Megan Ingram
August 23, 2021
Non-profits and businesses whose revenue is dependent on charitable donations have been impacted during the pandemic. Many have felt that that the government has treated them “shabbily” since the start of COVID-19. The normal ways of doing business and marketing were no longer going to work. While there is a perceived notion that charitable revenue has declined significantly; giving in the US has been better than people realize. Here are a few digital research facts we’ve found from Global Web Index and some other sources:
• Volunteers’ hesitancy, inability to plan events ahead, and lower demand for places were likely to hit charities’ finances Guardian forecasted.
• The Giving USA annual report found that 2020 giving revenue increased 3.8% over 2019.
• Across most world regions, the proportion of people donating to charity regularly (i.e. at least once a month) has decreased just slightly since the pandemic first hit.
• We’ve seen the biggest increase in regular donations from 36% in Q4 2019 to 41% in Q1 2021 in the US (vs. other international countries).
• Past research in the U.S. also found that philanthropy tends to bounce back higher after times of recession.
With all this said, non profit senior leadership has had a terribly tough task navigating this new remote environment. But the latest results suggest that they’ve been able to to find new virtual ways to combat this significant challenge and come out of the pandemic more positively than is being perceived or thought. We dive into the latest digital research trends for charitable donations we’ve found that have helped turn the storm.
What are the latest digital research trends for charitable donations that have helped turn the storm?
Like any good strategy, make sure you are defining donors correctly. This is even more critical with a digital strategy. There are a few misconceptions about this audience that many non profits got right to help them find the right people in a virtual environment.
• Younger aged donations are higher than you’d think: 42% of Gen Z and 50% of millennials donate to charity at least once a month compared to 34% of boomers (even though they fall into a lower income bracket). We’ll expand on this point more below but the bottom line is that younger aged audiences should be factored into non-profit content planning.
• Donors care about the community and helping people: The most important things to “donors” according to GWI are contributing to their community (42%), helping others before themselves (41%), and standing out in a crowd (29%). These motivations played a role in keeping donations even or above the prior year donation numbers. Despite the pandemic, people largely still felt a motivation to donate.
• Income isn’t as highly correlated to donations as expected: While you may think that high income is associated with charitable giving, it’s not as highly correlated as you’d expect. Both high income and low income people are classified as “donors” with 35% defined as “high income” and 32% defined as “low income”. Additionally, those who donate regularly to charity are 16% more likely than less-regular donors to say their personal finances will get better in the next 6 months.
It’s been a tough year for generating revenue from events, which can be a huge revenue driver for these cause-related organizations. Historically, many non profit-related events can generate over $1M+ in donated revenue. Non-profits (and other organizations) have been forced to think “outside the box” to generate fundraising for charities and cause-driven events, and shifted their digital strategies in this new remote pandemic world. These digital research trends in charitable donation behavior we predict will have the most impact:
Digital will be a top driver of donations now (and in the future): Non profits turned to digital channels which has proven very effective, and is a strategy that should continue. GWI data found 21% of regular donors say they use social media to support/connect with good causes – and they’re 56% more likely than less-regular donors to say this. Social media is also important for brand discovery across age groups – 23% of Gen Z regular donors discover brands via ads on social media, only dropping to 19% for Gen-X.
Mobile payment continuing to trend up: We’ve seen digital payments become a top general social media trend over the last year as many businesses have gone “contactless”. 24% of global baby boomer regular donors have used a mobile payment service like Apple Pay in the last month, rising to 27% of Gen Z donors. Many donors are using these methods to make donations and non-profits should be building eCommerce solutions to take advantage of this growing social media trend.
Demand for brands to donate: There has been a cry from donors (especially young donors) for brands to get more involved socially. One way brands can show “receipts” of their social actions is through donations, and its clear active donors want to see more of it. 31% of regular donors want brands to support charities – they’re 20% more likely to say this than those who donate less often.
August 23, 2021
