them. And the future? It’s already here. More.

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    Jeff BrooksJeff Brooks has been serving the nonprofit community for more than 35 years and blogging about it since 2005. He considers fundraising the most noble of pursuits and hopes you’ll join him in that opinion. You can reach him at jeff [at] jeff-brooks [dot] com. More.

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    The future of fundraising is not about social media, online video, or SEM. It’s not about any technology, medium, or technique. It’s about donors. If you need to raise funds from donors, you need to study them, respect them, and build everything you do around them. And the future? It’s already here. More.

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    About the blogger

    Jeff Brooks has been serving the nonprofit community for more than 30 years and blogging about it since 2005. He considers fundraising the most noble of pursuits and hopes you’ll join him in that opinion. You can reach him at jeff [at] jeff-brooks [dot] com.